A smartphone smuggled out of North Korea has revealed the alarming extent of digital surveillance enforced by the Kim regime. Though it resembles a modern Android device, the software within tells a darker story: every five minutes, the phone covertly captures screenshots, storing them in an inaccessible folder for later state inspection. more
A new audit has sharply challenged the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) broadband availability estimates, revealing that 26 million Americans lack access to fixed 100/20 Mbps internet, 6.4 million more than the FCC claims. more
The i2Coalition has unveiled a new report and website, DNS at Risk, spotlighting the growing misuse of Internet infrastructure by governments to control online content. Released on June 3rd, the initiative documents how states are increasingly deploying DNS resolvers and IP filtering—originally neutral systems—as tools of censorship and enforcement. more
A wave of high-profile cyberattacks is reshaping the global insurance industry, creating both risk and reward for major players. According to a new Bloomberg report, firms like Munich Re and Chubb are capitalising on surging demand for cyber insurance as artificial intelligence makes digital breaches more frequent and destructive. more
Japan Post said Monday that it has launched a "digital address" system that links seven-digit combinations of numbers and letters to physical addresses. more
Competition has been creeping into broadband pricing for the last several years as cable companies have been using low introductory rates to try to win new customers and offering similarly low prices to try to keep them. Anybody who competes against the big cable companies will tell you that cable companies have been competing for years by offering two-year promotional prices to keep customers. However, competition might have gone into a new gear recently... more
The NetBeacon Institute is pleased to publish its White Paper: Proposal for PDPs on DNS Abuse. We created this paper to support and advance ICANN Community discussions on potential policy development related to DNS Abuse. From our unique perspective, we believe there are a number of issues that are constrained enough to be a successful ICANN PDP and can make a meaningful difference in our collective work against DNS Abuse. more
As the European Union presses ahead with its European Democracy Shield (EUDS) to counter foreign disinformation, European country code top-level domain (ccTLD) registries are urging caution. more
The ability to rank results according to the level of threat they pose (based on factors such as, for example, the extent to which a webpage relates to a brand of interest) is a key component of many brand protection services. The prioritisation process has a number of purposes, including the identification of: (a) priority targets for further analysis; (b) candidates for content tracking (i.e. regular reinspection of content or configuration, and the generation of an alert if high-concern findings are identified) - as may be appropriate in cases where a domain name presents a high potential level of risk but is not currently associated with any live site content; and (c) priority targets for enforcement actions. more
Negotiation processes in the UN are remembered not just for what came out of them, but also for what they were like, who participated, and how they were conducted. People who participated in the first World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) back in 2003 and 2005 often talk about the process, its challenges and its achievements. more
Cyber criminals are the kings of recycling. Once they've found a tactic that works well, they'll keep doing it as long as they can get away with it. That's why it's so important for research teams to keep a close eye on what's happening behind the scenes with web traffic. Case in point? Our team at DNSFilter recently analyzed global DNS activity from the first quarter of 2025 and identified several notable trends. more
Netscout recently released its latest Threat Intelligence Report that documents DDoS attacks in the second half of 2024. As has been the trend for many years, the largest target of DDoS attacks has been ISP networks. There were over 8.9 million DDoS attacks documented in the second half of last year, up 12.75% over the first half of the year. more
After several delays due to bad weather, Amazon's Project Kuiper finally launched its first batch of low-orbit broadband satellites on April 28. The company says it is in communication with all 27 new satellites. Amazon used a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket launched from Cape Canaveral. Amazon is under pressure to get the launches going and has a commitment to the FCC to launch 1,618 satellites by July 2026. more
The story of computing and communications over the past eighty years has been a story of quite astounding improvements in the capability, cost and efficiency of computers and communications. If the same efficiency improvements had been made in the automobile industry cars would cost a couple of dollars, would cost fractions of a cent to use for trips, and be capable of travelling at speeds probably approaching the speed of light! more
On April 28th, a widespread blackout plunged millions across Spain, Portugal, and parts of south-west France into darkness, disrupting homes, transit systems, and even sporting events like the Madrid Open. more