Mobile infrastructure must catch up with user needs and demands. Ubiquitous mobile computing is all around us. Some time in the next six months, the number of smartphones on earth will pass the number of PCs. As the power and capability of many mobile devices increases, the increased demand on networks. We watch more videos, and listen to music on our phones. Mobile Data Traffic To Grow 300% Globally By 2017 Led By Video, Web Use. Mobile network operators would have had an easier life if it wasn’t for smartphones and the flood of data traffic they initiated, and soon there will be also very many Internet of Things devices. Businesses and consumers want more bandwidth for less money.
More and more network bandwidth is being used by video: Netflix And YouTube Account For Over 50% Of Peak Fixed Network Data In North America. Netflix remains the biggest pig in the broadband python, representing 31.6% of all downstream Internet traffic in North America during primetime. In other parts of the world, YouTube is the biggest consumer of bandwidth. In Europe, YouTube represented of 28.7% of downstream traffic.
Gartner: Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends For 2014 expects that Software Defined Anything is a new mega-trend in data centers. Software-defined anything (SDx) is defined by “improved standards for infrastructure programmability and data center interoperability driven by automation inherent to cloud computing, DevOps and fast infrastructure provisioning.” Dominant vendors in a given sector of an infrastructure-type may elect not to follow standards that increase competition and lower margins, but end-customer will benefit from simplicity, cost reduction opportunities, and the possibility for consolidation. More hype around Software-Defined-Everything will keep the marketeers and the marchitecture specialists well employed for the next twelve months but don’t expect anything radical.
Software defined technologies are coming quickly to telecom operator networks with Network Functions Virtualisation (NFV). Intel and rather a lot of telcos want networks to operate like data centres. Today’s networks are mostly based around proprietary boxes designed to do very specific jobs. It used to be that way in the server business too until cheap generic x86 boxes took most of the market. The idea in NFV is that low-cost x86 servers can successfully many of those those pricey proprietary boxes currently attached to base-stations and other parts of the network. This scents a shift in the mood of the telcos themselves. This change is one that they want, and rather a lot of them are working together to make it happen. So the future mobile network will have more and more x86 and ARM based generic computing boxes running on Linux.
With the introduction of Network Functions Virtualisation base stations will have new functions built into them. For example NSN has announced a mobile edge computing platform that enables mobile base stations to host data and run apps. Think of this as an internet cloud server that’s really close to the customer.
Hybrid Cloud and IT as Service Broker are talked about. Telecom companies and cloud service providers are selling together service packages that have both connectivity and cloud storage sold as single service. Gartner suggests that bringing together personal clouds and external private cloud services is essential.
The type of device one has will be less important, as the personal or public cloud takes over some of the role. The push for more personal cloud technologies will lead to a shift toward services and away from devices, but there are also cases where where there is a great incentive to exploit the intelligence and storage of the client device. Gartner suggests that now through 2018, a variety of devices, user contexts, and interaction paradigms will make “everything everywhere” strategies unachievable, although many would like to see this working.
“Internet of Things” gets more push. The Internet is expanding into enterprise assets and consumer items such as cars and televisions. The concept of “Internet of Things” will evolve a step toward The Internet of Everything. Gartner identifies four basic usage models that are emerging: Manage, Monetize, Operate, Extend. The Internet of Things (IoT) will evolve into the Web of Things, increasing the coordination between things in the real world and their counterparts on the Web. The Industrial Internet of Things will be talked about. IoT takes advantage of mobile devices’ and sensors’ ability to observe and monitor their environments
Car of the future is M2M-ready and has Ethernet. Many manufacturers taking an additional step to develop vehicle connectivity. One such example is the European Commission’s emergency eCall system, which is on target for installation in every new car by 2015.
Smart Home Systems Are on the Rise article tells that most automated technology is found in commercial buildings that feature automated lighting that changes in intensity depending on the amount of sunlight present. Some of these buildings have WiFi incorporated into their lighting systems. There will be new and affordable technology on the market, but people today are still reluctant to bring automation to their homes.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Intel Releases SD-Card-Sized PC, Unveils Next 14nm Chip
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/14/09/09/1934241/intel-releases-sd-card-sized-pc-unveils-next-14nm-chip
They’ve launched their Edison board, which features an x86 based SoC running at 100 MHz. The footprint measures 35.5mm x 25.0mm and offers a 70-pin connector to break out 40 pins for add-on hardware.
Intel is pushing to break into both wearable devices and household devices
Tomi Engdahl says:
Twitter, Netflix and Reddit hold net neutrality protest
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-29127179
Twitter, Netflix and Reddit will take part in an “internet slowdown” protest in favour of net neutrality on Wednesday.
They are among dozens of firms worried that proposed new regulations will mean extra charges for fast internet access.
The US Federal Communications Commission said its proposals were designed to protect net neutrality.
Many groups taking part will display the spinning wheel, an icon for slow loading speed, but will run normally.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Holy sentient blender, Batman: Telefónica to trial AT&T’s Internet of Home Stuff in Europe
We don’t know WHERE, but it’s coming for our houses
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/10/telefonica_att_digital_life_trial/
Telefónica will be trialling AT&T’s home security tech in Europe as the US firm tries to get its foot in the door of the Internet of Stuff.
The Spanish company is licensing the tech for limited trials on this side of the pond, after which it will decide if it’s worth signing up for a longer term. The trial will be a version of AT&T’s Digital Life, which monitors the home and automates and controls systems like lights, thermostats and doors in an integrated app.
“The collaboration between Telefónica and AT&T gives OEMs and developers another channel to extend new services to global markets.”
AT&T released Digital Life in the US early last year and has set it up to allow other firms to license the tech for their own versions.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Intel Gives Makers Upgraded Edison
Smartphone chip powers IoT drive
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1323841&
Tomi Engdahl says:
Small Cells Tipped by Big 3
AlcaLu, Ericsson, Nokia vie in LTE
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1323815&
Nokia Networks, Ericsson, and Alcatel-Lucent announced updates to their respective small cell base stations, migrating to LTE-Advanced with features such as carrier aggregation and easier connections to heterogeneous networks. The pico cells are slated for indoor use and traditionally cover between 32 and 100 users, though one analyst says the market for such devices is still small.
Ericsson expects mobile traffic to grow by a factor of 10 by 2019, creating a host of issues.
Petter Blomberg, strategic product manager for small cells at Ericsson, told EE Times:
We have 10 million small commercial buildings that are facing issues with reliable mobile coverage. At the same time, spectrum constraints are the next sustainability challenge that is facing the IT industry. Smaller buildings have same capacity requirements as larger counterparts as well as outdoor networks. Users are getting used to upgrading their mobile devices fairly often, so you get more and more demanding applications.
