Morning Broadband Bytes1) Get coffee 2) Read Morning Broadband Bytes 3) Start day ( old news - 05:28AM Tuesday Nov 30 2004) Inside Todays Bytes:
•Around the Industry:
SBC VoIP fee furor draws eyes to BellSouth program
Tony Blair's broadband scheme canned
Verizon pitches 11th-hour deal on Philly Wi-Fi
Commentary: The FCC wields too much tech power
Ex-virus writer questioned over Slammer worm
Controversy over free municipal wi-fi networks grips Spain
•SecurityBits:
Microsoft confirms WINS flaw
Newly mutated Skulls cell phone virus now comes loaded with Cabir Bluetooth worm
•Get more news from around the industry and SecurityBits, plus TidBytes... inside!... . Around The Industry:• SBC VoIP fee furor draws eyes to BellSouth program: While SBC drew considerable fire for a service offering to Internet telephony providers, BellSouth has been selling similar services for more than a year without any protest--until the SBC furor. BellSouth began in mid-2003 to sell wholesale access services that let Internet phone providers complete customer calls on BellSouth's local phone network. The service package raises the costs to Internet phone companies, which is what drew criticism when SBC unveiled its Tiptop service package last week.• Tony Blair's broadband scheme canned: The UK Government's broadband plans are in tatters following the implosion of a key strategy designed to aggregate public sector demand for broadband. Nine regional Government bodies and an umbrella organisation at the DTI began work pooling £1bn of public sector spending on broadband. Less than a year later the central body is closing and the most regionals are following. Critics claim this is yet another IT cock-up by the Government which has spent three years and millions of pounds on a project which always looked destined for the rubbish bin.• Verizon pitches 11th-hour deal on Philly Wi-Fi: Verizon is vying to let off the pressure for Philly’s plans on citywide Wi-Fi. Before the Governor’s deadline to veto or sign the bill (November 30 at midnight) Verizon and city officials are in talks to allow the project to continue. But the talks may be moot. Some say Verizon doesn’t have the power to grant exceptions to the law, regardless of any deal it cuts with Philly. This bill is turning out to be a flashpoint between municipalities, broadband users, and existing telecom companies.• Commentary: The FCC wields too much tech power: The FCC basically states that even though Congress has never given it specific rights to control TV equipment, Congress also never said "that the FCC lacks general rule-making authority over television receiving equipment." Combine this with the claim that the FCC has control over all messages sent and received via either radio or wire-based communications, and you're looking at the FCC having control over the entire Internet and every piece of equipment that connects to it.• Ex-virus writer questioned over Slammer worm: Czech police are questioning a former member of the 29A virus writers' club over the Slammer worm, and confiscated computers from his home. "[The virus writer] has always said that he never released his viruses into the wild, so it will be interesting to see if any charges will be brought against him." However, he has published viral source code which may have acted as an encouragement for others to cause damage. Benny was recently employed by the AV company Zoner software.• Controversy over free municipal wi-fi networks grips Spain: The city of Barcelona recently suspended its free wi-fi service providing access to public interest websites, after the Spanish telecommunications market regulator said the service was infringing competition rules. Other municipal wi-fi networks are also under threat. The city of Barcelona’s "Sensefils" (wireless in catalan) wi-fi service allowed users to connect free of charge to a number of websites considered to be of public interest, most of them from public entities.• Commentary: Is Microsoft creating tomorrow's IE security holes today?: Up to now, it has been somewhat excusable: much of the software codebase we use every day was written long before we heard about things like buffer overflows and canonicalization. Security certainly wasn't high on that list because back then no one switched browsers for security purposes. Rapid development cycles won the browser wars. But today people do switch browsers for security purposes and Microsoft is losing customers to competing browsers.• Notre Dame tries to stay ahead of telecom trends with hosted VoIP deal: Notre Dame likes having the 631 dialing exchange exclusive to the school. It also isn't eager to run its own phone system. And it wants technology flexible enough to adapt to new services and applications. That's why Notre Dame decided to sign a multimillion contract for a hosted VoIP system that will be deployed over the next several years and eventually serve around 16,000 students, faculty, and staff. It is one of the largest hosted VoIP contracts to date, according to industry analysts and SBC. • 802.11 standard modified for Japan: The IEEE has approved an amendment to IEEE 802.11 that will enable WLAN vendors to offer wireless products that adapt to new frequencies, different channel widths, and operating parameters for indoor and outdoor use in Japan. The standard, designated IEEE 802.11j takes advantage of spectrum and technology that has emerged since the original IEEE 802.11 standard was written in 1997.