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Latest Key Developments

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Gov Asks UK Broadband ISPs to Offer 8 Hours of Battery Backup

10th Sep, 2024 (35 Comments)

The UK Government’s Minister for Telecoms, Sir Chris Bryant, has written a new letter to the bosses of major broadband ISPs that calls on them to help protect vulnerable users during the switchover from analogue (PSTN) to digital (IP) phone solutions by refraining from re-starting non-voluntary migrations and offering battery backup that can last “up to” 8 hours.

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Ofcom Sets Guidance to Improve Resilience of UK Broadband and Mobile Networks UPDATE

6th Sep, 2024 (13 Comments)

The UK telecoms and media regulator, Ofcom, has today set out how they intend to update their guidance on network resilience in order to give broadband ISPs, mobile operators and other digital network providers greater clarity on how they can “reduce the risk of network outages“. But proposals to improve battery backup on mobile networks will come later.

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Ofcom Partially Delays New UK Broadband Switching Process by 6 Weeks

4th Sep, 2024 (10 Comments)

The UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has today acknowledge that their already much delayed new One Touch Switch (OTS) system for faster consumer broadband ISP migrations won’t be 100% ready for launch on 12th September 2024. But rather than delay it, again, they’ve instead ordered providers to retain the old system for a further 6 weeks.

Ofcom Predict 98 Percent of UK Covered by Gigabit Broadband in May 2027

4th Sep, 2024 (25 Comments)

The UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has today published the third edition of their forecast for Planned Network Deployments, which predicts that full fibre (FTTP) broadband ISP lines are on course to cover 95-96% of all UK properties by May 2027 (29 million premises) – rising to 97-98% for “gigabit-capable” networks (i.e. FTTP and Cable).

Gov Considers Easier Access to Blocks of Flats for UK Broadband Upgrades

3rd Sep, 2024 (11 Comments)

The new UK Government has begun informally consulting with the telecoms industry after network operators called on them to make it easier and cheaper to access large residential buildings (MDUs – blocks of flats or apartments), which could help to upgrade related buildings to gigabit-capable broadband. Easier said than done.

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ISP Sky Broadband UK to Launch CityFibre Based FTTP Packages UPDATE

20th Aug, 2024 (74 Comments)

In a big development, Sky UK (Comcast) has this morning announced that they’ve finally reached a “long-term partnership” (wholesale) agreement with alternative network operator CityFibre, which will enable ISP Sky Broadband to finally launch a new range of multi-gigabit speed capable full fibre (FTTP) broadband packages “from next year“.

New UK Gov Reiterates Call for Limits on Building Broadband Poles UPDATE

17th Aug, 2024 (24 Comments)

The new Labour-led UK Government has somewhat echoed the previous administration today by calling on broadband operators to “end the deployment of unnecessary telegraph poles” when rolling out new gigabit-capable networks. But they have “at this stage” rejected the idea of removing Permitted Development (PD) rights for poles.

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Openreach Reveal UK Plan for Symmetric 1Gbps FTTP Broadband UPDATE

14th Aug, 2024 (109 Comments)

Network access provider Openreach (BT) has just announced that they’re planning to launch their first symmetric 1Gbps speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based broadband ISP packages, albeit initially only in “certain locations” from April 2025. Some of the first premises to benefit will be those covered by their rural Project Gigabit contracts (here).

Openreach Win UK Project Gigabit Broadband Contracts and Help 312k Premises

13th Aug, 2024 (21 Comments)

The Government claims to have kicked off a “renewed push” today to “reach full gigabit [broadband] coverage by 2030“, which they’ve done by announcing that Openreach (BT) has secured several contracts under the £5bn Project Gigabit scheme. This could eventually be worth up to £800m (state aid) and may upgrade 312,000 premises in remote rural areas of Scotland, England and Wales.

UK Broadband and Mobile Providers Balk at Ofcom’s Call for Battery Backup

7th Aug, 2024 (24 Comments)

The UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has published some of the responses they’ve received from fixed broadband ISPs and mobile operators to their consultation on enhancing network resilience in order to “reduce the risk of network outages“ (here). Suffice to say that many operators are balking at the costs of deploying national battery backup.

Scotland Partly Pauses R100 Gigabit Broadband Voucher Applications

6th Aug, 2024 (1 Comment)

The Scottish Government (SG) has confirmed to ISPreview that they will be introducing a “temporary pause” on Scottish Broadband Voucher Scheme (SBVS) applications for gigabit-capable projects covering multiple premises, which is intended to ensure the “best use of public funds” and to help “deliver an optimised roll out schedule“.

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Welsh Government Suspends ABC Broadband Voucher Scheme

3rd Aug, 2024 (3 Comments)

The Welsh Government (WG) has chosen to “pause” their long-running Access Broadband Cymru (ABC) grant scheme, which offered funding to help rural homes get a faster broadband service installed in areas of slow connectivity. But given the greater focus on gigabit-capable connections, ABC was starting to look a bit dated.

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Ofcom Orders UK Phones Providers to Add Tougher Scam Call Blocking

29th Jul, 2024 (10 Comments)

The telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has today given UK phone providers (fixed line and mobile) six months to implement changes that aim to help tackle scammers who call from abroad and imitate UK landline numbers (i.e. spoofed calls), which requires stricter measures against “Presentation Numbers” that are used to identify who is making a call.

Virgin Media O2 Reveals UK Plan for 2G Mobile Switch Off

23rd Jul, 2024 (37 Comments)

The CTO of network operator O2 (Virgin Media), Jeanie York, has today become the first UK mobile provider to set out their plans for withdrawing the old 2G service, which will see the first customers beginning to be moved off that platform in 2025. But they won’t be switching 2G off completely, at least not for a long time.

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Ofcom Review UK Mobile Licence Fees for 900MHz, 1800MHz and 2100MHz

23rd Jul, 2024 (1 Comment)

The UK telecoms regulator has announced that, following a request from BT, it has launched a review of the annual licence fees they charge mobile network operators (EE, Vodafone, Three UK and O2) for use of three popular mobile spectrum bands – 900MHz, 1800MHz and 2100MHz – supporting 2G, 3G and 4G (mobile broadband) services.

Ofcom Propose New Ban to Tackle Abuse of UK Mobile Networks

22nd Jul, 2024 (8 Comments)

Market regulator Ofcom has proposed to ban UK telecoms operators from leasing Global Titles – numbers like +44 (for the United Kingdom) that support mobile services – to third parties. This is because such leasing can be misused to try and intercept messages and calls, disrupt the operation of networks and track the location of users of other networks.

Ofcom UK Hit BT with £17.5m Fine for 999 Call Handling Fault UPDATE

22nd Jul, 2024 (17 Comments)

The national regulator, Ofcom, has this morning hit BT with a fine of £17.5m for being “ill-prepared to respond to a catastrophic failure of its emergency call handling service last summer” (here), which readers may recall occurred after a technical fault (“complex software issue”) resulted in 14,000 emergency calls being disrupted. The disruption lasted for 10.5 hours.