Tag: Telecommunications services

Why cell phone service is down in Maui — and when it could be restored | CNN Business

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Thousands of people in Maui are without cell service as the wildfires continue to rage out of control on the island, preventing people from calling emergency services or updating loved ones about their status. It could take days or even weeks to get the networks back up and running.

“911 is down. Cell service is down. Phone service is down,” Hawaii Lt. Gov. Sylvia Luke told CNN on Wednesday morning.

Although strong winds can sometimes threaten cell towers, most are strong enough to handle the worst that even a Category 5 hurricane can bring. Fire, however, complicates the issue.

“When the fires get too close to cell sites, they will obviously burn equipment, antennas, and feedlines,” said Glenn O’Donnell, VP of research at market research firm Forrester. “In extreme cases, they will also weaken the towers, leading some to collapse. The smoke and flames can also attenuate signals because of the particulate density in the air.”

If a tower collapses, cell networks could take months to restore. But if carriers are able and prepared to do restorations with mobile backup units, it could bring limited service back within hours, O’Donnell said. Wireless carriers often bring in COWs (Cells On Wheels), COLTs (Cells On Light Trucks), and GOaTs (Generators on Trailers) in emergencies to provide backup service when cell towers go down.

Power outages are also a threat to cell phone towers. The Maui disaster has already wiped out power to at least 14,000 homes and businesses in the area, according to PowerOutage.us. Many towers have backup power generators, but they have limited capacity to keep towers running.

Cell towers have back-up technology built in, but this is typically done through optical fiber cables or microwave (wireless) links, according to Dimitris Mavrakis, senior researcher at ABI Research. However, if something extraordinary happens, such as interaction with rampant fires, these links may experience “catastrophic failures and leave cells without a connection to the rest of the world.”

And, in an emergency, a spike in call volume can overload the system – even if people are able to get reception.

“Even cells that have a good service may experience outages due to the sheer volume of communication happening at once,” Mavrakis said. “Everyone in these areas may be trying to contact relatives or the authorities at once, saturating the network and causing an outage. This is easier to correct though and network operators may put in place additional measures to render them operational quickly.”

A T-Mobile spokesperson said the company is monitoring the situation and assessing the fire’s impact on its equipment in the area.

“When conditions are safe, our Emergency Management Team will deploy portable, agile satellite and microwave solutions that will restore service in impacted areas,” the spokesperson said. “We also have portable generators ready to deploy to sites affected by commercial power loss, and our Emergency Response Team is working with FEMA and the state of Hawaii to support firefighters and other first responders, organizations and communities.”

An AT&T spokesperson told CNN it is also assessing the’ impact to its wireless network and “will continue to coordinate closely with local utility companies on restoration progress.” The company is waiving talk, text and data overage charges during this time.

Verizon did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment.

Satellite networks, however, continue to operate regardless of what’s happening on the ground. This means satellite phones, which often feature large antennas, can help provide voice, SMS, and data services anywhere on Earth, even without cell service.

Satellite phones have been popularized over the years by hikers, emergency responders and intrepid travelers, but they are are expensive and are not mainstream products. However, some newer smartphone models – including the latest model iPhone 14 and some phones built by Motorola and Huawei – offer built-in satellite connectivity, which allows the sending of SOS messages via satellites.

For example, Apple’s free Emergency SOS via satellite service, which launched last year, allows iPhone users to contact dedicated dispatchers in emergency situations via satellites. When a user attempts to call 911 and is unable to get on a cell network, they will be automatically redirected to the service’s dispatchers where they can answer a questionnaire with short multiple choice questions to share information quickly. The dispatchers also receive their coordinates, medical ID and emergency contact information.

Apple told CNN the feature is reserved for connections to emergency services and does not allow users to contact friends and family. For anyone who has access to a Wi-Fi connection while wearing an Apple Watch, the Walkie-Talkie feature could also be used to send messages or make calls. However, Wi-Fi networks can also fail when optical fiber networks are disrupted.

Although it’s unclear how long cell phone service could be down in affected regions, companies have been able to bring connectivity to disaster regions in the past. In 2017, Google worked with AT&T and T-Mobile to deploy its Project Loon balloons to deliver Internet to Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.

Hawaii’s Red Cross recently tweeted that people can call 1-800-RED-CROSS to see if their loved ones are at a local shelter.

