Broadband News
Fri, 09th Nov 2018
Optus half-year profits fall by a fifth due to NBN migration charges
Optus has seen a 20% fall in profits year-on-year for the first half of its 2018 fiscal year, with Australia's second biggest telco reporting $259 million in net profit for the period against $325 million for the first half a year ago.
Source: iTWire
Thu, 08th Nov 2018
Optus 4G availability tops 90 percent: OpenSignal
Telstra has the fastest 4G speeds, Optus has the highest 4G availability, and Vodafone has the lowest latency, according to OpenSignal's latest report.
Source: ZDNet Australia
NBN Co faces FTTC skills squeeze
NBN Co is on track to complete the roll out of its network by June 2020 but the government-owned company is still dealing with a range of engineering challenges, according to its chief network deployment officer, Kathrine Dyer.
Source: Computerworld
How the NBN rollout avoided sacred sites
Providing NBN coverage across areas such as Alice Springs and Broome involved circumventing Indigenous sacred sites, the company's chief network deployment officer has described.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Vodafone's infrastructure boost to combat 'not great' iPhone launches
Vodafone Australia provisioned extra cloud infrastructure and set up new monitoring systems for Apple’s iPhone XS and XS Max launch to avoid a repeat of last year when its sites fell over due to the load.
Source: iTnews Australia
Optus to launch 5G across Canberra and Brisbane in January
Singtel's first-half FY19 financial results report said Optus would launch 5G first in Canberra and Brisbane at the start of next year, with Australia's remaining capital cities to follow by March 2019.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Wed, 07th Nov 2018
Rushed My Health Record changes still missing the point
The Australian government seems obsessed with pushing everyone into its centralised digital health records system before they've even finished working out the rules. Why is that?
Source: ZDNet Australia
My Health Record data misuse penalties raised
Employers have been barred from using health data to discriminate against current or potential employees.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Tue, 06th Nov 2018
Web creator Berners-Lee launches contract for better internet
Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, has launched a campaign to persuade governments, companies and individuals to sign a "Contract for the Web" set of principles designed to defend a free and open internet.
Source: iTnews Australia
Mon, 05th Nov 2018
Seven per cent of NBN customers still on half the speed they pay for
Thousands of Australians are still getting less than half the home internet speeds they're paying for, according to the latest data on NBN fixed-line connections.
Source: SMH
NBN users may cop speed hit from sub-wholesalers
Internet users whose service providers are directly linked to NBN Co are likely to see better speeds than those whose provider connects to the NBN through a sub-wholesaler, new numbers show.
Source: iTnews Australia
TPG takes out third NBN speed-monitoring report
The ACCC has said TPG is delivering the highest percentage of maximum download and upload speeds to its NBN customers, with Telstra retaining the lowest latency, while MyRepublic came last across most categories.
Source: ZDNet Australia
ACCC NBN performance figures reveal minimal peak-time speed hit
The latest figures from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s broadband performance monitoring regime reveal only a 1 per cent hit to the speeds encountered by households with NBN service during the busy 7-11pm period.
Source: Computerworld
TPG delivers NBN's fastest speeds in busy periods
TPG has delivered an average download speed on the NBN of 88.7 per cent, making it the fastest ISP tracked by the consumer watchdog.
Source: ARN
Union asks who will fix flaws if Telstra sacks tech workers
The union that covers Telstra workers has pointed out that the nationwide outage suffered by the telco came soon after the company announced the sacking of 360 technical field employees.
Source: iTWire
Telstra outage hits monitoring of offenders in SA
A nationwide Telstra outage has led to hundreds of offenders in South Australia, who were wearing electronic tracking devices, going unmonitored for more than 24 hours.
Source: iTWire
Fri, 02nd Nov 2018
NBN blinked when big Australian telcos had their CVC pants down: Aussie Broadband
NBN was the first to blink after Australia's retailers would not purchase enough CVC capacity, bringing down its wholesale pricing as a result, Aussie Broadband's MD has told ZDNet.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Telstra M2M problem affects ATMs, EFTPOS terminals
Telstra has confirmed a problem is affecting its machine to machine (M2M) data services.
Source: Computerworld
NBN withdraws pricing variation from ACCC
NBN has told the ACCC it wants longer to explore wholesale pricing options following the success of its Focus on 50 discounts, as well as the launch of its new bundles.
Source: ZDNet Australia
ACCC wary of NBN price shock for telcos, consumers
NBN Co has gone back to the drawing board in an effort to come up with changes to a key agreement governing its wholesale operations that will offer it flexibility but be acceptable to Australia’s competition and consumer watchdog.
Source: Computerworld
Optus staff told to please customers or face sack: report
The head of Australia's second biggest telecommunications company has told staff that they would be fired if they upset customers, a report claims.
Source: iTWire
Thu, 01st Nov 2018
NBN Co to cull 200 network ops roles
NBN Co is set to cut 200 roles from its network engineering and operations division before the end of the year.
Source: iTnews Australia
iiNet founder Michael Malone joins nano-satellite company
iiNet founder Michael Malone has been appointed as the chairman for Perth-headquartered satellite company Sky and Space Global, effective 1 November.
Source: ARN
Wed, 31st Oct 2018
NBN Co staff reap $42.7m in bonus payments
NBN Co’s senior executives shared $1.96 million in bonuses in the last financial year, despite a $2 billion cost blowout on the project and rollout delays.
Source: iTnews Australia
China bolsters VPN blocks ahead of major trade, internet shows
Chinese authorities have stepped up efforts to block virtual private networks (VPN), service providers said on Tuesday in describing a "cat and mouse" game with censors ahead of a major trade expo and internet conference.
Source: iTnews Australia
Tue, 30th Oct 2018
Don’t protect NBN from 5G competition: ACCC head
The head of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has warned the government against any move to protect NBN Co’s network from the competitive pressure of emerging mobile technologies.
Source: Computerworld
5G stakes couldn't be higher so we advised Huawei ban: ASD
High-risk vendors could previously be confined to the edge of networks, but 5G changes that, the Australian Signals Directorate has said.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Telstra adds 4G voice to NBN smart modem
The Telstra Smart Modem Gen 2 will provide 4G voice failover in the event of a broadband outage or a delay in migrating to NBN services.
Source: ZDNet Australia
NBN Co launches 1Gbps Enterprise Ethernet services
NBN Co has launched its flagship business product, with Australian businesses now able to order Enterprise Ethernet services delivered over the National Broadband Network.
Source: Computerworld
Telstra's new modems mean NBN outages won't kill your home phone
The Smart Modem Gen 2 will use Telstra's 4G mobile network to supply internet and phone calls in the event of an outage, at no extra cost.
Source: SMH