The companies are attempting to expand their base stations through easily configurable small cells, offering a variety of software programs to get the pico base stations online easily and align with outdoor devices.
For example, Nokia’s Flexi Zone G2 Pico platform can work as a standalone deployment or as a cluster that operates as a large cell in the network. Ericsson officials estimate that one of its RBS 6402 units can cover approximately 10,000 square feet and 128 LTE users. Alcatel-Lucent’s 9962 Multi-Standard Enterprise Cell was developed with Qualcomm as a plug-and-play device.
Small cells will take off about a year after major LTE deployments, and a decline in macro cell shipments will follow as those larger outdoor cells will already be in place.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Internet of Things is a money making internet
Intel’s mega event, the actual first day went heavily IoT marks. Major product releases is not just seen, even more focused on the IOT-world (internet of things)-intensive business opportunities.
Intel is taking the partners of traditional technology companies from outside. The big problem with the proliferation of new product groups Krzanich sees technology’s reluctance to cooperate with your bounds. Engineers know how to do this in a functioning technology – but ugly creations does anyone want to buy.
Top designers in turn create objects that all they want, but they lack the intellect.
Internet of Things deputy director of the Department Doug Davis brought up the existing IoT solutions. Special to get to Africa were in use in the living rhinoceros horn to the network of poachers case, Heathrow Airport smart pisuars, and Spire- Pepsi soda vending machine, which gives the thirst for the opportunity to mix drinks according to your taste, the taste of the audience and reported directly to Pepsi’s R & D Department.
Concrete IoT technologies savings arrived at the present Saia-transport company boss Brian Balius, the company’s trucks was installed Vnomicsin intelligent devices to optimize the transport. Year savings amounted to only fuel the cost of 4 million dollars.
Internet of Things must therefore be punting analysts say that as much as 19 trillion dollars worth. Davis illustrated by calculating the amount of money that the pot enough to 2500 bucks every single one of the world’s inhabitants.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/blogit/uutiskommentti/esineiden+internet+on+rahanteon+internet/a1010321
Tomi Engdahl says:
FCC may put mobile under same Net neutrality rules as wired broadband
The past double standard is a big issue in many public comments, FCC Chairman Wheeler said
http://www.infoworld.com/d/mobile-technology/fcc-may-put-mobile-under-same-net-neutrality-rules-wired-broadband-250173
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission is reexamining how it treats wireless net neutrality, in response to public comments on the agency’s proposed Open Internet rules.
Under the Net neutrality rules the FCC set in 2010, wireless was set apart from wired access and mobile operators were given more leeway to treat some streams of traffic differently from others. But that distinction is a major concern for “tens of thousands” of people who have commented on the agency’s new proposal, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said today.
An open Internet encourages innovation, which in turn drives network use and infrastructure buildout, Wheeler said. “Mobile wireless broadband is a key component of that virtuous cycle,” he said.
The wireless industry’s role has changed since 2010, with LTE delivering higher speeds that in some places are comparable to wired services. In 2010, there were only 200,000 LTE subscribers in the U.S., and now there are 120 million, with networks reaching 300 million residents, Wheeler said.
Carriers should be allowed “reasonable network management” to ensure their networks run properly, but the FCC will hold them strictly to that definition, he said, citing his recent letter to Verizon Wireless that attacked the carrier’s plan to throttle speeds for some subscribers with unlimited data plans.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How APIs Will Change the Future of the Internet of Things
http://www.syncano.com/how-api-will-change-internet-of-things/
The dawn of the Application Programming Interface (API) has been an exciting time for developers who are passionate about the coming world of connectivity. There are currently over 11,000 APIs listed on programmableweb.com. With an increase in demand and requirements for Internet of Things apps, more and more APIs will emerge to support fast growth in three major ways:
1. Merging front-end and backend development
2. Faster development times
3. More complex user experiences
By using multiple APIs in unison, you’ll be able to create applications that mix and match a variety of functions to create “modern” user experiences that synchronize every aspect of someone’s life. How else would your thermostat talk to your windows, and your windows to your light bulbs? Conjoined APIs that deliver these fully integrated experiences will be the nucleus of the Internet of Things.
Tomi Engdahl says:
T-Mobile will give you a customized router for better Wi-Fi calling
https://gigaom.com/2014/09/10/t-mobile-will-give-you-a-customized-router-for-better-wi-fi-calling/
After Apple announced Wi-Fi calling support in iOS 8, T-Mobile reemphasized its long-term commitment to the UMA standard, complete with a new free router for subscribers that prioritizes voice calls over other traffic.
Tomi Engdahl says:
“Internet Slowdown Day” sends over 111,000* new comments on net neutrality to FCC
http://e-pluribusunum.com/2014/09/11/internet-slowdown-day-sends-over-111000-new-comments-on-net-neutrality-to-fcc/
Tomi Engdahl says:
IDF: Tabula Unleashes Extreme FPGA-Based Coms & Server Boards
Intel silicon photonics on board
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1323852&
A few years ago, Tabula was often in the news with regard to its innovative 3D Spacetime FPGA architecture, the resulting ABAX2 family of general-purpose 3D programmable logic devices (3PLDs), and the associated Stylus tool suite.
Tabula has just announced the first shipments of 100G development systems based on the industry’s first 22nm 3PLD, which have been manufactured for it by Intel. The extreme performance ABAX2 devices enable deep packet inspection at line rate and the routing and switching of multiple 100G streams on a single chip.
The first board is a low-latency 12 x 10 GigE-to-100 GigE Bridge providing transparent bidirectional bridging between the 10 GigE ports and the 100 GigE port. This board — which can be easily modified to support different port counts, port speeds, and interface standards — is shipping to customers.
Two more boards will be made available in the fourth quarter — a 4 x 100G L2-L4 Switch for use in next-generation routers and data centers
and a 100G RegEx Accelerator for use in next-generation firewalls and security appliances.
This one supports a sustainable throughput of 40 Gps and in excess of 1M rules, as well as advanced features such as cross-packet inspection.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nokia Networks has introduced a new pico base station: Flexi Zone G2 Pico has a capacity of 8-liter base station, which weighs only 8 pounds., Nokia points out that by 2020, 78 percent of all mobile data passes through the small cells. Dense areas of the urban center a pic base station is the easiest way to increase the network capacity. First, the new G2 Pico brought to 3.5 gigahertz time division LTE networks
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1750:nokia-kasvattaa-pienen-solun-kapasiteettia&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
Equipment manufacturers will present now the new effective products to small cells for easy implementation. Nokia yesterday launched the Flexi Zone G2 Pico Base Station, now Ericsson shows even smaller RBS 6402 router.