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August 2, 2023
FCC to reintroduce rules protecting net neutrality | CNN Business

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The US government aims to restore sweeping regulations for high-speed internet providers such as AT&T, Comcast and Verizon, reviving “net neutrality” rules for the broadband industry — and an ongoing debate about the internet’s future.

The proposed rules from the Federal Communications Commission will designate internet service — both the wired kind found in homes and businesses as well as mobile data on cellphones — as “essential telecommunications” akin to traditional telephone services, said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. The rules would ban internet service providers (ISPs) from blocking or slowing down access to websites and online content.

In addition to the prohibitions on blocking and throttling internet traffic, the draft rules also seek to prevent ISPs from selectively speeding up service to favored websites or to those that agree to pay extra fees, Rosenworcel said, a move designed to prevent the emergence of “fast lanes” on the web that could give some websites a paid advantage over others.

With Tuesday’s proposal, the FCC aims to restore Obama-era regulations that the FCC under Republican leadership rolled back during the Trump administration.

But the proposal is likely to trigger strong pushback from internet providers who have spent years fighting earlier versions of the rules in court.

Beyond their immediate impact to internet providers, the draft rules directly help US telecom regulators address a range of consumer issues in the longer run by allowing the FCC to bring its most powerful legal tools to bear, Rosenworcel said. Some of the priorities the FCC could address after the implementation of net neutrality rules include spam robotexts, internet outages, digital privacy and high-speed internet access, said Rosenworcel in a speech at the National Press Club Tuesday to announce the proposal.

Rosenworcel said reclassifying internet service providers as essential telecommunications entities — by regulating them under Title II of the FCC’s congressional charter — would provide the FCC with clearer authority to adopt future rules governing everything from public safety to national security.

Rosenworcel argued, “without reclassification, the FCC has limited authority to incorporate updated cybersecurity standards into our network policies.”

She added that traditional telephone companies currently cannot sell customer data, but those restrictions do not apply to ISPs, which are regulated differently. “Does that really make sense? Do we want our broadband providers selling off where we go and what we do online?”

Regulating internet providers using the most powerful tools at the FCC’s disposal would let the agency crack down harder on spam robotexts, Rosenworcel said, as spammers are “constantly evolving their techniques.”

And the proposed rules could promote the Biden administration’s agenda to blanket the country in fast, affordable broadband, she argued, by granting internet providers the rights to put their equipment on telephone poles.

“As a nation we are committed, post-pandemic, to building broadband for all,” she said. “So keep in mind that when you construct these facilities, utility poles are really important.”

The FCC plans to vote Oct. 19 on whether to advance the draft rules by soliciting public feedback on them — a step that would precede the creation of any final rules.

Net neutrality rules are more necessary than ever, Rosenworcel said in her speech, after millions of Americans discovered the vital importance of reliable internet access during the Covid-19 pandemic. Rosenworcel also made the case that a single, national standard on net neutrality could give businesses the certainty they need to speed up efforts to blanket the nation in fast, affordable broadband.

But Rosenworcel’s push is already inviting a widespread revolt from internet providers that make up some of the most powerful and well-resourced groups in Washington.

The proposal could also lead to more of what has helped make net neutrality a household term over the past decade: Late-night segments by comedians including John Oliver and Stephen Colbert; in-person demonstrations, including at the FCC’s headquarters and at the home of its chair; allegations of fake, AstroTurfed public comments and claims of cyberattacks; and even threats of violence.

The latest net neutrality rulemaking reflects one of the most visible efforts of Rosenworcel’s chairwomanship — and one of her first undertakings since the US Senate this month confirmed Anna Gomez as the agency’s fifth commissioner, breaking a years-long 2-2 partisan deadlock at the FCC that had prevented hot-button initiatives from moving forward.

The draft rules also show how a continued lack of federal legislation to establish a nationwide net neutrality standard has led to continued flip-flopping rules for ISPs with every change of political administration, along with a patchwork of state laws seeking to fill the gap.

If approved next month, the FCC draft would be opened for public comment until approximately mid-December, followed by an opportunity for public replies lasting into January. A final set of rules could be voted on in the months following.

For years, consumer advocacy groups have called for strong rules that could prevent ISPs from distorting the free flow of information on the internet using arbitrary or commercially motivated traffic rules.

