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Thursday 19 February 2015

Telecom Bigwigs on 5G at Mobile World Congress




In a duration of just five years, established industry forecasters are predicting the first commercial deployments of 5G (5th Generation) networks. As of now, there is no 5G standard around and the world’s several standards bodies are working unanimously on a vision set for 5G.

Besides that, several companies are already gearing their efforts on 5G and are establishing the criteria for what they aspire 5G to be. Going by the Chinese vendor Huawei, it will conduct a 5G trial while the FIFA World Cup runs in 2018 with MegaFon, a Russian operator. In the beginning of this year, SK Telecom also signed a MoU (Memorandum of understanding) with Nokia in a venture to conduct research and development jointly on 5G, which also is ultimately aimed at testing the technology in 2018 and then commercially launching it in 2020.

So for of those who are inquisitive about the upcoming technological developments, the question is how will 5G be different from 4G? Many experts claim that 5G will not necessarily be an air interface enhancement, which was the case with 3G and 4G. Instead, 5G will involve LTE-Advanced characteristics and collaborate with other technologies such as the millimeter wave, Wi-Fi and more.

Perhaps more important than the 5G technological specifications is the vision, which foresees a stage where all machines are wirelessly connected to other machines and mission-critical apps are prioritized over less-critical communications. The download speeds with 5G are expected to outdo 20 Gbps and the latency mere milliseconds.

The top tech experts in the world will talk at length about the next big thing in technology at the Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona, Spain on Tuesday, March 4. The group of speakers for the panel will include Adam Koeppe, VP of network planning and strategy at Verizon Communications, Tom Keathley, SVP of network planning and products at AT&T and various other bigwigs of the telecom industry.

Thursday 12 February 2015

‘Kill Switch’ Brings Down Smart Phone Thefts in Major Cities




A major change has finally come along in the number of cellphone thefts occurring in big cities. For the better, these thefts have declined tremendously in a few places since manufacturers began using “kill switches”, which permit the phones to be shut down remotely if they have been stolen.

As per authorities, there has been a steep drop of 40 percent in the number of stolen iPhones in San Francisco and 25 percent in New York in the 12 months after Apple Inc. embraced a kill switch to provide better security in its devices in September 2013. The smartphone thefts in London has dramatically dropped almost by half as per the announcement made by officials in the three cities.

It was time that the smartphone theft epidemic was offered a successful counter and looking at the statistics, it seems the ‘kill switch’ has helped a great deal.  Attorneys in New York and San Francisco are among the various other officials who are already arguing for new laws that would mandate the kill switches. California is one of the places that is yet to see a law mandating kill switches. However, smartphone theft still continues to drop in that area because some manufacturers have already begun installing the software-based switches on the devices sold by them. It is given that the wireless industry will continue to roll out sophisticated and fresh looking features, but saving their own customers from falling prey to smartphone thieves is the most useful technology that they can offer to the market.

California’s law, which is one of the nation’s strongest, received huge support from California prosecutors and law enforcement agencies who had high hopes attached to the ‘kill switch’, believing that it could help reduce the incidence of smartphone thefts. Going by the National Consumers League, mobile devices were pilfered from approximately 1.6 million Americans in 2012. In California alone, mobile device thefts accounted for more than half of all crimes taking place in areas like San Francisco, Oakland and other cities.

As of now, Apple, Samsung and Google have implemented kill switches on their handheld devices. Microsoft on the other hand is expected to roll out an operating system for its Windows phones that has one this year.

Thursday 5 February 2015

Should High-Speed Internet be a Public Utility? AT&T Versus the FCC




It is only a suggestion that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has made regarding turning the high-speed Internet into a public utility but the backlash has started quicker than expected. In a move against the FCC’s latest suggestion, AT&T has already taken a step toward challenging the regulatory authority.

According to AT&T, the FCC might just end up losing a legal battle if it plunges ahead with its decision to increase Internet regulation with the approach it is trying to follow. The intent behind the FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s decision in this case is that he wants to avoid Internet providers from blocking some websites which the consumers wish to visit. Or the incidence of charging more to Netflix or YouTube for fast lanes to your houses. To that end, the FCC Chairman is trying to release a heavier regulation of the Internet. He also prepared to propose new rules in this regard very soon. If the broadband ends up being a public utility, the FCC would be able to have far more information and insight into the type of network-access arrangements that Internet providers make with content providers like Netflix and Google.

In a very lightly veiled threat, AT&T has made it clear that it will ultimately sue to discourage the FCC from asserting the authority and going ahead with the idea it shared. However, the FCC has not even formally announced the rules and regulations it is thinking to lay down yet and still, the telecoms are already up for fighting a legal battle against it.

AT&T has stated two reasons for the FCC’s decision not turning into a reality. First, it claims that the FCC cannot view Internet providers as telecom-like utilities because the FCC itself termed them as "information providers" way back in 2002. The second reason is that the FCC hasn’t performed a study to prove that Internet providers in a certain geographic area act like monopolistic “common carriers,” like the old Bell System. In an interview with CNET last month, Wheeler said he was indeed ready for battle, if there is one.