This 2.8-liter unit is planted in four radio, with the radio power is 250 milliwatts (designed for interior spaces). According to Ericsson RBS 6402 is the first 300-megabit speeds to support LTE pico router. Of course, the device also supports 3G connectivity and the new 802.11ac standard WLAN links.
In this comparison, the Nokia G2 is a versatile a higher transmission power it.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1754:ericssonin-pikotukiasema-on-todella-pieni&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
Smart Grid gets its own interface standard
Smart grid is supposed to be an entity in which electricity can be transferred to where it is needed, and to which the consumers can sell their electricity. The German project is to develop connections with the various players in the intelligent network.
EEBus of Energy Efficiency Bus is a project to define a neutral data interface through which all information transferred to the electricity network for everyone. At present, intelligent power grid metrics to monitor and share their data in energy, but in general this is a custom-designed equipment, which do not talk to other manufacturers’ equipment.
EEBus bus is intended to change this. The concept in every household installed energy management unit, which sees the home of all equipment in electricity consumption (and the future of electricity production), to guide their consumption and be able to predict future consumption.
EEBus Initiative estimates that the standard is ready for next year.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1765:alysahkoverkko-saa-oman-liitantastandardin&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
EEBus Initiative e.V.
http://www.eebus.org/en/eebus-initiative-ev/
The EEBus Initiative connects: technologies, markets, people.
We network the leading companies, associations and stakeholders in the German and international energy, telecommunications and electrical industry.
The challenge: a future-oriented, secure, efficient infrastructure for smart networks.
Our path: To continue to develop EEBus as a standardised and consensus-oriented smart grid and smart home networking concept. Starting by connecting smart grid and smart consumers, we are developing an approach above and beyond smart home and smart building in order to develop a comprehensive concept for almost all smart devices. Our focus here is the definition of relevant content as the basis of comprehensively networked world tomorrow.
The goal: To open up the new market or smart connectivity with our combined strengths and skills. For increased efficiency, environmental protection, convenience, and security.
Tomi Engdahl says:
IDF2014
Just a mere mystery of cloud services offering to Intel and its partners are not. On the stage was rotated while the mutual boasting about the club, which in turn was praised as a host as the guests.
F5 Networks and Arista were represented on the basis of short-term visits been very happy with Intel
Copper Cable 100-gigabit speeds achieved, but the cable length is limited to three meters. Incidentally, Intel’s silicon photonics technology, using 100 gigabits can travel as much as 300-meter cable from end to end at full speed (shortly up to two kilometers).
Cloudera Mike Olson with Bryant advertised, how the Xeon E5 processor Hadoop v3 rotate twice faster than before.
The cloud security was speaked on the Moscone Center, ground floor of the exhibition space, which featured a large range of Intel’s large and small partners.
Hytrustin idea is to provide security in the cloud located in the server. Virtual Server and everything is just a file, so protecting it is, in principle, easy. Extremely simplified Hytrustin software to check every startup the host computer’s BIOS, and if the notice changes, refusing to starting.
Especially in Europe, there has been great interest in the possibility of limiting the virtual servers start of the countries borders.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/blogit/uutiskommentti/dataa+pilvessa+ja+turvassa/a1010711
Tomi Engdahl says:
Boffins: Behold the SILICON CHEAPNESS of our tiny, radio-signal-munching IoT sensor
Single ant-sized Stanford chip combines radio, ‘puter, antenna
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/11/iot_sensor_the_size_of_an_ant/
Electronics boffins at Stanford University are putting their mark on the Internet of Things by way of a tiny radio-plus-computer that uses scavenged radio signals for its power.
Instead of shrinking discrete components and patching them together, the Stanford team set out to create a single silicon component that integrates everything needed to connect a sensor: computing, a communication stack, a radio and an antenna.
That, the university says, delivers an ant-sized component “a few millimetres across”.
The boffins have also implemented power-harvesting capability onto the chip, so it can be woken up and given enough juice to communicate by a radio signal. As assistant professor of electrical engineering Armin Arbabian explains, the device will wake up, receive a signal, run a computation and send its reply on narrow 60GHz pulses – all using the power it receives via radio waves.
STMicroelectronics has already produced runs of hundreds of the radio-on-a-chip devices as a proof of concept
Tomi Engdahl says:
Global Radiation Monitoring Network Update
http://hackaday.com/2014/09/11/global-radiation-monitoring-network-update/
Things have been busy at Global Radiation Monitoring Network Central Command.
[Radu's] latest news is that he’s ready to go into production with model A of the uRADMonitor. Moving from project to production can be an incredible amount of work
This is the 10th unit in the USA. You can view the map, data, and graphs of global radiation live on the uRADMonitor website.
http://www.uradmonitor.com/
Data traffic
The devices send small packets of data every minute. It is ok if some are lost (then those measurements will simply not reach the server). Each packet is close to 46 Bytes in size. One day (24h) will total a number of 66KB of data, this a very limited quantity that will work even on slow connections, with no impact issues on other transmissions.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The second-generation ZigBee ready for remote controls
Zigbee radio technology to try to get the consumer electronics remote controls, but so far the time vaisulla success. Now, technology Remote Control standard is derived from the second version, which allows commercial solutions are expected to become more common.
Radio technology is in many ways a traditional infrapunakaukoa a better solution. The controller does not need to prove exactly the IR receiver and the remote control can also be planted in a variety of structures.
The new ZigBee Remote Control standard has added many new features. For example, the pandering is introduced into a new proxy-cache, which can be utilized for rapid linking devices such as NFC, or via HDMI.
Texas Instruments is among the first announced the new RF4CE platform, which supports the new configuration.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1772:toisen-polven-zigbee-valmis-kaukosaatimiin&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
LA TV stations free up airwaves for wireless broadband
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2667034/networking-hardware/la-tv-stations-free-up-airwaves-for-wireless-broadband.html#tk.rss_all
An effort to free up some of the airwaves used by TV broadcasts and make them available for wireless broadband took a big step forward this week in the U.S.
Two TV stations in Los Angeles, KLCS and KCET, have agreed to share a single frequency to deliver their programming, freeing up a channel that can be auctioned off to wireless carriers next year.
The change, which the Federal Communications Commission calls “repackaging,” is possible because digital TV broadcasts don’t need the full 6MHz of broadcast spectrum that was used for analog TV. Today, some stations use the extra space to broadcast additional subchannels while others let it go to waste.