In contrast, ISPs have long argued that websites using up big portions of a network’s capacity, such as search engines or video streaming sites, should pay for the network demand their users generate. European Union officials are said to be considering just such a proposal.

A third rail of broadband policy

In attempting to revive the agency rules, the FCC is once again touching what has become the third rail of US broadband policy: Title II of the Communications Act of 1934, the law that gave the FCC its congressional mandate to regulate legacy telephone services.

Tuesday’s proposal moves to regulate ISPs under Title II, which would give the FCC clearer authority to impose rules against blocking, throttling and paid prioritization of websites. The draft rules are substantially similar to the rules the FCC passed in 2015, the people said. The rules were upheld in 2016 by a federal appeals court in Washington in the face of an industry lawsuit.

Soon after that ruling, however, Donald Trump won the White House, leading him to name Ajit Pai, then one of the FCC’s Republican commissioners, as its chair. Among Pai’s first acts as agency chief was to propose a rollback of the earlier net neutrality rules. The FCC voted in 2017 to reverse the rules, with Pai arguing that the repeal would accelerate private investment in broadband networks and free the industry from heavy-handed regulation. The repeal took effect in 2018.

In the time since, ISPs have refrained from doing the kind of blocking and preferential treatment that net neutrality advocates have warned could occur, but Rosenworcel’s proposal highlights how concerns about that possibility have persisted.

The Biden administration on Tuesday praised the FCC’s plan to reintroduce net neutrality rules for broadband providers.

“President Biden supports net neutrality so that large corporations can’t pick and choose what content you can access online or charge you more for certain content,” said Hannah Garden-Monheit, special assistant to the president for economic policy. “Today’s announcement is a major step forward for American consumers and small businesses and demonstrates the importance of the president’s push to restore competition in our economy.”

Net neutrality began as a bipartisan issue, with the George W. Bush administration issuing some of the earliest principles for an open internet that led to FCC attempts at concrete regulation in 2010 and again in 2015.

The telecom and cable industries have long opposed the use of Title II to regulate broadband, arguing that it would be a form of government overreach, that telephone-style regulations are not suited for digital technologies, and that it would discourage private investment in broadband networks, hindering Americans’ ability to get online.

“Treating broadband as a Title II utility is a dangerous and costly solution in search of a problem,” said USTelecom, a prominent industry trade group, in a statement Tuesday. “Congress must step in on this major question and end this game of regulatory ping-pong. The future of the open, vibrant internet we now enjoy hangs in the balance.”

The reference to net neutrality as a “major question” offers clues about possible future litigation involving the proposal, as the Supreme Court has increasingly invoked the “major questions” doctrine to scrutinize federal agency initiatives.

In her speech Tuesday, Rosenworcel acknowledged the coming pushback — as well as past incidents involving supporters of strong net neutrality rules.

“I have every expectation that this process will get messy at times,” Rosenworcel said. “In the past, when this subject came up, we saw death threats against [former Republican FCC Chairman Ajit Pai] and his family. That is completely unacceptable, and I am grateful to law enforcement for bringing the individual behind these threats to justice. We had a fake bomb threat called in to disrupt a vote at the agency. We had protesters blocking [former Democratic FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler] in his driveway and keeping him from his car. We saw a dark effort to tear down a pro-net neutrality nominee for the agency.”

Part of what made the FCC’s 2015 rules particularly controversial, however, was that classifying ISPs as Title II providers meant the agency could theoretically attempt to set prices for internet service directly, a prospect that ISPs widely feared but that the FCC in 2015 promised not to do.

Tuesday’s proposal makes the same commitment, the people said, forbearing from 26 provisions of Title II and more than 700 other agency rules that could be seen as intrusive. The draft rules also prohibit the FCC from forcing ISPs to share their network infrastructure with other, competing internet providers, the people said, a concept known as network unbundling.

On top of fierce industry pushback in the FCC’s comments process, the proposal could also lead to legal challenges against the FCC. While the 2015 net neutrality rules survived on appeal, suggesting the current FCC may be on firm ground to issue the current proposed rules, the draft comes as the Supreme Court has moved to reconsider the power of federal agencies by scrutinizing courts’ decades-long deference to their expert authority.

