Home » UK ISP News Archive » Article Tag: Security (828 Posts)

Articles for Category Tag - Security

Online Harms – UK Finalise Plan for Ofcom Internet Regulation

15th December, 2020 (16 Comments)

The UK government has today appeared to finalise their plans for turning Ofcom into a regulator of internet content via a new legal “duty of care“, which will hand them new powers to force websites (e.g. Facebook) into removing “harmful” content (e.g. terrorism, child abuse, self-harm and suicide imagery etc.).

BT Aim to Establish UK’s First Commercial Drone Corridor

15th December, 2020 (0 Comments)

Broadband and mobile giant BT has today announced that they will lead a new Government backed consortium as part of ‘Project XCelerate‘, which seeks to establish the UK’s first commercial drone corridor in open and unrestricted airspace (i.e. enabling automated drones and manned aviation to safely co-exist).

Gov Tightens Huawei 5G Mobile and FTTP Broadband Restrictions

30th November, 2020 (10 Comments)

In another telecoms policy surprise the UK Government has today announced that mobile operators, such as Three UK, EE (BT) and Vodafone, must stop installing “any” Huawei equipment in ultrafast 5G networks from the end of September 2021. A 35% cap on kit will also apply to FTTP and gigabit broadband from Jan 2023.

Amazon’s Sidewalk Shared Wireless Network Should Be Opt-In

25th November, 2020 (14 Comments)

At some point in the near future Amazon plans to introduce a new feature to their smart devices (Echo, Echo Show, Ring etc.) called ‘Sidewalk‘, which by default will create a new wireless network – this has access to both your broadband ISP connection and that of your neighbour’s (if they have similar kit) – to improve connectivity.

ip address Fiber optic cables for backbone lines on blue network background

New Bill Laid to BAN Huawei and Boost UK Telecoms Security

24th November, 2020 (12 Comments)

The Government will today publish their Telecommunications (Security) Bill, which imposes new rules to improve the security of UK networks (mobile and broadband) and ban “high risk vendors” like Huawei, while also threatening fines of up to £100k a day (or 10% of turnover) against operators that fail to meet the standard.

BT Virus Protect Struggling to Work on Latest Mac OS Big Sur

24th November, 2020 (13 Comments)

Customers of UK ISP BT and its various home broadband packages, which come bundled with an included McAfee internet security solution called Virus Protect (can be installed on PCs, Android phones and tablets), are finding that the software fails to function properly or get updates on the latest release of Mac OS (v11 Big Sur).

Error message concept. Alert, attention notification. Important reminder

UK Mobile Operators Launch NumberVerify to Combat Fraud UPDATE

18th November, 2020 (24 Comments)

Mobile network operators including EE (BT), O2, Three UK and Vodafone have today collaborated to launch a new service called NumberVerify (NV), which is a new consumer safety solution that aims to make it both easier and more secure to authenticate a user’s identity for online transactions.

House of Lords Committee Probes Online UK Freedom of Speech

16th November, 2020 (10 Comments)

The House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee has launched a new inquiry, which will examine whether or not freedom of expression is under threat online and, if so, how modern technology might be used to help protect it. The inquiry will also weigh that against how such freedoms should be balanced with other rights.

ISP Virgin Media UK Restricting Port 7547 After Leaving it Open

1st November, 2020 (34 Comments)

Nothing to worry about, move along please. Cable broadband ISP Virgin Media has “taken steps to ensure [port 7547] is no longer discoverable” online after they left it open on some routers. The good news is that this “posed no security risk” to customers, but it remains unclear why it occurred.

Law Firm Starts Legal Action Over Virgin Media UK Data Breach

14th October, 2020 (17 Comments)

A consumer action law firm, Your Lawyers, has today announced that they’ve launched a Group Action Claim against broadband ISP Virgin Media UK, which gives the provider “four weeks to admit liability” for a recent data breach that exposed the personal details belonging to 900,000 of their customers.

Questions for UK Gov as EU Court Rules on Internet Data Snooping

6th October, 2020 (12 Comments)

The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has this morning issued a ruling that appears to impose restrictions on the general and indiscriminate retention of phone and internet data, which raises some new questions for the UK Government’s Investigatory Powers Act (IPAct) – also known as the “snoopers charter.”

network cables and fiber optic closeup with keyboard background

BT and Toshiba Deploy First UK Industrial Quantum Secure Fibre Network

1st October, 2020 (10 Comments)

After years of development BT and Toshiba have today announced that they’ve made the UK’s first “industrial deployment” of a quantum-secure network using Openreach’s “standard” fibre optic infrastructure, which runs between the National Composites Centre (NCC) and the Centre for Modelling & Simulation (CFMS).

NordVPN Named Top VPN for Speed in 2020 AV-TEST Benchmark

1st October, 2020 (15 Comments)

A new report from internet security firm AV-TEST has benchmarked several popular Virtual Private Network (VPN) providers and found that NordVPN was the “clear winner” for measured broadband download and upload speeds in three major world regions (UK, Japan and the US west coast). Well.. they did commission the “independent” test.

Ex-BT CEO to Help UK Gov Hunt for New Telecoms Suppliers

23rd September, 2020 (6 Comments)

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has announced that the Ex-BT CEO and former trade minister, Lord Ian Livingston, will lead a new “Telecoms Diversification Task Force” to help diversify the UK’s telecoms (mobile and broadband) supply chain and reduce reliance on high-risk vendors like Huawei.

New UK Smart Data Laws May Help Broadband Deal Comparisons

10th September, 2020 (0 Comments)

The UK Government has proposed to mandate that broadband and phone providers, as well as related companies in the sector, should participate in their new “Smart Data” initiative, which aims to foster the “sharing [of] customer data” in order to deliver better product comparisons and billing management across accounts etc.

NETGEAR Decline to Patch Security Flaw in 45 Routers and Modems

31st July, 2020 (19 Comments)

Back in June it was revealed that around 80 of NETGEARs broadband wireless router(s), modems and other products suffered from a remote code execution vulnerability, which could allow “unauthenticated remote code execution with root privileges.” The company patched some of those but seems to have no plan for doing the rest.

EE UK Boosts Parental Controls Over Children’s Smartphones

28th July, 2020 (2 Comments)

Mobile operator EE (BT) has today launched “Set Up Safe” for all UK Pay Monthly customers, which is a free new SMS service that is designed to help parents “quickly and easily set up their child’s phone with safety features” (i.e. block adult internet content, set spending caps and stop them adding extra charges to the bill etc.).