Access Providers

Who Should Solve the Digital Divide?

Adjit Walia, a Global Technology Strategist at Deutsche Bank, suggested in a recent paper that it's in the best interest of U.S. tech companies to tackle the digital divide. He says that those companies rely on a computer-literate public and workforce and that they ought to take a small sliver of their earnings and invest in students today before they fall on the wrong side of the digital divide. more

Support Plug-and-Play with On-Boot Firmware Updates

Have you ever purchased a new electronic device, taken it home, excitedly unwrapped it and switched it on, only to discover that something is wrong and you need to phone customer support? This scenario is all-too-common in the broadband services industry, and unfortunately, it's usually the service provider who takes the blame. New customers will often purchase gateways from third parties or redistributors without knowing that the device's firmware is out of date. more

H.R. 2666 Bill Proposes Deregulating U.S. Broadband Rates, Obama Threatens to Veto

President Obama has threatened to veto a backdoor attempt by a Republican-backed bill that would undermine net neutrality protection measures. The "No Rate Regulation of Broadband Internet Access Act", or H.R. 2666, proposes to prohibit the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) from regulating the rates charged for broadband Internet access service. more

5 Reasons Why You Should Adopt NFV for Your CPEs

Communication service providers around the world are about to embark on an epic journey. A journey which has the potential to be a major game changer for hardware and software vendors alike. The simple concept of decoupling software from hardware, referred to as network functions virtualization (NFV), promises to improve an operator's ability to differentiate themselves from the competition by moving network functions from dedicated appliances to generic commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) servers. more

The Birth of the Digital Divide

A lot of the money being spent on broadband infrastructure today is trying to solve the digital divide, which I define as a technology gap where good broadband is available in some places but not everywhere. The technology divide can be as large as an entire county that doesn't have broadband or as small as a pocket of homes or apartment buildings in cities that got bypassed. more

Google Fiber Ramps Up Testing of Its 20 Gigabit Internet Service

Google Fiber is pushing the boundaries of internet speed with the testing of its 20 Gigabit product. After successful trials in domestic settings, the tech giant is now taking its ultra-fast service to educational and professional organizations to further test its capabilities. more

Report on Governments Involved in Edited DNS Responses

Earl Zmijewski reporting in Renesys Blog: "There's been sudden interest recently in a Chinese route hijacking incident that occurred way back in April, brought about by a new report to the US Congress that highlighted the event. A second Chinese event, also in the report, has received almost no attention despite being much more interesting (technically, anyway). A Chinese DNS censorship incident occurred just one month earlier, in March..." more

Google.org Awards Grant to Internet Society to Advance Internet Exchange Points in Emerging Markets

The Internet Society today announced that it has been awarded a grant by Google.org to extend its Internet exchange point (IXP) activities in emerging markets. The grant will build on the Internet Society's previous efforts and will establish a methodology to assess IXPs, provide training for people to operate the IXPs, and build a more robust local Internet infrastructure in emerging markets. more

Iraq Shuts Down Internet Once Again to Combat Cheating

Earlier this morning, the national fiber backbone of Iraq was taken offline in an effort to combat cheating on 6th grade placement exams. more

Pursuit of Sikh Separatist Prompts Widespread Internet Shutdown in Punjab, India

Indian authorities have instituted a mobile internet and text messaging blackout in the state of Punjab, which has a population of around 27 million, in an effort to capture a Sikh separatist. The ban began midday Saturday and was extended for another 24 hours on Sunday. more

Japan Earthquake Only Minor Impact on Region’s Internet Infrastructure

James Cowie from Renesys reports: "8.9 magnitude earthquake in Japan has had surprisingly limited impacts on the structure and routing dynamics of the regional Internet. Of roughly 6,000 Japanese network prefixes in the global routing table, only about 100 were temporarily withdrawn from service -- and that number has actually decreased in the hours since the event. Other carriers around the region have reported congestion and drops in traffic due to follow-on effects of the quake, but most websites are up and operational, and the Internet is available to support critical communications." more

New Australian Law Could Turn ISPs Into Online Sheriffs

According to reports today, the Australian federal government made a drastic change to a bill that could potentially allow ISPs to police online traffic. Karen Dearne of the Australian IT reports: "Electronic Frontiers Australia spokesman Geordie Guy said it was unclear if the draft Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Amendment Bill was an "attempt to sneak through" a wholesale expansion of intercepts of private emails and file-sharing or merely a badly drafted bill." more

Google Fiber to Push Speed Limits Again

Dinni Jain, the CEO of Google Fiber, posted a blog last week that talks about dramatically increasing the top speeds available on fiber. He says the specific announcement will come in the coming months to dramatically expand Google Fiber's gigabit offerings. The blog gives a hint at what might be coming. Included in the blog is a speed test from the home of a Google Fiber employee in Kansas City who is receiving 20.2 Gbps. more

Reframing the Infrastructure Debate

Fast and reliable infrastructure of any kind is good for business. That it's debatable for the Internet shows we still don't understand what the Internet i -- or how, compared to what it costs to build and maintain other forms of infrastructure, it's damned cheap, with economic and social leverage in the extreme. Here's a thought exercise... Imagine no Internet: no data on phones, no ethernet or wi-fi connections at home - or anywhere. No email, no Google, no Facebook, no Amazon, no Skype. That's what we would have if designing the Internet had been left up to phone and cable companies... more

Broadband and the Census: Why Decision to Go Online Is Probably Ten Years Premature

The US government is gearing up to begin the 2020 census which will be administered starting next April 20. For the first time, the census is going to rely heavily on people answering the census questions online. Live census takers will then follow-up with those that don't submit the online response. This seems like an odd decision since there are still many people who don't have home broadband. more