The FCC is hoping to entice local broadcasters to give up unused spectrum in return for cash.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cities scramble to upgrade “stingray” tracking as end of 2G network looms
Oakland is latest city confirmed seeking Hailstorm upgrade, targeting 4G LTE.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/09/cities-scramble-to-upgrade-stingray-tracking-as-end-of-2g-network-looms/
OAKLAND, CA—Documents released last week by the City of Oakland reveal that it is one of a handful of American jurisdictions attempting to upgrade an existing cellular surveillance system, commonly known as a stingray.
Stingray is a trademark of its manufacturer, publicly traded defense contractor Harris Corporation, but “stingray” has also come to be used as a generic term for similar devices.
The cellular surveillance system’s upgrade, known as Hailstorm, is necessary. Existing stingray devices will no longer work in a few years as older phone networks get turned off.
Relatively little is known about how stingrays are precisely used by law enforcement agencies nationwide, although documents have surfaced showing how they have been purchased and used in some limited instances.
One of the primary ways that stingrays operate is by taking advantage of a design feature in any phone available today. When 3G or 4G networks are unavailable, the handset will drop down to the older 2G network. While normally that works as a nice last-resort backup to provide service, 2G networks are notoriously insecure.
So the stingray takes advantage of this feature by jamming the 3G and 4G signals, forcing the phone to use a 2G signal.
“Stingray II to Hailstrom Upgrade, etc. The Hailstorm Upgrade is necessary for the Stingray system to track 4G LTE Phones”
He explained that the new upgrade will continue to provide existing surveillance capability even after major cellular providers turn off support for the legacy 2G network, which is expected to occur in upcoming years. In 2012, AT&T announced that it would be shutting down its 2G network in 2017. Without the forced downgrade to 2G, a 4G phone targeted by a stingray would not be susceptible to the same types of interception at present, but it likely would still be susceptible to location tracking.
“Presumably, at some point after, new phones sold by AT&T will no longer support 2G,” Soghoian added. “Once new phones stop working with 2G, Stingrays won’t work any more. At that point, the Hailstorm will be the only way.”
For now, 4G LTE stingray-like devices appear relatively rare.
“We haven’t seen any 4G LTE IMSI catchers from any of the brochures from companies that we’ve picked up yet, so this will be the first,” Eric King, the deputy director of Privacy International, told Ars, using another name for stingrays.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Comcast and Liberty Global agree to share their Wi-Fi networks
https://gigaom.com/2014/09/11/comcast-and-liberty-global-agree-to-share-their-wi-fi-networks/
Both cable operators are using crowdsourcing to build massive hotspot networks on their customers’ home routers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Small carriers want guarantees they won’t get burned at next year’s spectrum auction
https://gigaom.com/2014/09/12/small-carriers-want-guarantees-they-wont-get-burned-at-next-years-spectrum-auction/
FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler wants small carrier support for the the upcoming 600 MHz auction, but those carriers are reluctant to give it. They trusted the FCC in the 700 MHz auction and they got screwed.
At CTIA Wireless this week, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler made a plea to mobile carriers: Commit to participating in the next year’s broadcast incentive auction, so he can convince reluctant TV stations to sell their airwaves to the mobile industry. Smaller mobile carriers aren’t quite ready to put their money on the table, though, because they’re just as worried as broadcasters that they’ll get a raw deal.
C Spire, like many rural and regional carriers, bought licenses in a portion of the 700 MHz band called the A block, expecting to fully participate in the LTE revolution of the last several years. It was sorely mistaken. Verizon Wireless and AT&T essentially carved out private little empires in their portions of the 700 MHz band, over which their devices – and their devices alone – would work.
Many smaller carriers like C Spire and U.S. Cellular found themselves stranded on their own island of 4G spectrum called Band 12. And if their networks don’t interoperate with the big carriers that means the devices they use are incompatible as well. To this day, Apple still hasn’t built an iPhone that works on a Band 12 network, despite commitments from AT&T and Sprint to back interoperability.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Idea for IoT visualizations?
Gaming supremo creates maps that turn real world into Sim City
Complete with live cartoon buses that sync up with real-time bus arrivals
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/10/maps_make_the_real_world_look_like_a_game/
Ian Hetherington, formerly of games companies Realtime Worlds and Psygnosis – yes, the company responsible for ’90s legend Lemmings – and has applied games technology to mapping, making your 3D navigation feel like a trip to Sim City.
eeGeo’s maps can show weather conditions – so you can make it snow – and time of day, with night-time images.
The software has a cartoon-like feel, but uses real 3D models rather than pasted-on bitmaps.
There are hooks to show data in real time, so a bus mapping app might show where all the buses are or a delivery company might show where your delivery is
Tomi Engdahl says:
Net neutrality fans’ joy as ’2.3 million email’ flood hits US Congress
FCC invites opinions in CSV format, after Slowdown day ‘success’
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/13/net_neutrality_supporters_celebrate_as_fcc_again_buckles_under_comment_flood/
This week’s internet slowdown protest has been, as one might expect, declared a roaring success by its organizers, after US watchdog the FCC was once again forced to change its comment policy under a deluge of opinions.
Organizing group BattleForTheNet said 2,039,500 people took part in the September 10th day-long campaign, sending 2,332,092 emails to members of the US Congress, and filing 777,364 comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) about the fate of net neutrality protections.
According to FCC chief information officer David Bray, the Open Internet proceeding has now generated more public comments than any previous measure.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Trying to Hit the Brake on Texting While Driving
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/business/trying-to-hit-the-brake-on-texting-while-driving.html?_r=0
People know they shouldn’t text and drive. Overwhelmingly, they tell pollsters that doing so is unacceptable and dangerous, and yet they do it anyway. They can’t resist. So safety advocates and public officials have called for a technological solution that does an end run around free will and prevents people from texting in the first place.
A Changing Business Model
Cellphone carriers like Sprint have become strong opponents of distracted driving. That was not always so. When cellphones first became mass-market products, drivers were the target market. Carriers sold talk-time by the minute, so the more people talked, the more money carriers made. And people spend a lot of time in cars.
But business models have changed. Carriers now sell unlimited use, making it much less important to their bottom line that people talk or text behind the wheel.
“It did become less of a business interest for carriers to push the freedom of use wherever an individual might be,” said Ray Rothermel, internal counsel for Sprint, who works on government affairs.
Moreover, carriers can now receive fees from insurance companies for carrying the wireless connections on their networks — up to $5 a month a car. That money can add up.