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August 2, 2023
Did your cell phone make a screeching noise today? Here’s why | CNN Business

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Today was the day for the US government’s big emergency alert drill, which sent a test message to every TV, radio and cell phone in the nation.

Starting at approximately 2:20 pm ET on Wednesday, the federal government began conducting a nationwide test of its Emergency Alert System and Wireless Emergency Alerts. The EAS portion of the test sent an emergency alert to all radios and televisions, while the WEA portion of the drill sent an alert to all consumer cell phones.

The test was being conducted by the Federal Emergency Management Agency in coordination with the Federal Communication Commission. Its purpose was to ensure that the systems in place continue to be an effective means of warning the public about emergencies at a national level.

Essentially, what this means is that hundreds of millions of cell phones around the country made a screeching alert noise at approximately the same time today, beginning around 2:20 pm ET. Radio and TV stations also blared a test alert at around the same time. But there was no action required from you after receiving the free message — it was just a test.

Here are answers to all of your burning questions about today’s emergency alert test.

While some recent models of mobile phones may include a setting to opt-out of tests and alerts, none of these settings will affect the 2023 national test, FEMA has said.

That means if your mobile phone was on and receiving service from a participating wireless provider, you will likely received the national Wireless Emergency Alert test, the agency added.

There are, however, three conditions which would prevent the cell phone alert from getting delivered to a device. If your phone is turned off, has airplane mode switched on, or is not connected or associated with a cell tower, then it did not receive the message.

Survivors of domestic violence and people in abusive relationships often have a secret or emergency phone that they don’t want their partner or others to know about. On a call with reporters Tuesday, a senior FEMA official said the agency was aware of these concerns stemming from survivors of domestic violence and their allies. The official recommended that people who do not want a secret phone to be revealed to turn their phone completely off ahead of the 2:20 pm ET test — and not to turn it back on for thirty minutes, or until after 2:50 pm ET.

If you wanted to be cautious, you could also wait until you are in a safe place before turning your phone back on.

Educators are braced themselves for some disruption this afternoon, as the test impacting cell phones occurred during school hours for most of the country.

On the call with reporters, the senior FEMA official recommended that educators, as much as possible, try to use this as a teaching opportunity about federal emergency management and preparedness initiatives.

The national test cannot be used to monitor, locate or lock your phone, FEMA has said. The test is also using broadcast technology and does not collect any of your data.

All cell phones should have received an alert and an accompanying text message that reads: “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.”

The free text message was sent in either English or Spanish, depending on the language settings of your device. The text was accompanied by a unique tone and vibration that is meant to make the alert accessible to the entire public, including people with disabilities, FEMA has said.

The test was broadcast by cell towers for approximately 30 minutes beginning at 2:20 pm ET, FEMA said. During this time, all compatible wireless phones that were switched on, within range of an active cell tower, and whose wireless providers participates in WEA tests should have received the text message.

Although the test will be transmitting for approximately 30 minutes, you should only have received the alert message once.

Meanwhile, all radios and televisions also broadcast a test emergency alert at the same time as part of the broader test. This message, which ran for approximately one minute, stated: “This is a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System, issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, covering the United States from 14:20 to 14:50 hours ET. This is only a test. No action is required by the public.”

Can the emergency alert impact my body?

In short: No. There are a number of false claims circulating online with regard to the test alert, including some conspiracy theories that incorrectly allege the sound emitted as part of the national test can impact your body at the cellular level. This is false.

“FEMA is not aware of any adverse health effects caused by the audio signal,” the agency has stated.

And while this is a national test, it uses the same technology and infrastructure that state and local authorities rely on to send localized Amber Alerts or extreme weather warnings, a senior FEMA official emphasized to reporters on Tuesday. In a frequently asked question sheet released by FEMA ahead of Wednesday’s test, the agency stated: “The audio signal that will be used in the National Test is the same combination of audio tones that has been used since 1963 in the original Emergency Broadcast System.”

If you have a mobile phone that was switched on, not on airplane mode, within range of an active cell tower and on a network where wireless providers participate in Wireless Emergency Alerts then you should have received the test message on Wednesday afternoon by 2:50 pm ET.

If you are trying to figure out why you did not receive an alert when you should have, or have any other feedback on the test, members of the public can write to the email address: FEMA-National-Test@fema.dhs.gov.

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August 2, 2023
411 is going out of service for millions of Americans | CNN Business

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The operator is going off the hook for millions of customers.

