Access Providers

Obama Urges FCC to Treat the Internet As a Utility

President Obama released a letter today stating that Internet services -- including both wired and wireless Internet -- should fall under Title II of the Telecommunications Act. Reclassifying broadband this way would prevent providers such as Comcast from charging fees to companies like Netflix in exchange for faster delivery speeds.

Russian Internet Traffic Redirected Due to Routing Errors by China

Doug Madory, Director of Internet Analysis at Dyn, is reporting that the Russian Internet traffic (including domestic traffic) was re-routed out of the country due to routing errors by China Telecom.

Map Illustrates Global Internet Population and Penetration

A map released by Information Geographies at the Oxford Internet Institute illustrates the total number of Internet users in a country as well as the percentage of the population that has Internet access. "The distortion in the map paints a revealing picture about human activity on the Internet. China is now home to the world’s largest Internet population at over half a billion. The United States, India, and Japan then follow as the next most populous nations of Internet users."

Escalating Violence in Iraq Leads to Internet Shutdown

The escalating violence in Iraq has resulted in government shutting the the local Internet access according to a report by Renesys today. From the report: "Renesys has observed two large Internet outages this week that our sources confirmed to be government-directed outages. These interruptions appear to coincide with military operations, amid concerns that ISIL forces are using Internet websites to coordinate their attacks."

Apple Rumored Building Its Own CDN, Negotiating Paid Interconnect Deals With ISPs

Apple has reportedly formed a new internal group to work on building out their own content delivery network (CDN) to deliver Apple software updates, apps and other Apple related content.

3 Billion Internet Users by End of 2014, Two-Thirds from Developing World

Releasing new statistics today, the United Nations International Telecommunications Union (ITU) announced that by end of 2014, there will be nearly three billion Internet users -- two-thirds of them from the developing world -- with mobile-broadband penetration approaching 32 per cent. Moreover, people from developing countries make up for more than 90 per cent of those who are not yet using the Internet.

Mozilla Offers Proposal for Solving Net Neutrality Problem

Mozilla says that the FCC shouldn't look at an Internet line only as a relationship between an Internet provider and a subscriber. Regulators should formally recognize that there's a third party involved: Content providers such as websites, apps, gaming and more, Mozilla says.

Vint Cerf: Ask Your ISPs What Their Plan Is for IPv6

Vint Cerf joined TWiT TV host Leo Laporte yesterday in Google+ Hangout urging that we need to stop running the experimental version of the Internet and move to the production version of the Internet running IPv6! He also made a great request to everyone watching to ask their Internet Service Providers (ISPs) about when the ISPs would have IPv6 available.

Faceobook on Connecting the World from the Sky

Facebook has announced more details on how its Connectivity Lab is working to connect the world from the sky with drones, satellites and lasers.

Internet Society Calls for Restoration of Full Internet Access in Turkey

Internet Society President and CEO, Kathy Brown, issued the following statement in light of recent Internet disruptions in Turkey.

Comcast to Buy Time Warner Cable, Making It Largest Cable Provider in U.S.

Comcast has reached an agreement to acquire Time Warner Cable, according to a tweet from CNBC reporter, Dave Faber. The new company, based on the $44 billion purchase, will be by far the largest cable provider in the U.S. with over 33 million subscribers, and is assumed to face tough review from the Federal Communications Commission.

Network Outages Costing Mobile Operators $15B Annually

Sarah Reedy reporting in LightRading: Mobile operators suffer from an average of five network outages or degradations that impact subscribers each year, costing them around $15 billion annually, according to new Heavy Reading research. Put another way, that's about one outage every other month. More than 80 percent of those outages affect just one or a subset of networks or services.

IETF Reaches Broad Consensus to Upgrade Internet Security Protocols Amid Pervasive Surveillance

Internet security has been a primary focus this week for more than 1100 engineers and technologists from around the world gathered at the 88th meeting of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Participants are rethinking approaches to security across a wide range of technical areas.

Google DNS to Be Discontinued in Brazil Ahead of New Law

Doug Madory from Renesys reports: "In response to recent NSA spying allegations, Brazil is pressing ahead with a new law to require Internet companies like Google to store data about Brazilian users inside Brazil, where it will be subject to local privacy laws. The proposed legislation could be signed into law as early as the end of this week. However, Google's DNS service started leaving the country on September 12th, the day President Rousseff announced her intention to require local storage of user data."

Google, US and UK Government Organizations Announce “Alliance for Affordable Internet”

Stephen Shankland reporting in CNET: "In a new effort to bring Internet access to the world's billions, Google, US and UK government organizations, and a raft of high-tech partners on Monday announced the Alliance for Affordable Internet..."