Back in February, Mr. Rothermel described the partnership with Katasi as “a good-sized weapon in the war against distracted driving.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
China, clouds, to kill data centre tech market growth
China, cloud operators and software-definers about to cannibalise shrinking market
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/15/china_clouds_to_kill_data_centre_tech_market_growth/
China’s data centre kit-providers will take two per cent of the global market from current suppliers, according to newly-released Gartner research titled “Four Highly Disruptive Factors Will Challenge the Survival of Incumbent Data Center Market Vendors.”
Gartner says China will advance because it is “buoyed by deep resources” offers “increasingly respected brands (such as Alcatel Lucent/Huaxin, Huawei and Lenovo)” enjoys good relationships with Taiwanese original design manufacturers, access to local manufacturers and has a nice well of local anti-US sentiment to tap.
China accounts for two of the four disruptors Gartner identifies, namely a Snowden-driven nationalistic tinge to procurement policy that sees local providers favoured. China-led Asian innovation efforts will also give the market a shake, drawing its centre of gravity Eastwards. That Asian nations are digitising services fast will help to accelerate this trend.
If that’s not bad enough, Gartner also says that move to building applications for delivery from the cloud cuts off another opportunity for conventional data-centre kit-makers because such apps will run on public IaaS and PaaS platforms, not on on-premises servers. “Traditional vendors,” the report says will “find it increasingly hard to compete”, as those designing kit with the OpenCompute and Project Scorpio templates scoop up cloud providers’ business.
One scenario Gartner offers is as follows:
“Amazon could decide to offer its own branded servers, storage, network and infrastructure software products to enterprises for installation on-premises. It has technology, scale, brand and the beginnings of a channel, as well as a history of disrupting established markets.”
Here’s another throw the first punch scenario:
“Another possibility would see Microsoft attempting to stop Cisco’s incursions into its collaboration business, by bundling a full SDN stack with Windows Server, and by certifying multiple ODM/whitebox switch vendors’ products.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile phones in poor audibility in new houses or passive houses have not yet found anything definite solution. Builders, the coverage will not be a problem, if it is taken into account at the design stage.
“The premise is that the operators strengthen and re-orient their base stations”
“Our aim is that towards the base station is not only a stone wall, but also a signal-permeable parts.”
“We are telecom operators, we established that passive houses would be left gaps in radio waves. We also made a concrete proposal that the building regulations to the specific RF-reading”, Lamminluoto says.
The RF section of the building walls tell of attenuation. It will be defined by calculation on the basis of building materials.
“Construction in the regulation of energy efficiency should also take into account the use of the building. After all, it is remarkable, if the houses can not use modern technology”, Lamminluoto says.
Lamminluoto not hold cell phones coverage problem so far very evil. At least the feedback from passive reception problems should be rare.
“The working group was first set up in anticipation for the worst, but apparently the structures is, however, remained the RF signal permeable parts.”
The situation could deteriorate when the renovation of buildings pace is accelerating. The worst problem is just the old buildings, which may be a window renovations will come too close to radio waves.
Houses could also build property-base stations, but expensive solution is ill-suited to normal residential block of flats. Another possible solution would be to store the tasks indoor antenna networks.
“It may become necessary when the passive houses is increasing,”
Finnish Lammi Window has developed a special antenna window, which takes into account of selective degradation caused by radio signals.
“At best, we get our window three times higher field strength than the normal window.”
If the field is low, a triple amplification is not necessarily sufficient.
Insulation manufacturer SPU has an insulation product where the aluminum film on it’s surface is converted into the plastic. It attenuates much less the radio signals. “Some of the walls can be insulated using this, or all”. The aluminum film removal solves only the insulation problem, which is, for example, made of stone, the house is not the main cause of poor reception.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/uutisia/quotlyijytalotquot+edelleen+ongelma++kannykoiden+kuuluvuushairiot+voidaan+estaa+vain+varhaisella+suunnittelulla/a1011756
Tomi Engdahl says:
Universal boot enables faster fiber connections
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2014/09/belden-universal-boot.html
“OSP loose-tube 250-micron fiber-optic cabling must be terminated within 50 feet of entering a facility, and breakout kits are commonly used to build the cable up for protection and termination to 900-micron connector boots. The optional Brilliance Universal 250-micron connector boot allows for direct termination, eliminating the need for a breakout kit. … Used inside splice cassettes to protect the 250-micron terminations and fiber, the 250-micron connector boots allow data center and service provider technicians and installers to take full advantage of Brilliance Universal’s faster no-epoxy, no-polish, no-crimp fiber terminations.”
“While indoor/outdoor 900-micron fiber popular in campus environments prevents having to perform service-entrance splicing to in-building cable, 250-micron fiber is still the norm in most outside plant and service provider applications.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cyborg Unplug disconnects drones, Google Glass, spy microphones from WiFi networks
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2014/09/cyborg-unplug.html
Cyborg Unplug is a device costing $50 to $100 that its creators describe as “a wireless anti-surveillance system for the home and workplace,” which “detects and kicks devices known to pose a risk to personal privacy from your local wireless network, breaking uploads and streams. Detected devices currently include: Google Glass, Dropcam, small drones/copters, wireless ‘spy’ microphones and various other network-dependent surveillance devices.”
The product’s development was led by Glasshole writer Julian Oliver
Cyborg Unplug isn’t designed for use in those cases where there is already strict control over who uses the local wireless network. Rather, it’s for those with networks used by many people (school, office, library, bar, café) that either give out the password or provide an open network.
“Wireless devices used to spy and stream images/video/audio/data to the Internet using that network (Territory Mode) or via any network (All Out Mode, which includes tethered connections to phones) will be detected. An alarm is then signaled and the detected device is disconnected by Cyborg Unplug. Please note that no encryption of any kind is a hindrance to the detection and disconnection of wireless (WiFi and Bluetooth) devices by Cyborg Unplug; it operates at a level below the IP network (specifically at Layer 2 of the OSI stack).”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Analyst finds 802.11ac Wi-Fi access point penetration nearly doubling every quarter
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2014/09/infonetics-ac-ap-doubling.html
The report states that global wireless LAN (WLAN) equipment sales totaled $1.2 billion in 2Q14, up 13% sequentially, and up 4% year-over-year. Significantly, Infonetics finds that 802.11ac access point penetration has nearly doubled every quarter, and is starting to cannibalize the 802.11n market. However, while access point shipments are up by a third year-over-year in 2Q14, the data finds that controller revenue is down 5% in 2Q14 from the year-ago 2nd quarter. Notably, WiFi phone revenue was also shown to be down again in 2Q14, declining 1% quarter-over-quarter and 15% year-over-year.