Starting in January, AT&T customers with digital landlines won’t be able to dial 411 or 0 to reach an operator or get directory assistance. AT&T in 2021 ended operator services for wireless callers, although customers with home phone landlines can still access operators and directory help. Verizon, T-Mobile and other major carriers still offer these services for a fee.

On a notice on AT&T’s website, the company directs customers to find addresses and phone numbers on Google or online directories.

“Nearly all of these customers have internet access to look up this information,” said an AT&T spokesperson.

But a century ago, the operator functioned as Google. Everyone knew it as “Information.”

“The operator was the internet before the internet. There’s a wonderful circularity there,” said Josh Lauer, an associate professor of media studies at the University of New Hampshire who is writing a book on the cultural history of the telephone.

Operator services were a selling point to customers during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The operator was the essential link in the dominant Bell System, owned by American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T), telecommunications network.

The operator became the early face of the telephone, a human behind an emerging and complex technology. The job came to be occupied mostly by single, middle-class White women, often known as “Hello Girls.” The Bell System, known as Ma Bell, advertised its mostly female ranks of operators as servile and attentive – “The Voice with a Smile” – to attract and maintain customers.

Well into the 20th century, AT&T offered weather, bus schedules, sports scores, time and date, election results and other information requests.

“Telephone users interpreted her as an efficient way to locate any information,” wrote Emma Goodmann, an assistant professor of communication at Clarke University, in her 2019 paper on the history of telephone operators.

On Halloween eve in 1938, during Orson Welles’ radio broadcast of “War of the Worlds,” New Jersey residents believed martians were invading and frantically phoned the operator for information on the invasion and to connect them with loved ones before the world ended.

Three decades later, a Bell company said a customer called to ask the operator if he was a mammal, “like a whale,” while a woman wanted to know how to get a squirrel out of her house, according to Goodmann.

The advance of technology like the internet and smartphones, the deregulation of the telecomms industry in the 1980s, and other factors have left human operators virtually extinct. In 2021, there were fewer than 4,000 telephone operators, down from a peak of around 420,000 in the 1970s, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

But there are still people who call the operator and request directory help.

“411 usage is not insignificant,” the FCC said in a 2019 report. The FCC estimated then that 71 million calls annually were placed to 411.

The first telephone exchange took place in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1878, two years after Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone.

It was designed to handle business communication, not social calls between local residents. Physicians, police, banks and the post office were some of the first subscribers.

To connect a call, an operator at a switching office would take a request from a caller and physically plug one line into another.

Bell and other telephone exchanges spread throughout the Northeast. Initially, telephone companies hired mostly men and boys to take calls. But the operator quickly became a gendered job.

Male managers decided that women were better suited to answering and connecting calls from rude customers because they were seen as more docile and polite. Companies could also pay them less than men.

Telephone companies sought female operators who would project a “comfortable and genteel image to their customers,” Kenneth Lipartito, a professor of history at Florida International University, wrote in a 1994 paper “When Women Were Switches.”

Companies rejected Black and ethnic workers with accents, and policies barred female operators from being married. By 1900, more than 80% of operators were White, single, US-born women.

Operator jobs were frenetic and repetitive.

Workers had to scan thousands of tiny jacks, always keeping an eye open for lights indicating new calls and ones that ended. During peak times, operators handled several hundred calls an hour, Lipartito said.

Training was also rigorous and procedures were strict. Women were instructed to modulate their voices to sound more polite answering calls and used approved language with callers.

“Through training in the art of inflection she gains in those gentler qualities of unfailing courtesy,” a 1926 AT&T video, “Training for Service,” says.

Although many of Bell’s independent telephone rivals began using “girlless” automated switchboards in the first decades of the twentieth century, the Bell System was committed to human operators. Automation could not provide the same level of personal service, Bell believed.

“She’s one of 250,000 girls who help to give you good service, day and night, seven days a week. She’s your telephone operator,” read one typical Bell Systems magazine ad.

Operators played a crucial function because telephone books were often inaccurate and customers could not be counted on to remember updated numbers and addresses.

During the first decades of exchanges, operators also unintentionally became a catch-all for information. It was common for people to call and ask the operator for directions, the time and weather, baseball scores and other questions.

By early part of the twentieth century, telephone companies began to separate requests for information and requests for telephone numbers.

