Google Adds U.S. Cellular as Partner for Project Fi

Google today announced the addition of U.S Cellular, a leading mobile networks in the U.S., as its newest partner network for its Project Fi program. more

US Congress Website Recovers from a Crippling 3-Day DNS Attack

A number of websites owned and operated by the United States Congress are recovering from a three-day DNS attack. more

13th Registration Operations Workshop: Join Us Online on June 4th, 2024

As a member of the ROW Planning Committee, I am writing this post on behalf of the Committee and welcome all community members to join us on June 4th. We are celebrating ROW's 10th anniversary! A decade of collaboration and inspiration! Thank you to the incredible community that has fueled this journey! more

An Inquiry Into an Organization’s Security Priorities

In the wake of recent high-profile security incidents, I started wondering: what, generally speaking, should an organization's security priorities be? That is, given a finite budget - and everyone's budget is finite - what should you do first? More precisely, what security practices or features will give you the most protection per zorkmid? I suggested two of my own, and then asked my infosec-heavy Twitter feed for suggestions. more

Expression of Interest for New TLDs: Time to Shine!

Like many of those present at the ICANN Seoul meeting last October, and indeed along with those around the globe who were eagerly awaiting new TLDs, I too was angered and frustrated at ICANN's deadlines that were slipping like a cartoon character running on an oil slick, caused by an incessant search by certain industry factions for perfection in an imperfect science. (We do work with the internet remember?). more

Efficient Threat Intelligence: Learning the Secrets

How can our threat intelligence platform deliver more? This is a question many business professionals employing threat intelligence practices are asking themselves as their companies continue to fall short against the machinations of modern-day cybercriminals. The truth is that while threat intelligence is certainly not a silver bullet, organizations often make a mistake when they opt for a platform without considering several important factors that can help them evaluate the market better and deploy the practice more effectively. more

Healthy Domains Initiative Isn’t Healthy for the Internet

We had high hopes that the Domain Name Association's Healthy Domains Initiative (HDI) wouldn't be just another secretive industry deal between rightsholders and domain name intermediaries. Toward that end, we and other civil society organizations worked in good faith on many fronts to make sure HDI protected Internet users as well. Those efforts seem to have failed. more

Don’t Break out the Champagne Just Yet: More Work to Do Before IANA Transition Occurs

After two years of meetings, comment periods, and more meetings, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers submitted its IANA transition proposal to the US Department of Commerce last week at the end of the ICANN 55 meeting in Marrakech. While this is a critical milestone and the multi-stakeholder community should be commended for its efforts, several concerns still remain. more

ITU Targeting Broadband for Over Half of World Population by 2015

ITU Secretary-General, Dr. Hamadoun Touré, has challenged global leaders to ensure that more than half of all the world's people have access to broadband networks by 2015, and make access to high-speed networks a basic civil right. "Broadband will be a game-changer in addressing rising healthcare costs, delivering digital education, empowering marginalized communities, and mitigating climate change." more

Internet Society Expresses Concern over Direction of WCIT

In light of final developments during the WCIT meetings, the following statement was released from the CEO and President of Internet Society, Lynn St. Amour on Wednesday, December 12, 2012: "At the conclusion of today's plenary, the Internet Society is concerned about the direction that the ITR'S are taking with regards to the Internet. The Internet Society came to this meeting in the hopes that revisions to the treaty would focus on competition, liberalization, free flow of information and independent regulation..." more

Why We Need Broadband Regulation

Anybody that reads my blog posts knows that I am in favor of broadband regulation. I'm sure ISPs read this and wonder why -- because who doesn't like being unregulated? My feelings on this go back to basic economics - monopolies must either be regulated or split up. By definition, monopolies always end up taking advantage of consumers - unregulated monopolies really can't help this behavior because employees and management of monopolies will inevitably take advantage of monopoly market power. more

40% of Wi-Fi Access Points in US Open, Only 25% in Europe

United States has a higher percentage of 'open' Wi-Fi hostspots than Europe according the recent data analysis based on close to 50 million Wi-Fi networks worldwide. WeFi, a broadband Wi-Fi locater with a database of over 47 million access point worldwide, reports that 40% of Wi-Fi access points recorded in the US are unlocked and do not require a security password, compared with only 25% of total access points in Europe."Within Europe, out of the top 10 countries in terms of Wi-Fi deployment, the most Wi-Fi friendly countries are Belgium and Norway, while the highest percentage of locked access points is found in Germany and Spain." more

Do You See What I See? Geotargeting in Brand Infringements

Geotargeting is a well-established online technique for delivering tailored web content based on a user's geographic location. From an internet technology point of view, this is usually based on the user's IP address, which is converted to a physical location through a standard look-up process performed by network infrastructure. Geotargeting is commonly used by websites for several legitimate reasons, including providing users with relevant advertising and other content... more

U.S. Falls Behind China in Broadband, Light-Touch Regulation Blamed for the Decline

Recent reports indicate that China has now surpassed the U.S. and is becoming the number one broadband country in the world. According to data analysis by market research firm Point Topic, both the U.S. and China had about 78 million broadband lines at the end of August; however China is growing twice as fast. Point Topic says that when broadband use initially surged in China, some experts predicted the country would overtake the U.S. in 2006. However the U.S. speeded up in the number of broadband lines and growth in China leveled off. For 18 months the two countries were more or less even with similar numbers of lines added in each quarter until the first quarter of this year. more

Amnesty International: Popular Mobile Apps Failing to Adopt Basic Privacy Protections

"Tech companies like Snapchat and Skype's owner Microsoft are failing to adopt basic privacy protections on their instant messaging services, putting users' human rights at risk," says Amnesty International. more