“Despite access point shipments reaching record levels, revenue growth in the WLAN market has been relatively weak so far this year due to temporary declines in service provider and K–12 spending, 802.11ac failing to lift average selling prices, and the rise of lower-cost solutions, including controller-less approaches,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Leviton acquires AV-control provider BitWise
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2014/09/leviton-bitwise.html
On September 9 Leviton announced it has acquired BitWise Controls LLC, which designs and manufactures control and monitoring solutions for commercial and residential facilities’ audio-video systems. Leviton said it “has been carrying BitWise Controls’ automation controllers for some time and is excited to welcome them into Leviton.”
http://www.bitwisecontrols.com/
Tomi Engdahl says:
‘Speargun’ program is fantasy, says cable operator
We just might notice if you cut our cables
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/16/speargun_program_is_fantasy_says_cable_operator/
The washup from yesterday’s Dotcom-Snowden-Greenwald saga rolls on, with Southern Cross Cable Network angrily denying that New Zealand’s spooks, the NSA, or anybody else for that matter has worked a tap into its cables.
“Speargun”, Greenwald clearly believes the taps were inserted underwater.
This, Southern Cross has said in a statement sent to media, is “total nonsense”. CEO Anthony Briscoe notes that to install any such device would mean cutting the cable – something that not only the cable operator would notice, but also any of its customers that weren’t buying a protected service to give them access to both SCCN routes.
“It is a physical impossibility to do it without us knowing”, Briscoe says in the statement. “There isn’t a technology in the world, as far as I am aware, that can splice into an undersea fibre optic cable without causing a serious outage and sending alarms back to our network operations centre that something’s wrong”.
It’s no secret that cable operators have to agree to cooperate with law enforcement as a condition of their licenses
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cable internet won’t need dose of fibre to stop feeling bloated
Standards group CableLabs tackling TCP ‘bufferbloat’ in 3.1 standard
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/15/cablelabs_tackling_bufferbloat_in_31_standard/
CableLabs, the industry group that develops data transmission standards for cable television networks, is experimenting with Active Queue Management (AQM) to deal with the issue of bufferbloat in cable networks.
Bufferbloat is one of the underground problems of Internet performance: the way that buffers in network kit add to latency, because TCP will helpfully fill up buffers, however much memory equipment providers put in their equipment.
That’s because TCP doesn’t reduce its flow-rate until packets start getting dropped. While packets are getting through – even with long latency – TCP assumes that the network is fine, and it can just keep transmitting.
In fact, more buffer can make the problem worse. As CableLabs puts it here, “if network equipment implements larger and larger buffers to avoid dropping packets, and TCP by its very design won’t stop increasing its data rate until it sees packet loss, the result is that the network has large buffers that are being kept full whenever a TCP flow is moving files, and packets have to sit and wait in a queue to be processed.”
It’s only a problem for latency-sensitive traffic – game-clicks, or live video – and as the Bufferbloat project records, there are a variety of proposals on the table.
One of those, Active Queue Management, is what CableLabs is investigating.
Under AQM, the modem and CMTS include software that watches over their buffers, and if TCP is keeping buffers so full that it has an impact on latency, the devices will drop “just enough packets to send TCP the signal that it needs to slow down, so that more appropriate buffer levels can be maintained”.
AQM is mandated in DOCSIS 3.1, and in cable modems following that spec
Tomi Engdahl says:
Exclusive: Two Apple medical trials shed light on how HealthKit will work
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/15/us-apple-health-idUSKBN0HA0Y720140915
(Reuters) – Two prominent U.S. hospitals are preparing to launch trials with diabetics and chronic disease patients using Apple Inc’s (AAPL.O) HealthKit, offering a glimpse of how the iPhone maker’s ambitious take on healthcare will work in practice.
HealthKit, which is still under development, is the center of a new healthcare system by Apple. Regulated medical devices, such as glucose monitors with accompanying iPhone apps, can send information to HealthKit. With a patient’s consent, Apple’s service gathers data from various health apps so that it can be viewed by doctors in one place.
Stanford University Hospital doctors said they are working with Apple to let physicians track blood sugar levels for children with diabetes. Duke University is developing a pilot to track blood pressure, weight and other measurements for patients with cancer or heart disease.
Medical device makers are taking part in the Stanford and Duke trials.
DexCom Inc (DXCM.O), which makes blood sugar monitoring equipment, is in talks with Apple, Stanford, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration about integrating with HealthKit, said company Chief Technical Officer Jorge Valdes.
While HealthKit promises to enhance the process of data-sharing between physicians and those under their care, observers have noted the potential for sensitive data to be abused.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Hacking a Pogoplug into a $20 PBX
http://hackaday.com/2014/09/15/hacking-a-pogoplug-into-a-20-pbx/
The Pogoplug Series 4 is a little network attached device that makes your external drives accessible remotely.
If you’re looking to build your own PBX on the cheap, [Ward] runs us through the process. Since the Pogoplug 4 is currently available for about $20, it’s a cheap way to play with telephony.
VoIP Hardware Deal of the Year: Meet the $20 Pogoplug 4 with Incredible PBX
http://nerdvittles.com/?p=10560
UPDATE: There’s more good news. Now the cost with the Pogoplug Backup & Sharing model is just $10.95! For our purposes, the main difference is one less USB port, but it still has one which is all you need for wireless networking.
Tomi Engdahl says:
5G Rise Slowed by Cost, Regulation
Countries must harmonize, researcher says
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1323877&
Governments around the world must agree to release spectrum in harmonized millimeter wave bands for 5G cellular services, according to a leading researcher in the field. The US has taken some, but not enough, steps in this direction, said Theodore Rappaport, director of NYU Wireless here.
“To keep cost down, and get adoption rates to be very high, it will be better for the industry to have common frequency bands to use with the same chipset,” Rappaport said in an interview with EE Times.
Korea, China, and Japan are being “very aggressive” in leading the charge to 5G. NTT Docomo in Japan is expecting 5G standardization in 2016 and, in May, announced trials of “emerging 5G mobile communications technologies” with Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, Fujitsu, NEC, Nokia, and Samsung. They aim to exploit frequency bands above 6 GHz with very high system capacity per unit area, as well as prove radio technologies to support M2M services.
Meanwhile, the European Union’s 5G Infrastructure Public Private Partnership is also making inroads in exploring 5G.
