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Ofcom Orders UK Phones Providers to Add Tougher Scam Call Blocking

29th July, 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.

Ofcom Propose New Ban to Tackle Abuse of UK Mobile Networks

22nd July, 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 July, 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.

Openreach-2024-van-driving-along-uk-road

Openreach Toughen Whereabouts Stance for Altnet UK Broadband Engineers UPDATE

29th June, 2024 (10 Comments)

Openreach (BT) has begun the process of toughening up their stance on compliance with their “whereabouts” rules. This could see them taking further contractual action against alternative UK broadband networks (altnets) that struggle to reach the necessary 90% performance threshold, which might eventually include restrictions on network access.

Northumberland Council Warn of Rise in UK Broadband Scammers

28th June, 2024 (0 Comments)

The Northumberland County Council (NCC) in England has put out a general warning to residents after observing a rise in “broadband-related cyber fraud“, which occurs when scammers attempt to impersonate your ISP in order to steal financial data and money. Some 68% of the reported victims have collectively lost £12.57k to this scam alone.

Police Arrest Two Men Over Illegal UK Phone Mast and Smishing

12th June, 2024 (7 Comments)

In somewhat of a first for the United Kingdom, Police in the City of London area last week reported that they had arrested two men in connection with the investigation of an “illegitimate telephone mast” and antenna, which is believed to have been setup for the purpose of acting as an “SMS blaster”.

O2 UK Begins Rolling Out New, Free Caller Identification Feature

10th June, 2024 (11 Comments)

Mobile operator O2 (Virgin Media) has today officially confirmed that they’ve started rolling out Hiya’s new Brand ID technology to customers for free, which is a caller identification solution that can reduce the number of calls customers receive from unknown numbers (e.g. scammers) by providing details of the organisation making the call.

Copper Cable Thieves Strike Openreach’s Network in County Tyrone

29th May, 2024 (4 Comments)

Some 700 homes and businesses in the County Tyrone (Northern Ireland) town of Dungannon have suffered significant broadband and phone connectivity problems, which occurred after criminals damaged Openreach’s local network during the theft of a “large quantity” of their copper telecoms cable.

Connectivity Problems in Telford After Openreach Network Attacked

16th May, 2024 (8 Comments)

An unspecified number of Openreach’s broadband ISP and phone customers, including some Ethernet links, appear to have been disrupted in the Shropshire (England) town of Telford after the operator’s network was “badly damaged” in an attack. The operator informs that this “attack” is not being linked to cable theft.

New SSID Confusion Attack Exploits General WiFi Vulnerability

14th May, 2024 (11 Comments)

Network security researchers have published details of a new vulnerability that arises from a “design flaw” in the IEEE 802.11 WiFi standard (CVE-2023-52424), which is said to impact “all operating systems and WiFi clients” and allows an attacker to trick Wi-Fi clients into connecting to an untrusted network.

Copper Cable Thieves Strike Openreach’s Network in New Forest UPDATE

3rd May, 2024 (7 Comments)

Homes and businesses in the New Forest (Hampshire, England) village of Everton were left cut-off from part of Openreach’s UK broadband and phone services this week, which occurred after criminals caused significant damage to the network while attempting to steal the operator’s copper telecoms cable.

Full Fibre Broadband Network in Wolverhampton Attacked by Vandals

1st May, 2024 (17 Comments)

Broadband ISP Exascale, which is building a gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network to several thousand premises – mostly around Telford and Wrekin, has revealed that several core Dark Fibre cables – between Telford and Wolverhampton – were cut this week in what appears to have been a targeted attack by vandals.

Openreach Tackle UK Copper Cable Theft with DNA Tracing Tech UPDATE

25th April, 2024 (16 Comments)

Network operator Openreach (BT) has told ISPreview that they’ve seen a 30% fall in the theft of their copper phone and broadband cables (Metal Theft) over the last year, which is being partly attributed to the deployment of a new “invisible” forensic liquid marker that can be sprayed directly onto cables and equipment.

Full Fibre Providers Move to Tackle Rising UK Thefts of Fibre Equipment

21st March, 2024 (21 Comments)

The SHIFT (Safety & Health In Fibre Telecoms) group, which aims to improve health and safety practices and standards across the UK’s fibre broadband industry, has today told ISPreview that its members (network operators etc.) are uniting to tackle the “numerous thefts of fibre splicing and test equipment amongst its members in recent weeks“.

Government Boosts Resilience of UK 999 Calls After BT Fault

21st March, 2024 (0 Comments)

The UK Government has today proposed a series of recommendations to help “bolster the resilience” of the 999 emergency call handling system, which is operated by BT, following a technical fault (“complex software issue”) last summer (here) that resulted in 11,470 unique emergency calls being “unsuccessfully connected“.

Broadband Operators Call on UK Gov to Help STOP Physical Network Attacks

7th March, 2024 (4 Comments)

A group of full fibre broadband operators, which are being led by alternative network providers Ogi and Vorboss, have today called on the UK Government and Ofcom to urgently help tackle a recent rise in attacks – often committed by criminal gangs and vandals – against vital national telecoms infrastructure and the engineers who build it.

Virgin Media O2 UK Adopt Hiya AI to Tackle SPAM and Fraud Calls

12th February, 2024 (12 Comments)

Broadband ISP and mobile operator Virgin Media and O2 have today announced that they’ve become the second major UK telecoms provider, after BT (EE), to adopt Hiya’s AI-based technologies, which can analyse call behaviour in real-time and determine whether to flag an incoming call as ‘suspected spam’ or block fraud.