In 1968, the Bell System changed the name of its information service to “directory assistance” because too many people were taking the name too literally.

“When she was called ‘Information,’ people kept calling her for the wrong reasons,” one Bell company ad said at the time. “Now we call her ‘Directory Assistance’ in the hope that you’ll call her only for numbers you can’t find in the phone book.”

Strikes, competition for labor, and rising wages during and after World War I drove Bell to speed up its automation plans.

In 1920, fewer than 5% of Bell exchanges had automated switchboards. A decade later, more than 30% were automated, according to a 2019 article by the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.

The growth of automatic switchboards led to the direct-dial telephone in the 1920s. (The “0” for operator appeared with dial phones, said Lauer from the University of New Hampshire. On the new Bell dials, “Operator” was printed in the “0” position. The use of “411” also emerged with the dial era. “0” became universal for operator assistance and “411” was the number for directory assistance. In later years, if you dialed “0 and asked for directory assistance, the operator would transfer you over to “411.”)

But electronic switchboards and direct dialing were phased in gradually and did not eliminate the need for human operators.

Automatic switchboards were mainly used for local telephone calls. For decades after the introduction of direct dialing, operators still handled long-distance calls, toll calls, and calls to the police and fire department. This meant that operator jobs continued to rise until around the 1970s.

Directory assistance was also mostly free for customers until the 1970s, when AT&T began charging customers to curb the “misuse” of the service and shift the high costs of employing operators and handling time-consuming queries for information.

“Some people just simply don’t want to bother to look the number up themselves,” AT&T’s chairman complained in 1974.

The breakup of AT&T in the 1980s and the deregulation of the telecommunications industry altered operator and directory services. Phone companies began to cut their ranks of operators, automate services and charge customers fees for calls.

As companies increased prices, demand for directory assistance plunged. Meanwhile, the internet and smartphones emerged to replace these services for most callers.

In 1984, there were 220,000 telephone operators. A decade later, there were 165,000, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. By 2004, at the dawn of the smartphone age, 56,000 people were employed as telephone operators.

David McGarty, the president of US Directory Assistance, which provides services for major carriers, has watched the transformation of the operator firsthand.

Calls to operators have decreased an average of 3% a year and around 90% overall since he started in 1996, he said.

“We’re content with riding the Titanic down,” he said.

While operator services may be nearly obsolete, it’s important to consider emergency circumstances where a caller may need to reach an operator and the customers who still rely on these services, such as low-income callers, the elderly and people with disabilities, said Edward Tenner, a technology historian in the Smithsonian’s Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation. (AT&T said it would still offer free directory assistance to elderly customers and people with disabilities.)

“Often tragedies happen when something is exceptional,” he said.

He also empathized with people who are being forced to keep up with technological change, whether they like it or not.

“There are a lot of people who, for various reasons, haven’t adapted,” Tenner said. “Why should they be forced to migrate to the web if they don’t want to?”

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January 7, 2023
Airtel goes live with 5G Plus services in Assam’s capital city of Guwahati

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Telecommunications service provider Bharti Airtel on Monday announced the launch of its 5G services in Guwahati. Airtel 5G Plus services will be available to customers in a phased manner as the company continues to construct its network and complete the roll out, the company said in a statement.

According to Rajnish Verma, CEO, Bharti Airtel, Assam and North East, “Airtel customers can now experience ultrafast network and enjoy speeds upto 20-30 times faster than the current 4G speeds. We are in the process of lighting up the entire city which will allow customers to enjoy superfast access to high-definition video streaming, gaming, multiple chatting, instant uploading of photos and more.”

The company has also stated that customers with 5G enabled devices will enjoy high speed Airtel 5G Plus network at no extra cost until the roll out is more widespread. Currently operational at G S Road, Guwahati medical College and Hospital (GMCH), Dispur College, Ganeshguri, Christian Basti, Sree Nagar, Zoo Road, Lachit Nagar, Ulubari, Bhangagarh and Beltola and few other select locations, Airtel will augment its network making its services available across the city in due course of time.

Airtel 5G Plus will allow superfast access to high-definition video streaming, gaming, multiple chatting, instant uploading of photos and more, the company said. “With this launch, India will get a fillip to economic growth as Airtel 5G Plus revolutionises education, healthcare, manufacturing, agriculture, mobility and logistics,” it highlighted.