The US isn’t completely ignoring the need for regulations around 5G.
the commission has issued a notice of inquiry on millimeter wave feasibility for cellular with a focus on frequencies less than 95 GHz.
“I’ve known for a long time that you can make high-gain adaptive arrays at millimeter wave frequencies that fit in the palm of your hand,” Rappaport said. “So when you combine the idea of smart antennas in the handset with huge bandwidth at these frequencies it becomes clear you can take wireless to a whole new regime that’s never existed…
“The cellular and WiFi markets are so competitive and the advancements that are being put into silicon so remarkable that there’s already sort of a moat around breaking into that field. However, millimeter-wave technologies bring a whole new set of challenges where some new entrants will be able to make a stand — but it’s going to be tough.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Intel Buys Powerwave Patents
Acquisition supports cellular network plans
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1323905&
Intel bought more than 1,400 patents and patent applications from Powerwave Technologies. The patents cover telecommunications infrastructure technologies including tower mounted amplifiers, antenna structures, power amplifier configurations, crest factor reduction, and digital pre-distortion circuitry, Intel said.
The company purchased the patent portfolio for an undisclosed amount from an affiliate of The Gores Group, which obtained the patents following Powerwave’s bankruptcy.
Intel said the purchase is part it’s ongoing process of managing its patent portfolio. The purchase follows the company’s recent acquisition of LSI’s Axxia unit, which makes and sells an ARM-based SoC for a range of networking systems including cellular base stations.
The PC giant has been working for some time on pilot projects for Cloud Radio Access Networks (C-RAN) with carriers in China and South Korea, including China Mobile the world’s largest carrier in terms of subscribers. The patent acquisition clearly supports Intel’s expanding plans in back-end cellular networks.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Future Technologies In Smart Homes
http://www.enstra.com/energy-assets/Futuretechnologiesinsmarthomes.pdf
Tomi Engdahl says:
Xpliant targets white-label Ethernet switch vendors with shiny new silicon
SDK and simulator now, sample product by year’s end
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/16/xpliant_targets_whitebox_ethernet_switch_vendors_with_upcoming_chip_release/
Ethernet silicon vendor Xpliant – currently being digested by Cavium in an acquisition due to conclude in 2015 – is hoping to knock Broadcom out of its spot at the heart of the Ethernet switch market.
The upstart, launched in 2011, says it’ll have sample silicon in Q4 2014 for an architecture designed to combine speed and programmability.
The Xpliant chips were, according to the company’s Dan Tuchler, designed to scratch an itch that its developers had experienced as chip designers in other companies: “Every year, they did the same thing over again: a little faster, a couple more features, but pretty much the same architecture”, they said.
The opportunity Xpliant is trying to address is one in which the chip can be revised with software upgrades. The XPA – Xpliant Packet Architecture – puts switching logic on the chips “in which every parameter can be configured very quickly”, he said, so “you can add different protocols to [finished devices] via a software update”.
Why would users bother? Tuchler said the growth of data centres and the parallel growth of the virtualisation market provides a good example of the opportunity.
In current merchant silicon, such protocols – along with how addresses and statistics are handled – are hard-coded. By making its silicon more programmable, Tuchler said, “if you want to do a different kind of table lookup or support a new protocol, you can. You can configure every stage of the switch – you write software, and push it out to the switch”.
OEMs can get the chance to “innovate at the data plane again”, he said – “what protocols are processed, how they’re processed.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cavium Attacks B’com in Switches
http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1323931&
An emerging breed of chip startup is helping Cavium launch an Ethernet switch chip that aims to challenge Broadcom, the dominant player in networking silicon. The chip uses a novel architecture to deliver the competing needs of both more throughput and more programmability for rapidly growing datacenters.
With up to 128 25 Gbit/s ports, the Xpliant Packet Architecture (XPA) will deliver up to 3.2 Tbit/s throughput, more than twice that of Broadcom’s current high-end switch. At the same time, it claims it can support any emerging protocol in two months with a software update, a feat that takes traditional chips a hardware re-spin and as much as 30 months.
Today’s largest datacenters are hungry for both more speed and flexibility.
Networking has become the main performance bottleneck and management nightmare both for big datacenters such as Amazon, Google, and Microsoft and service providers such as AT&T and Verizon. They see network virtualization as a way to bust through the clogs and complexity, but the industry is inventing new protocols and overlays at a rapid pace in the competitive search for the best way forward.
Cavium won’t say how its XPA chips work. It suggests they use low-level generic engines optimized for basic packet-processing jobs such as parsing streams of packets and creating lookup tables to track and modify them.
“It’s essentially a table-drive architecture that’s highly configurable but not programmable,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Facebook unleashes inter-cache router code on a waiting world
‘Mcrouter’ released under BSD license
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/17/facebook_unleashes_intercache_router_code_on_a_waiting_world/
Facebook has slung another slice of code into the open source world: the software that lets it sling content between caches around the world, fast enough to keep The Social NetworkTM social.
First discussed last year at Usenix, “Mcrouter” handles “all traffic to, from, and between thousands of cache servers across dozens of clusters distributed in our data centres around the world”, Facebook’s Anton Likhtarov, Rajesh Nishtala and Ryan McElroy write in this post.
From its internal development, they say, the memory cached protocol router was then tested as a binary in AWS, “when Instagram used it last year before fully transitioning to Facebook’s infrastructure.”
So, okay: it’s a big piece of serious software. Why, however, would the rest of the world want it?
The idea is that on either side of Mcrouter, nobody should notice anything different. The client should think it’s connecting to a cache, and not notice its characteristics; and on the other side, a server is dumping data into a cache and forgetting it. To help keep things invisible, Facebook says, Mcrouter uses the standard ASCII memcached protocol as its API.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Oi! You noisy servers! Talk among yourselves and stop bothering that poor router!
RDMA-over-Ethernet steps up to v 2.0, promises less chatter so servers can get on with it
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/17/rocev2_spec_lands/
The group behind the RDMA over converged Ethernet standard – RoCE to its friends – is tweaking the spec to support UPD and IP in the stack.
RDMA – remote direct memory access – has become increasingly important in large-scale data centres, since it lets data move between different servers’ user space without having to drop down through the stack and get put into TCP/IP packets.
The resulting efficiency and low node-to-node latency is particularly important in highly virtualised environments, which is why (for example) Microsoft has made much of its support in Azure.
However, there are reasons to want some routing capability in the RoCE world.
“You need routing between the layer 2 networks,” Lee said. Hence RoCE v2, which slips UDP and IP in that part of the RoCE stack that formerly supported only Infiniband: the new version establishes “east-west” communication in the RoCE world.
