Cybersecurity is a top-of-mind issue with calls for individual vigilance, national legislation, and international treaties to address gaps that are exploited causing significant harm and financial loss on a daily basis. The vast majority of these calls are well-intentioned though even among the best-intentioned, some are poorly directed. Such is the case with all of the proposals that would introduce security into the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs) of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). more
Let me begin by saying that I am big supporter of ICANN. But good grief ICANN, why must the ENTIRE new gTLD process be so painful? I could run through a long list of all the delays, missteps and glitches, but why bother? It's almost comical at this point -- although not for 1,930 new gTLD applicants who have been waiting for ICANN to get their act together. First we were led to believe that the batching of applications was necessary due to resourcing constraints, which I personally never understood as the evaluation of applications is being done be third-party consultants. more
The Google Fiber project is receiving international attention. This in itself is a good thing, since it brings the benefits of high-speed FttH infrastructure to the attention of large numbers of people in business and government who will not have to deal with such developments on a regular basis... At the same time we have to look at Google Fiber from the point of view of operating in the American regulatory environment. Yes, we can all learn from its disruptive model, and particularly when the results of the more innovative elements of the services begin to kick in; but for other reasons there is no way that this model can be replicated elsewhere. more
The Times of India recently interviewed India's Minister of State for Communications and IT, Sachin Pilot, on Internet Governance. Titled "'Internet's governance can't be limited to one geography'", the article started off with an amazing assertion by the minister... While this interview is a fairly standard restatement of the position some Governments (including India) have about governmental control of Internet Governance, it is sadly apparent that the minister unfortunately doesn't appear to understand what the root servers are, or how they work. more
When the ICM Registry initially launched .XXX last year, the notion of a 'registration block' was a fairly novel idea. Essentially, the ICM Registry allowed companies who were not part of the "global adult entertainment industry", to seek permanent removal of names matching their trademarks from the general pool of names available for registration for a low-cost fee. Many saw this move by the ICM Registry as a genuine attempt to protect the rights of brand owners, while others saw it as yet another mechanism for generating revenue from rights owners under the guise of a "Sunrise Period." more
During the last few months the US's main DSL providers AT&T and Verizon have begun retracting from the DSL and landline market in many rural and less commercially viable areas while concentrating on their wireless LTE ambitions. DSL and voice telephony provide relatively low returns, which can be whittled away through network maintenance costs, while LTE promises to deliver proportionately higher profits, based on exorbitant charges by data volume. more
The European Telecommunications Network Operators' Association (ETNO) has issued a press release in which its Executive Board Chair and the ITU's Secretary-General "reiterated the importance of the WCIT to lay the framework that will facilitate the further growth of an innovative, and sustainable future for the telecom and information and communication technology sector (including the Internet)". more
Reading Peter Olthoorn's book on Google (a link is found here), I ran into a passage on IP addresses. Where Google states that it does not see an IP address as privacy sensitive. An IP address could be used by more than one person, it claims. The Article 29 Working Party, the EU privacy commissioners, states that it is privacy sensitive as a unique identifier of a private person. It got me wondering whether it is this simple. Here is a blog post meant to give some food for thought and debate. I invite you to think about the question 'how private is an IP address'? more
A few days ago I opined that if several people want the same Top-Level Domain (TLD) and can't come to terms otherwise, they should arrange a private auction. It would be an odd sort of auction, since the buyers and sellers are the same people, so unlike normal auctions, the goal is not to maximize the selling price. How might it work? more
Countries, cities and commercial organisations around the globe are facing problems associated with the rollout of fibre-to-the-home networks... We have been warning about these issues for well over a decade. The problem arises because the telecoms industry has been based on the principle 'build and they will come'. more
The process for ICANN's new TLDs says that if there are several equally qualified applicants for a TLD, and they can't agree which one gets it, ICANN will hold an auction to decide. Recently some people have suggested that the applicants could use a private auction instead. Well, of course. In a situation like this, the question isn't whether there will be an auction, but only who will keep the money. more
I presented at a OECD/BEREC workshop that was held on the 20th June in Brussels, and I'd like to share some personal impressions and opinions from this workshop. The OECD/BEREC workshop was a policy-oriented peering and exchange forum. It was not a conventional operational peering forum where the aim is to introduce potential peers to each other and facilitate peer-based interconnection of network operators, but a workshop that involved both network operators and various national and EU regulators, as well has having inputs from the OECD. more
I'm sitting in the Popov Room of the ITU Tower in Geneva, the room is quiet, the atmosphere placid, chairs are empty. The final meeting of the CWG WCIT prep WG has just concluded its work and the chair will be reporting to the Council the results of our work. I find myself strangely calm and looking forward to my next week, to be spent in Prague... Should you choose to read through the documents, and they are lengthy at approximately 375 pages, you might think that a number of the proposals were directed at the Internet. more
A new IETF draft has been published that specifies a new HTTP status code for legally restricted resources. That is, if the government restricts your access to the web page, return this code (similar to how something not found is a 404). The error code: 451. From the Internet Draft, if the user tries to access a page, but access to the page is restricted by the government, display the following... more
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in Washington has advanced its wireless health care agenda by adopting rules that will enable Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs), low-power wideband networks consisting of multiple body-worn sensors that transmit a variety of patient data to a control device. MBANs provide a cost effective way to monitor every patient in a healthcare institution, so clinicians can provide real-time and accurate data which allows them to intervene if necessary. more
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