The company had first announced 5G Plus in October, with initial availability limited to eight cities — Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Siliguri, Nagpur, and Varanasi. It has since expanded the service to include Panipat and Gurugram. Recently, the company also announced the deployment of its Airtel 5G Plus service at Pune Lohegaon airport as well as at the Lal Bahadur Shastri International Airport of Varanasi.

Also Read: Airtel 5G now available in Pune airport: when will you get to use Airtel 5G on your phone?

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November 21, 2022
Millions in federal grants awarded for rural Alaska internet

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ANCHORAGE, Alaska — More than $100 million in grants have been announced by the federal government as part of a major effort to close the digital divide in parts of rural Alaska.

The projects will improve upon an existing system of internet service that is a series of microwave transmitters with limited data transmission and vulnerability to bad weather, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

The grants include $73 million for a partnership between the Alaska Native village corporation for Bethel, Bethel Native Corporation, and telecommunications company GCI. That partnership, announced Monday, is aimed at delivering fiber cable to 10 villages and more than 10,000 people. The project has been dubbed the Airraq Network, with Airraq translating to “string that tells the story,” according to a press release.

The project includes $42 million from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to build a fiber network to the regional hub community of Bethel and villages of Eek, Oscarville, Napaskiak and Platinum, according to the statement. A $31 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Utilities Service program will bring fiber service to the villages of Atmautluak, Kasigluk, Nunapitchuk, Quinhagak and Tuntutuliak.

The statement said the project would bring “2 gigabit internet speeds and affordable plans to more than 10,000 Alaskans.”

Separately, another telecommunications company, Alaska Communications and Calista Corp., the Alaska Native regional corporation for much of southwest Alaska, will receive a grant from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to bring high-speed fiber internet to more than 2,300 Alaskans in seven other villages in the Bethel region, the organizations announced recently. Those communities are Lower Kalskag, Upper Kalskag, Tuluksak, Akiak, Akiachak, Kwethluk and Napakiak.

Calista Corp. and Alaska Communications applied for about $52 million but a specific funding award had not been announced by the federal government as of Monday, said Thom Leonard, a Calista spokesperson.

Funding from last year’s federal infrastructure bill and other sources has been lauded by political leaders and officials with Alaska Native organizations and telecommunications companies as providing a unique opportunity to improve telecommunications in many parts of the state.

Earlier this year, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration announced a $50 million grant to provide fiber-optic cable to about 20 villages in Alaska’s Interior as part of a collaboration between Doyon Inc., an Alaska Native corporation, and Alaska Communications.

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October 11, 2022
FBI warns consumers not to use public phone charging stations | CNN Business

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The FBI is warning consumers against using public phone charging stations in order to avoid exposing their devices to malicious software.

Public USB stations like the kind found at malls and airports are being used by bad actors to spread malware and monitoring software, according to a tweet last week from the FBI’s Denver branch. The agency did not provide any specific examples.

“Carry your own charger and USB cord and use an electrical outlet instead,” the agency advised in the tweet.

While public charging stations are attractive to many when devices are running critically low on battery, security experts have for years raised concerns about the risk. In 2011, researchers coined the term “juice jacking” to describe the problem.

“Just by plugging your phone into a [compromised] power strip or charger, your device is now infected, and that compromises all your data,” Drew Paik, formerly of security firm Authentic8, explained to CNN in 2017.

The cord you use to charge your phone is also used to send data from your phone to other devices. For instance, when you plug your iPhone into your Mac with the charging cord, you can download photos from your phone to your computer.

If a port is compromised, there’s no limit to what information a hacker could take, Paik previously explained to CNN. That includes your email, text messages, photos and contacts.

“The FBI regularly provides reminders and public service announcements in conjunction with our partners,” Vikki Migoya, public affairs officer at the FBI’s Denver branch, told CNN. “This was a general reminder for the American public to stay safe and diligent, especially while traveling.”

The Federal Communications Commission also updated a blog post on Tuesday warning that a corrupted charging port can allow a malicious actor to lock a device or extract personal data and passwords.

“In some cases, criminals may have intentionally left cables plugged in at charging stations,” according to the FCC blog post. “There have even been reports of infected cables being given away as promotional gifts.”

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April 12, 2021