“They wanted RoCE to span across layer 3. Ethernet with priority flow control is the most optimal way of developing a fabric that will support RoCE and RoCE 2, and RoCE is suitable for multiple subnets within a fabric”.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ant-sized radio – Inexpensive, Ant-Sized Radio Chip to Control the ‘Internet of Things’
http://video.techbriefs.com/video/Inexpensive-Ant-Sized-Radio-Chi;TBTV-Most-Recent
A Stanford University engineering team has built a radio the size of an ant. The device gathers all the power it needs from the same electromagnetic waves that carry signals to its receiving antenna. Designed to compute, execute, and relay commands, the tiny wireless chip costs pennies to manufacture — making it cheap enough to become the missing link between the Internet and the connected smart gadgets envisioned in the ‘Internet of Things.’
To build this tiny device, every function in the radio had to be reengineered. The antenna had to be small, one-tenth the size of a Wi-Fi antenna, and operate at the incredibly fast rate of 24 billion cycles per second.
Many other such tweaks were needed but in the end the team managed to put all the necessary components on one chip.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fastly grabs $40M on its quest to build a big, cool content-distribution network
http://venturebeat.com/2014/09/16/fastly-funding/
Fastly, a startup looking to challenge the biggest companies in the business of distributing content around the world for quick online access, has brought on $40 million in fresh money.
“Customers are happy to pay for that,” Bergman said.
The content-distribution network (CDN) market has proven interesting for investments and acquisitions.
Verizon last year acquired EdgeCast. CDN and security provider CloudFlare announced a $50 million round late last year. Apple has started serving web requests through its own CDN, which could be useful when it’s time to download an operating-system update. Meanwhile, CDN giant Akamai has hung around.
Fastly aims to stand out by storing customers’ content on speedy solid-state drives and delivering it over 10-gigabit Ethernet. It even employs software-defined networks based on Arista switching hardware that can help Fastly “choose the best path out into the Internet,” Bergman said, and ultimately deliver content more quickly than it could without such techniques.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why Is It Taking So Long To Secure Internet Routing?
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/14/09/17/0016241/why-is-it-taking-so-long-to-secure-internet-routing
We live in an imperfect world where routing-security incidents can still slip past deployed security defenses, and no single routing-security solution can prevent every attacks. Research suggests, however, that the combination of RPKI (Resource Public Key Infrastructure) with prefix filtering could significantly improve routing security
Routing security incidents can still slip past deployed security defenses.
http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=2668966
BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) is the glue that sticks the Internet together, enabling data communications between large networks operated by different organizations. BGP makes Internet communications global by setting up routes for traffic between organizations
While BGP plays a crucial role in Internet communications, it remains surprisingly vulnerable to attack. The past few years have seen a range of routing incidents that highlight the fragility of routing with BGP. They range from a simple misconfiguration at a small Indonesian ISP that took Google offline in parts of Asia,32 to a case of BGP-based censorship that leaked out of Pakistan Telecom and took YouTube offline for most of the Internet,2 to a routing error that caused a large fraction of the world’s Internet traffic to be routed through China Telecom,6 to highly targeted traffic interception by networks in Iceland and Belarus.
People have been aware of BGP’s security issues for almost two decades and have proposed a number of solutions
Why is it taking so long to secure BGP?
The answer to this question lies in the fact that BGP is a global protocol, running across organizational and national borders. As such, it lacks a single centralized authority that can mandate the deployment of a security solution; instead, every organization can autonomously decide which routing security solutions it will deploy in its own network. Thus, the deployment becomes a coordination game among thousands of independently operated networks. This is further complicated by the fact that many security solutions do not work well unless a large number of networks deploy them.
Tomi Engdahl says:
As of midnight last night, the FCC received approximately 3.7 million #OpenInternet comments.
Source: https://twitter.com/khart/status/511986916141842432
Tomi Engdahl says:
Huawei: Our sales in Europe and US are TINY, admits red-faced exec
Channel recruitment plans are stalling – and US spy accusations still dog the firm
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2014/09/17/huawei_our_sales_europe_us_are_tiny/
Huawei’s enterprise biz outside of China is crawling along, hampered in Europe by a slower-than-forecast recruitment of channel partners and in the US by government paranoia concerns over espionage.
The networking, server and storage kit division accounts for nine per cent of Huawei’s overall revenues of £23mm in 2013
It is now four years since the Chinese company launched its Enterprise wing – it grew up building networks for telco customers – but in the West, Huawei has struggled to assemble an army of channel evangelists.
Tomi Engdahl says:
US boffins demo ‘twisted radio’ mux
OAM takes wireless signals to 32 Gbps
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/17/us_boffins_demo_twisted_radio_mux/
Evidence continues to mount that the orbital angular momentum (OAM) of radio waves – “twisted waves” – can be exploited to modulate multiple data streams on the same spatial path.
Researchers from the University of Southern California are claiming an impressive 32 Gbps transmission, albeit over a distance of 2.5 metres, using eight OAM channels – four independent OAM beams on each of two polarisations.
In a paper to be published in Nature Communications, a group led by Alan Willner claims a spectral efficiency of 16 bits/second/Hz on a 28 GHz carrier. Willner earlier led research that twisted photons to multiplex two ten-wavelength signals on the same 1.1 Km length of fibre for a 1.6 Tbps transmission.
While 32 Gbps is an impressive throughput for a radio transmission, the USC group isn’t repeating the “infinite bandwidth” hype that accompanied Thide’s original announcement.
Tomi Engdahl says:
New ‘Cosmos’ browser surfs the net by TXT alone
No data plan? No WiFi? No worries … except sluggish download speed
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/15/cosmos_browsing_for_the_developing_world/
A project that’s just landed on github aims to let users in the developing world access Web pages over text messages alone.
It’s not as absurd an idea as it might first seem
While the number of mobile phones in the world continues to rise, most of the networks are yet to experience the joys of fast downloads – and in many places, the mobile network is the main contact with the outside world, since fixed networks haven’t been built.
Enter the Cosmos Browser project: a bit of code that lets users browse the Web using just text messages.
First, the user enters a URL into the Cosmos app. That URL is sent via text to ColdSauce’s Twillio number, and forwarded as a normal POST request to ColdSauce’s Node.js backend.
“The backend takes the url, gets the HTML source of the website, minifies it, gets rid of the css, javascript, and images, GZIP compresses it, encodes it in Base64, and sends the data as a series of SMSes”, the post explains.
Those messages are sent to the browser at the rate of three per second, and back at the phone, the app orders the received data, decompresses it, and displays it.