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Articles for Category Tag - Politics

University of Portsmouth Team Get £772k to Develop Subsea Cable Surveillance

15th October, 2025 (1 Comment)

A scientist from the University of Portsmouth’s School of Mathematics and Physics has successfully bid for £772,372 of funding from the Lloyd’s Register Foundation, which will be used to design a surveillance algorithm and maritime training programme to help identify, repair and reduce damage to undersea infrastructure (e.g. energy pipes and fibre optic internet cables).

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Parliament Publishes Useful UK Summary of Rules for Broadband Poles

15th October, 2025 (12 Comments)

The House of Commons Library within the UK Parliament has published a useful new document that helps to summarise and explain some of the core rules around the deployment of poles (telegraph poles) for broadband network expansion. In recent years, these have often become a point of some contention for communities that don’t want them.

Ofcom Will Tomorrow Kick Off the UK 5G Mobile Auction for 26GHz and 40GHz

14th October, 2025 (14 Comments)

The telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has today confirmed that the first bidding on their auction of the 26GHz and 40GHz millimetre wave (mmW) spectrum bands for use by 5G mobile (mobile broadband) operators will get underway tomorrow, with BT (EE), O2 (Telefonica UK / Virgin Media) and Vodafone (VodafoneThree) all taking part.

Government to Reintegrate Building Digital UK Agency Back into DSIT UPDATE

13th October, 2025 (1 Comment)

The Government has today informed ISPreview that its Building Digital UK (BDUK) executive agency, which has responsibility for delivering gigabit broadband and better mobile connectivity across the nation (e.g. the £5bn Project Gigabit scheme), is to be integrated back into the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) from 1st November 2025.

Tees Valley Authority Publish Performance Map of Local Mobile Signals

9th October, 2025 (2 Comments)

The Tees Valley Combined Authority (TVCA) in North East England, which covers Darlington, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland and Stockton-on-Tees, has today published a map of mobile signal quality and mobile broadband performance – the result of their prior work with Inakalum to harness local bin lorries to help test 4G and 5G coverage.

Gigaclear Start East Gloucestershire UK Project Gigabit Broadband Rollout

9th October, 2025 (2 Comments)

Rural broadband provider Gigaclear, which has already deployed their full fibre (FTTP) network to cover 612,000 UK premises, has this morning finally announced the start of their roll-out under Project Gigabit’s East Gloucestershire (Lot 18) contract. The £10.81m deployment is currently expected to help upgrade 3,547 premises in hard to reach areas.

Welsh Gov Tenders for £70m Extending High Speed Broadband Project

8th October, 2025 (1 Comment)

ISPreview has spotted that the Welsh Government (WG) have today issued a formal tender notice for their £70m (state aid) “Extending High Speed Broadband” (EHSB) project for Wales. In its current form, this aims to help extend faster broadband to around 29,000 premises in poorly served areas (i.e. locations that can’t yet access 30Mbps+ speeds).

Ookla Finds UK Trains Deliver Some of the Slowest Wi-Fi Speeds in Europe

8th October, 2025 (27 Comments)

Network testing firm Ookla, which collects broadband performance data from consumers via their popular Speedtest.net service, has examined the onboard WiFi performance of train services across Europe (inc. some Asian rail networks) and found that the United Kingdom delivers some of the slowest internet speeds on trains.

Connected UK broadband house 123rf ID 169941702

Broadband and Mobile Considered as Part of UK Home Buying and Selling Reform

7th October, 2025 (6 Comments)

The UK government has begun consulting on new proposals aimed at speeding up the process of home buying and selling, while also improving the material information that Estate Agents are required to provide for every transaction. The availability of broadband, as well as mobile signal and coverage, are some of the data points proposed for inclusion in future guidance.

Ofcom Confirm Bidders for the UK 5G Mobile Auction of 26GHz and 40GHz

7th October, 2025 (4 Comments)

The UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has today confirmed that the final bidders due to take part in their auction of the 26GHz and 40GHz millimetre wave (mmW) bands for faster 5G data (mobile broadband) services will include BT (EE), Telefonica UK (O2 / Virgin Media) and Vodafone (VodafoneThree). No surprises this time around.

Broadband Outages on Shetland After Second Subsea Fibre Break in 3 Months UPDATE

4th October, 2025 (5 Comments)

Customers of ISP Sky Broadband, Vodafone and possibly others on Shetland, which is a remote UK subarctic archipelago that resides north of the Scottish mainland, started suffering from a loss of internet connectivity yesterday after the main SHEFA-2 (Faroese Telecom) subsea fibre optic cable suffered damage on Friday; the second time in 3 months.

BT Completes £1.9m Full Fibre Build for Swansea Bay City Deal

2nd October, 2025 (7 Comments)

The Swansea Bay City Deal’s Digital Infrastructure Programme has today announced the completion of their £1.9m Full Fibre Infrastructure Build project with BT, which has helped to upgrade 69 key public sector sites with “future proofed” broadband connectivity.

Gov Encourages Pension Firms to Invest in UK Science, Tech and Digital

2nd October, 2025 (12 Comments)

The UK Government has today launched a new Innovation Cluster Map, which forms part of a fresh drive to encourage pensions firms to commit more of their private investment toward the country’s science and technology sectors, which could include anything from research into new vaccines and medicines to AI or future satellite broadband technologies etc.

30th September, 2025 (40 Comments)

The popular online image sharing website Imgur.com, which was first founded in 2009 and has been widely used to host viral images, short videos and memes that can be linked to from other sites, appears as if it may have responded to a recent Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) investigation by blocking UK IP (Internet Protocol) addresses.

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Openreach Launches Alternative UK Analogue Phone Line Product

29th September, 2025 (36 Comments)

Openreach has today notified UK telecoms providers that their SOTAP Analogue product will, following a “successful pilot” (here), get its full commercial launch on 28th October 2025. This is a phone line service that does NOT require broadband to work and will be targeted at vulnerable users who would otherwise struggle with migrating to an All-IP (internet) based phone service.

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Government to Expand UK Availability of Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme

26th September, 2025 (4 Comments)

Good news. The Government’s Building Digital UK (BDUK) agency will shortly announce that more areas of the United Kingdom are to be re-opened to the Gigabit Broadband Voucher Scheme (GBVS), which means that homes and businesses in poorly served areas will be able to apply for funding to help get faster internet connections installed.

Fibrus Founder Claims Outdated Rules Force UK Taxpayers to Fund Rural Broadband

23rd September, 2025 (17 Comments)

The Co-Founder and Chairman of alternative rural broadband ISP Fibrus, Conal Henry, will tomorrow tell the Connected Britain event that Government subsidies (e.g. the £5bn Project Gigabit programme) are being “wasted” due to Ofcom’s rules allegedly making the roll-out of rural broadband “unnecessarily expensive“.