U.S. Government Invests $930 Million in Expanding Nationwide Internet Connectivity: Bridging Digital Divide in Remote and Underserved Regions

In a bid to expand nationwide internet access, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced a major $930 million grant initiative on Friday aimed at improving internet connections in remote parts of Alaska, rural Texas, and other regions with significant connectivity issues.  more

The Trade War for Undersea Fiber

A recent article by Joe Brock for Reuters describes a new geopolitical battle over undersea fibers. There are about 400 undersea fiber routes that cross oceans and that connect the world with fiber. This is a huge business, and about 95% of all international broadband traffic passes through the undersea fibers. more

Multistakeholder Advisory Group of the Internet Governance Forum Has Been Renewed

The United Nations has announced that the membership of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group of the Internet Governance Forum has been renewed. A total of 56 members, 33 among them new, have been appointed. The Advisory Group members are from all stakeholder groups and all regions, representing Governments, the private sector, civil society, academia and technical communities. more

The History of Broadband Price Competition

It's sometimes easy to forget that the broadband business is just over twenty-five years old. The telephone companies had a monopoly on copper-based technologies until Congress passed the Telecommunication Act of 1996, which forced the big telephone companies to allow competition for copper-based broadband services. more

Cisco Warning Software Used in Hundreds of Its Products Vulnerable to Critical Security Flaw

The security flaw was discovered by the company's own security researchers in WikiLeaks' most recent disclosure of classified information, released last week. more

What If IANA Transition Was Only a Mirage?

The U.S. government has long had a far-reaching control over the internet's technical center. What will happen now when ICANN's Board puts together a proposal on how to transfer responsibility for certain key functions within the domain name system to the internet community? Last week, ICANN had its 55th conference in Marrakech. The most important result of the meeting is that all parts of the so-called internet community approved that ICANN's Board will send a proposal to the U.S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) which suggests how to transfer responsibility for certain key functions within the domain name system to the internet community... more

Democracy Now Video Reporting on Iran’s European Aided Internet Monitoring Capabilities

Democracy Now has a video discussion on the recent reports about telecoms in Europe aiding the Iranian government develop highly sophisticated Internet censorship mechanisms or deep packet inspection. The WSJ recently reported that the Iranian monitoring capabilities where "at least in part [provided] by a joint venture of Siemens AG, the German conglomerate, and Nokia Corp., the Finish cellphone compnay, in second half of 2008." (also see previous report: Iran's Internet Censorship Most Sophisticated in the World) more

Google Releases a One-Stop Reference Source to Browser Security

Today via its Online Security Blog, Google announced the release of its Browser Security Handbook aimed at providing web application developers, browser engineers, and information security researchers a "one-stop reference" to critical security attributes of modern web browsers. "Insufficient understanding of these often poorly-documented characteristics is a major contributing factor to the prevalence of several classes of security vulnerabilities," says the introduction to the 60-page document. more

FCC Alert on Cybersecurity Risks

The FCC warns telecom companies of rising ransomware threats after attacks quadrupled since 2022. The agency urges stronger defenses including patching, multifactor authentication, network segmentation, and closer oversight of vendors and incident response planning. more

Rethinking Digital Sovereignty: The Pitfalls of an Infrastructured Approach

In an era where our lives are increasingly intertwined with digital technologies, a recent development in the realm of digital sovereignty has sparked a pressing concern for nations and individuals alike. The concept of digital self-determination, once hailed as a great equalizer, has become a battleground for power, privacy, and control, with governments and tech giants vying for dominance in the digital realm. more

EU and US Carry Out First Joint Cyber Security Exercise

The first joint cyber security exercise between the EU and US is being held today in Brussels, with the support of the EU's cyber security Agency ENISA and the US Department of Homeland Security. The day-long table-top exercise, named "Cyber Atlantic 2011", is using simulated cyber-crisis scenarios to explore how the EU and US would engage each other and cooperate in the event of cyber-attacks on their critical information infrastructures. more

Survey Finds “Complexity” as Most Common Challenge in Deploying DNSSEC

According to a recent survey conducted by the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA), 78% of service providers in Europe have plans to deploy DNSSEC within the next 3 years. On the other hand, the study also found 22% have no plans to deploy DNSSEC in the next 3 years. more

Second Round of Initial Evaluations for New gTLDs

Mary Iqbal writes to report that ICANN has released the second round of Initial Evaluation Results on March 29. ICANN is currently reviewing new gTLD applications at a rate of 30 applications per week and has plans to increase that to 100 per week. more

Internet Capacity Is Keeping Pace With Traffic Growth, Says Research Firm

According to new data from TeleGeography research group, international Internet traffic grew 53% between mid-2007 and mid-2008, down from 61% the preceding year. Traffic growth between the US and Latin America was especially fast, surging 112%. In contrast, traffic on internet backbones between major cities in the relatively more mature US market rose a modest 47%. For the second consecutive year, according to the study, total international Internet capacity grew faster than total Internet traffic, leading to lower utilization levels on many internet backbones. Between 2007 and 2008, average traffic utilization levels decreased from 31% to 29%... more

Winning the 6G Race

America has declared its intent to win the 6G race, casting next-generation wireless as vital to security and growth. Yet standards are global, vendors multinational, and the rhetoric looks like spectrum lobbying than technological rivalry. more