Broadband News
Mon, 29th Jul 2019
Telstra warns NSW influencing Australia-wide mobile costs
Telstra has warned of national repercussions to its mobile network costs if a draft plan by NSW on the rents levied on telcos to host infrastructure on public land is allowed to proceed.
Source: iTnews Australia
Google quiet on ACCC browser monopoly concerns
The search giant used its response to the ACCC to say its advertising platforms help publishers make more money online and drive traffic.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Fri, 26th Jul 2019
ACT Policing had an unauthorised metadata access party 3249 more times in 2015
ACT Policing has confessed that it found 3,249 extra times it accessed metadata without proper authorisation during 2015, on top of the 116 requests disclosed earlier this year.
Source: ZDNet Australia
ACCC Digital Platforms report calls for sweeping reforms
The Australian Consumer and Competition Commission’s Digital Platforms Inquiry has delivered its long-awaited final report, and it recommends a raft of far-reaching regulatory changes to curb the powers of web giants in Australia, and make them more responsible for content they distribute.
Source: iTnews Australia
Thu, 25th Jul 2019
Boomers and Coalition voters least worried by metadata and encryption laws
Almost 40% of those aged over 55, as well as Coalition voters, are not concerned by the introduction of Australia's encryption laws, according to Digital Rights Watch.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Never-Googlers take the ultimate step to guard their data
To take back control of their online data, a hearty few are trying to eliminate all things Google.
Source: SMH
Telstra CEO Penn costed, then rejected, call centre repatriation
Telstra ran the numbers on bringing all of its call centres back to Australia, and decided against it on grounds of cost and complexity.
Source: iTnews Australia
Wed, 24th Jul 2019
Dutton defends metadata protections, claims consequences exist for breaches
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton has defended the checks and protections within Australia's data retention regime, following the tabling yesterday of a Commonwealth Ombudsman's report that was released in February.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Telstra, Ericsson claim first 5G standalone call in Australia
Telstra and Ericsson claim to have completed Australia's first end-to-end 5G standalone call at the 5G Innovation Centre on the Gold Coast, over the 3.6GHz spectrum and using Ericsson's Baseband 6630, Radio AIR6488 and a 5G SA device based on a MediaTek chipset.
Source: iTWire
More than 10 million now able to connect to NBN, says network builder
More than 10 million homes and businesses are now able to connect to the NBN network with less than twelve months of the build remaining.
Source: iTWire
Tue, 23rd Jul 2019
Police cop the most blame for illegal telco metadata searches
Police agencies made a series of illegal - or otherwise problematic - telecommunications metadata searches between 2015 and mid-2017, according to the Commonwealth Ombudsman.
Source: iTnews Australia
Data retention costs Australian telcos upwards of AU$210 million to date
Law enforcement agencies have stumped up only AU$39 million to poke around in Australia's metadata.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Ericsson and Telstra make standalone 5G call
Telstra and Ericsson have teamed up to make what the pair are calling first end-to-end 5G standalone call in the southern hemisphere at Telstra's 5G Innovation Centre on the Gold Coast.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Law Council wants warrants and crime threshold for metadata retention scheme
Agencies that are allowed to view metadata should be spelled out in legislation, Law Council of Australia states.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Mon, 22nd Jul 2019
Govt to reintroduce consumer data right bill
The government will reintroduce legislation for the consumer data right (CDR) to parliament this week after it lapsed without passage when parliament was dissolved back in April.
Source: iTnews Australia
Fri, 19th Jul 2019
Telstra ‘seeking to position’ itself for NBN purchase, unions claim
The unions at the centre of Telstra bargaining talks have fuelled speculation that the telco is priming itself to buy the National Broadband Network (NBN).
Source: ARN
Encryption laws to run up against CLOUD Act and GDPR: Law Council
Australia's encryption laws are unlikely to be compatible with the United States' CLOUD Act, as well as the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation, the Law Council of Australia has said.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Thu, 18th Jul 2019
NBN Sky Muster Plus satellite trial averages 43Mbps
Trial users of NBN Co’s Sky Muster Plus service had a quarter of their data use unmetered and averaged 43Mbps speeds, according to retail service provider SkyMesh.
Source: iTnews Australia
'Australia can trust Huawei': executive says 5G mobile ban is the 'wrong decision'
One of Huawei's top global executives says the Federal Government got it wrong a year ago when it banned the Chinese telco giant from supplying equipment to Australia's new 5G mobile network.
Source: ABC News
Wed, 17th Jul 2019
Chorus has over 50% of NZ broadband on fibre
Peak data usage on its network now above 2Tbps, a 77% increase on June 2017 numbers.
Source: ZDNet Australia
NSW Police smash fake telco technician scam syndicate
NSW Police has dismantled a Sydney-based syndicate whose members posed as telecoms technicians and convinced victims to enable remote access on their computers to fix a “security flaw in their internet”.
Source: iTnews Australia
NBN HFC field test hits 994Mbps download speeds
The National Broadband Network (NBN) has conducted a DOCSIS 3.1 test on a customer's hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) line at Templestowe, Victoria that has clocked in at 994Mbps.
Source: ZDNet Australia
NBN Co hits gigabit HFC downloads with in-field DOCSIS 3.1 trial
NBN Co says it hit speeds of up to 994 megabits per second over a hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) connection during an in-field trial of DOCSIS 3.1 technology.
Source: Computerworld
Home Affairs could tap telcos for MAC and IP addresses, port numbers
The Department of Home Affairs has raised the prospect of forcing Australian telcos to capture an expanded range of user data including MAC addresses, IP addresses and port numbers under mandatory data retention laws.
Source: iTnews Australia
Tue, 16th Jul 2019
Home Affairs floats making telcos retain MAC addresses and port numbers
Soon it might just be easier for Australia's telcos to keep a copy of every TCP or UDP header for the cops to poke through.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Optus fears storage cost blowout to retain 5G metadata
Optus is concerned its data storage costs could blow out if Australia’s data retention regime is not “reviewed and calibrated” to deal with the arrival of 5G networks.
Source: iTnews Australia
Optus gained exemption to store metadata unencrypted
Optus has confessed it received an exemption to keep its legacy systems free from encryption when complying with Australia's data retention scheme.
Source: ZDNet Australia
Vodafone to refund customers over direct carrier billing charges
Vodafone has become the latest telco to offer refunds for their so-called ‘direct carrier billing’ service after customers were unknowingly charged for third-party apps and games.
Source: ARN
Fri, 12th Jul 2019
Retailers demand Telstra pay for massive payments outage
Key leaders in Australia’s retail industry say Telstra should be on the hook for compensation for lost sales resulting from Thursday’s national outage that crippled payment systems for around half the trading day after all major banks, merchant EFTPOS terminals and ATMs were knocked offline.
Source: iTnews Australia
myGov system goes down; Telstra blames 'traffic' for yesterday's outage
The myGov system is experiencing technical problems, denying people online access to the ATO, Medicare and Centrelink. Meanwhile, Telstra has blamed "unusually large traffic" in NSW for yesterday's payments outage.
Source: ABC News