Slow SA 5G uptake hits mobile core network growth

Mobile World Live

Research company Dell’Oro Group warned growth in the global mobile core network market was being impacted by slow operator deployments of standalone (SA) 5G, noting the technology represented a fraction of the overall number of next-generation services available.

Dell’Oro Group estimated around 19 SA 5G networks have launched to-date, while the Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) put the figure at 20 in 16 countries or territories, out of more than 200 5G networks which had launched by the end of 2021.

Read more…

Apple tells US lawmakers antitrust laws will harm user privacy

Al Jazeera

Apple Inc. and Google warned U.S. lawmakers Tuesday that bipartisan antitrust legislation aimed at curbing the power of big technology companies would harm the privacy and security of users if it becomes law.

Escalating its opposition to the legislation, Apple sent a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin; the panel’s ranking Republican, Chuck Grassley; Antitrust Subcommittee Chair Amy Klobuchar; and the subcommittee’s ranking Republican, Mike Lee. The letter, which was obtained by Bloomberg News, underscores Apple’s push to protect its App Store from government oversight and changes that would disrupt its business model.

Read more…

Innovation is slowly prising open UK banking, regulator says

Reuters

LONDON, Jan 20 (Reuters) – Innovation is finally weakening the market grip of Britain’s “Big Four” banks, but “challenger” lenders are finding it slow and expensive to build up market share, the Financial Conduct Authority said on Thursday.

High street banking has long been dominated by HSBC, Barclays, Lloyds and NatWest, prompting Britain to make it easier for new banks to enter the market, and for customers to switch banks with little fuss.

Read more…

Farming 3.0: How AI, IoT and Mobile Apps Are driving the AgriTech Revolution

Entrepeneur

The Indian agricultural sector is at the cusp of a breakthrough. The Indian agriculture industry is going through a huge transformation, a revolution as we speak. The Green Revolution was a path breaking initiative that brought agriculture to the forefront of the Indian economy. If the industrialisation of agriculture and initiatives like the Green revolution brought agriculture to the forefront, a new wave of technological advancement and new-age startups are revolutionising agriculture as we know it.

Read more…

Will blockchain fulfil its democratic promise or will it become a tool of big tech?

Guardian

When the cryptocurrency bitcoin first made its appearance in 2009, an interesting divergence of opinions about it rapidly emerged. Journalists tended to regard it as some kind of incomprehensible money-laundering scam, while computer scientists, who were largely agnostic about bitcoin’s prospects, nevertheless thought that the distributed-ledger technology (the so-called blockchain) that underpinned the currency was a Big Idea that could have far-reaching consequences.

Read more…

Mobile games spending passed $93 billion in 2021, says Newzoo

Pocket Gamer

According to Newzoo, mobile games generated $93.2 billion in 2021, an increase of 7.3 per cent year-over-year. Overall, mobile games accounted for 52 per cent of worldwide player spending in 2021. By revenue, the APAC region leads the way, accounting for 64 per cent of global consumer spending.

Unsurprisingly, this is due to the colossal consumer spending in China and Japan, which are the first and third highest grossing countries for mobile games spending at $31.8 billion and $13.7 billion respectively. The US was the second highest grossing country at $15.1 billion.

Read more…

It’s the end of an era for third-party cookies – here’s what happens next  

Mobile Marketing Magazine

Google’s decision last year to delay plans to phase out third-party cookies until 2023 may have given marketers brief respite – but it doesn’t change the industry’s direction of travel. By removing the ability to place third-party cookies on its market-leading Chrome browser, following in the footsteps of the likes of Safari and Firefox, surely Google is signaling the end-times for cookie-based website user-tracking?

It’s not quite that simple.

Read more…

SMS and telephone best practice: new guidance for organisations

NCSC

If, like many of us, you are working from home as a result of Covid, you’ve probably noticed the increase in dodgy text messages and cold calls. Like many phishing scams, the fraudsters behind these messages are preying on real-world concerns to try and trick you into interacting with them.

This blog explains how and why the NCSC produced our new guidance on SMS and telephone best practice, which will help ensure your telephone messages are consistent, trustworthy, and reach your customers without being blocked or deleted as suspicious. In doing so, we’ll demonstrate how the UK government addressed the same challenges that many small and medium sized businesses face every day.

Read more…

Facial recognition taken to court in India’s surveillance hotspot

Al Jazeera

It was lockdown in the Indian city of Hyderabad when activist S Q Masood was stopped on the street by police who asked him to remove his face mask and then took his picture, giving no reason and ignoring his objections.

Worried about how the photographs would be used, Masood sent a legal notice to the city’s police chief. But after receiving no response, he filed suit last month over Telangana state’s use of facial recognition systems – the first such case in India.

Read more…

China’s telcos join race for computing supremacy

Light Reading

China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom are stepping up to support the national crusade to boost China’s computing power.

Government agencies have issued a series of reports in recent months about the need to build out China’s computing capabilities in a global race against the US and other big economies. In the latest study, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology’s (MIIT’s) think tank CAICT described computing power as the foundation of the digital economy and an important driver in tech progress and economic growth.

Read more…