Is Call Forwarding an “Information Service” and Why It Matters for FTC Jurisdiction

Time to brush the dust off your Computer II notebooks. Are voicemail, electronic fax, and call forwarding enhanced services or telecom services? Today's case: FTC v. American eVoice, Ltd... The FTC brought an action against Defendants claiming that they were engaged in cramming, adding unwanted voicemail, electronic fax, and call forwarding services to consumers bills to the tune of $70 million. more

NTAG Chair Blog: A Better Auction Framework

New gTLD Applicants now have a more fair and reasonable ICANN auction framework. A collaborative negotiation between the New TLD Applicant Group (NTAG) Auctions Working Group and ICANN Staff resulted in changes that improve the auction rules and bidder agreement. The indemnification and waivers in the agreement are now aligned with breaches that applicants can control. Applicants also now have an indemnification from Power Auction for third party claims related to IP infringement. more

NCUC Workshop: One World, One Internet? New gTLDs & Competition in a Changing Global Environment

The Noncommercial Users Constituency (NCUC) has organized and is holding a policy workshop, One World, One Internet? New gTLDs & Competition in a Changing Global Environment, next week in Beijing at ICANN-46. The program, which brings together top Western and Chinese experts, will explore pressures for integration versus fragmentation of the Internet and implications for ICANN, as well as different competition and regulation perspectives as they relate to new gTLDs. more

Google Improving Location-Sensitive DNS Responses for Its 400B Responses-Per-Day Public DNS Service

Google announced today that its Public DNS team, in collaboration with Akamai, has reached a significant milestone improving the speed of accessing location-based Akamai hosted content. more

The Problem Of 5G Hype

I'm writing this as the 5G hype cycle reaches a new crescendo. What is most striking is how few of those touting 5G (or "private 5G") is how little technical detail there is beyond saying it is the next generation of cellular protocols. Yes, one can look at volumes of specifications with myriad options and flavors but no sense of 5G as such. That alone should make one suspicious - why does one have to eschew wires to get 5G? more

Telstra’s OneWeb Deal Caught Up in the Russian War

Telstra might regret having signed a commercial deal with London-based OneWeb as this company has now become a pawn in the war between Russia and Ukraine. Telstra agreed to host two OneWeb gateway Earth stations in Australia, one in the west and one in the north, which would also cover the APAC region, with a third Earth station currently under discussion for the east coast. more

U.S. Has Poor Cellular Video

Opensignal recently published a report that looks around the world at the quality of cellular video. Video has become a key part of the cellular experience as people are using cellphones for entertainment, and since social media and advertising have migrated to video. The use of cellular video is exploding. Netflix reports that 25% of its total streaming worldwide is sent to mobile devices. The new Disney+ app that was just launched got over 3 million downloads of their cellular app in just the first 24 hours. more

Spectrum and Weather Forecasting

There is currently a brewing controversy over the allocation of various radio frequencies for 5G that could have a negative impact on weather forecasting. Weather forecasting has become extremely sophisticated and relies on masses of data gathered from weather satellites and other data-gathering devices. The masses of data, along with modern supercomputers and data center computing, have significantly improved the ability to predict future weather. more

Is Nokia’s New Framework Announcement Bringing Us Closer to Truly Smart Cities?

Nokia has developed a framework that will enable governments to implement smart cities. The framework is designed to aid regions to design and obtain services for smart city concepts. However, Nokia states that more emphasis needs to be put on developing an overarching strategy rather than small projects. The Australian government announced that they are interested in building smart cities, but there are still major gaps in figuring out how to do so. more

Cybersecurity Continues to Be the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s Top Priority for 2019

For the fourth year, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Office continues to include cybersecurity as one of the top enforcement priorities for 2019. more

A 1998 IANA Technical Seminar I Will Never Forget

In 1998, I was a lawyer working at Jones Day in Los Angeles, specializing in patent lawsuits. Specifically, I was a member of Jones Day's Technology Issues Practice, which sought to assist companies becoming involved in computer and communications technologies, including the Internet. Meanwhile, in early May the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) was preparing to transition its home base from the University of Southern California's Information Sciences Institute (ISI) to a new, independent and not-for-profit organization. more

Google Wins .APP New gTLD Auction for $25 Million

Michael Berkens reporting in TheDomains.com: "The new gTLD .APP sold for $25 Million to Google today in a ICANN Last Resort Auction which I think is very good news for the new gTLD program in general. This is the highest price paid in an ICANN Last Resort Auction. It looks like Google was willing to pay over $30 Million based on the info published by ICANN..." more

Leveraging DNS for Subscriber Loyalty

There has been a lot of talk about how the DNS can provide network-based security, and how DNS is in the best position to detect malware traffic before it does any harm. But what does this mean for end users? How does it make their online lives easier and more secure? DNS servers that are aware of sites that host malware, perform phishing activities (harvesting bank details, for instance) and other nefarious misbehaviors, can prevent end users from ever going to those sites. more

Three Layers of China’s International Strategy on Cyberspace

China's newly released International Strategy on Cyberspace is marked by three distinctive layers with different degree of priority: (1) sovereignty (or cybersecurity, or UN Charter), (2) globalization (or digital economy, or WTO rules), and (3) fundamental freedoms (or human rights, or UDHR). The good point of the strategy is that it tries to make the three layers peacefully co-exist in one document. The failure, however, lies in the intentional ranking of relevance/importance of the three layers... more

Repeat DDoS Attacks the Norm in Q4 2015, 24 Attacks per Target on Average

During Q4, repeat DDoS attacks were the norm, with an average of 24 attacks per targeted customer in Q4, reports Akamai in its newly released Q4 2015 State of the Internet - Security Report. more