Under a proposed new Federal Communications Commission rule, telecoms will be blocked from forming joint ventures to bid for available segments of wireless spectrum that are scheduled to come up for auction in 2015.
The proposal aims to help keep larger telecoms from taking over more of the wireless spectrum at the expense of smaller players, according to an Aug. 1 blog post by Robert C. Sherman, the FCC’s wireless telecommunications bureau chief.
He explained that a key motivator behind this proposal was the ongoing trend of consolidation in the wireless industry as the desire to give smaller enterprises and minority-owned businesses a better chance of acquiring wireless spectrum.
Microsoft Surface Pro 3 tablets with Intel Core i3 and i7 processors are now available in the U.S. and Canada. When the company introduced the Surface Pro 3 on May 20, Microsoft aimed for the middle of the price/performance spectrum with an Intel Core i5-powered device.
The original Surface Pro 3 cost nearly $1,429. Now, buyers are able to get a Core i3 version of the Surface Pro 3 that runs full-fledged Windows 8.1 Pro at prices starting at $799 without sacrificing too much performance.
Cisco recently released its 2014 Midyear Security Report, which contained updates on some of the same trends that were covered in its 2014 Annual Security report at the beginning of the year.
However,there are also new trends debuting in the midyear report, which is based on an analysis of 16 large multinational organizations. One trend the report highlighted was the increasing levels of the malicious use of Dynamic DNS.
A Dynamic DNS service allows users to redirect a host name to an IP address of their choosing, but the report points out that it also poses a potential risk to enterprises.
A report from IT research firm Strategy Analytics shows that the Google Android operating system captured a new record of 85 percent of worldwide mobile market. This was mostly at the expense of BlackBerry, Apple iOS and Microsoft Windows Phone. Also, global smartphone shipments reached 295 million units in the second quarter of 2014.
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