• VoIP price war: Startup's offer lowers the VOIP price floor still further: SunRocket, a VoIP startup whose founders hail from MCI, has come up with a new consumer-scale calling package that brings the monthly unlimited charge down to $16.58—if subscribers sign up for a year. For the remainder of 2004, SunRocket is even throwing in a premium—a Uniden multi-headset cordless phone with base station, and a companion satellite extension.• BT to launch division for broadband content: BT announced it is creating a new division called BT Entertainment within its Retail consumer business to drive BT's broadband activities in entertainment and education. The new business will have a strategic brief to enable content providers to reach broadband customers through platforms and services backed by the quality of the BT brand. It will develop, license and bring to market content value added services such as on-demand music, gaming, TV and movies.• BT: VoIP not a threat, but an opportunity: The emergence of useable VoIP services is not a threat to BT but an opportunity, said the telco. BT, like other telcos, faces a loss of revenue if free VoIP services such as Skype take off. Incumbent operators across Europe are beginning to realise they have to work with VoIP. "VoIP is out of the closet in Europe," he said. "We have seen a lot of activity from incumbents" who, he said, used to talk about VoIP as being a flea on an elephant. "Now they talk about how it will impact their revenues."SecurityBits:• Microsoft confirms WINS flaw: MS has issued a workaround for a newly discovered security issue in WINS (Windows Internet Name Service) that could make it possible for an attacker to take control of a WINS server remotely. The issue affects Windows NT 4.0 Server, Windows NT Server 4.0 Terminal Server Edition, Windows 2000 Server, and Windows Server 2003. Win2000 Pro, WinXP and WinME are not affected by this vulnerability, according to MS. By default, WINS is not installed on any versions of Windows.• Newly mutated Skulls cell phone virus now comes loaded with Cabir Bluetooth worm: AV vendors have spotted a new strain of the "Skulls" Trojan sneaking into Symbian-based cell phones, and this one drops the Cabir worm on the devices. Skulls.B is similar to the Trojan discovered last week in the Nokia 7610 smart phone. However, while the original "Skulls" Trojan simply disabled the smart-phone functionality on the handset, the new version also infects the device with Cabir, a worm that uses the Bluetooth protocol to copy itself onto devices as far as 30 feet away.• Scammers exploit domainKeys anti-phishing weapon: In a week that saw analysts declare a 500% increase in global phishing activity over the previous quarter, experts are warning of new attacks that not only circumvent the fledgling DomainKeys system but also use the technology to their advantage. DomainKeys is regarded by many in the security community as one of the best hopes for preventing spammers and phishers from forging e-mail addresses.• Silicom integrates "tapping" device directly into network cards : Silicom has enhanced its multi-port, security-oriented, Ethernet network adapters by the addition of a "tapping" device that allows for non-intrusive network monitoring, sniffing, analysis, and troubleshooting without compromising connectivity or traffic flow. By integrating "tapping" devices directly into the adapters, the company claims, the cost, footprint, and number of components can be reduced when designing networks, while increasing reliability.TidBytes:• Canadian Inventor Lets Everyone Be an Armchair Spy• UK's biggest spammer goes berserk, then goes AWOL• Computer Firms Score Poorly In Privacy, Customer Response• Gartner: Third Of Top PC Vendors Gone In Three Years• Online Shopping Has Its Brightest 'Black Friday'• 'Ringback' Tones May Be Next Big Thing• First look at PlayStation 3 chip• New DVR may have video on demand
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 mwf
join:2000-11-26
Granite Quarry, NC | Directv's DVR that the savings could be passed to consumers
Everyone who believes that, hold your breath. | |
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Derch
Premium
join:2004-10-16
Tulsa, OK | Philly and Verizon I really don't get how Philly has to "talk" with Verizon. It's like going to bed with a cash cow. | |
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newbie 60
@psea.hawkcommunicati
| Satellite broadband I would like an opinion on using DirecWay Satellite broadband, or any other, for our business. I looked on the internet for any rep (bad or otherwise) on it but all I got was massive links to DirecWay, DirecTV, PCWorld etc... This site looked like I might get an honest, yet humorous, response to my query.
Thanks | |
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