Top Weekly Updates
Comcast to Rollout Gigabit Broadband by End of 2016
After a successful test of a DOCSIS 3.1 modem in Philadelphia, Comcast said it will offer a new gigabit-speed service by the end of 2016. So far, one large advantage for the company to offer this high-speed service is that customers are only required to set up a new modem. Comcast is competing with Google in response to the rising competition of deploying high-speed internet nationwide.
Comcast currently has Gigabit Pro, the 2 Gbps fiber service was made available so far in Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Tennessee, and California. On the other hand Google Fiber, the $70-per-month, 1 Gbps service that is either available or slated for deployment in the same cities where Comcast started offering services.
However, Comcast’s faster-than-Google Fiber internet is known as a very costly service in the past.The biggest concern with the DOCSIS 3.1 modem is price if they plan to compete with Google Fiber, as Comcast’s Gigabit Pro is already priced at $299.95 per month with up to $1,000 in installation and activation fees, and customers must sign a two-year agreement for the service.
Turkey Under Massive 40 Gbps DDos Attacks
Since last Monday, Turkey has been experiencing a massive cyberattack targeting the country’s official domain servers ending with Turkey’s internet code, .tr. NIC.tr’s five nameservers, ns1.nic.tr through ns5.nic.tr, were completely down under a 40 Gigabits per second DDoS attack, which caused massive disruption of service all over the country. Over 400,000 websites including over 300,000 businesses were affected including universities, government institutions, schools and the military.
So far, decentralized hacktivist group Anonymous has claimed responsibility for the attack. In an uploaded video, the hacktivists said that the DDos attack was sent as a message to Turkey for the country allegedly supporting and aiding the Daesh or ISIS/ISIL terrorist group and also for promoting mass censorship in blocking websites such as YouTube, Rapidshare, Fileserve, and Google services. In response, a local paper in Turkey has reported that 12 members were arrested in connection to Anonymous.
Apple Pays to Settle with Ericsson
After almost a year-long dispute between the two companies, Ericsson and Apple have finally reached a seven-year deal agreement. Apple will pay Ericsson an undisclosed settlement amount, along with royalties for the next seven years in order to secure “standards essential” patents related to GSM, UMTS and LTE cellular standards and granted certain other patent rights to each other.
Initially, the standardization of technology and increase emergence of smartphones into the market usually leads to companies exchanging information on research and development. However, the lawsuits between Ericsson and Apple were enacted over complaints of exact patent rights over certain technologies.
After the settled agreement, the two companies plan to collaborate on 5G communications, video network traffic management and wireless network optimization. The agreement also ends pending lawsuits in Texas, California, the United Kingdom, Germany and the Netherlands and an investigation being conducted by the U.S. International Trade Commission.
Microsoft Partners with India’s Surat Diamond Association to Enable Cloud Computing for 20,000 Small Businesses
In an effort to connect the 1.2 billion consumer base in India, Microsoft has partnered with the Surat Diamond Association (SDA) to help over 20,000 small and medium-sized diamond enterprises (SMBs) expand their business globally through cloud-based strategy. With support from Microhard IT Solutions, one of Microsoft’s leading partners, Microsoft will set up a common facility center in Varaccha and Mahidharpura and provide cloud-based services such as Office 365, Azure, and CRM at a low cost.
Lightower Acquires HarborLite Networks, Expands Fiber Network in Baltimore
Lightower Fiber Networks has acquired HarborLite Networks which will expand their fiber and service network in Baltimore. The agreement includes the acquisition of fiber located throughout downtown Baltimore and further strengthens Lightower’s network density in the region. In addition to the recent Sidera acquisition, Lightower will add 270 route miles of service within the Baltimore Metro area, and direct access into a significant portion of the data centers downtown.
Customers in Baltimore will gain immediate access to all Lightower solutions including access to over 15,000 service locations. Lightower is also a Direct Connect Partner for Amazon Web Services and can provide all-fiber connectivity to numerous other cloud providers. Their strategy is having aggressive expansion in the mid-Atlantic region.
MoneySwap Switches to Rackspace for Global Expansion
MoneySwap, a fintech company that enables cross-border payments with China UnionPay, has moved its servers from Europe to Rackspace’s data center in Hong Kong so the company could improve its response time to their userbase of over 800 million UnionPay customers and for global expansion into other countries.
MoneySwap provides merchants access to its payment gateways and accepts payments from UnionPay cardholders. Headquartered in Hong Kong with offices in the U.K. and Philippines, the migration of their P2P platform into Rackspace’s cloud platform was made as a lower-cost solution which will enable them to avoid IT downtime and improve customer service.