According to the most recent report from Canalys Cloud Channels Analysis, the worldwide spending on cloud infrastructure services has increased by more than one third (37.6%) year-on-year, soaring to USD 26.3 billion in the second quarter of 2019. The ranking of the leading cloud service providers remains unchanged, with Amazon Web Services (AWS) dominating at 36.1 percent growth, with revenue of over USD 8.3 billion, and a total market share of 31.5 percent. Microsoft Azure comes second with its sales growing by 63.6 percent to just under USD 5 billion, increasing its marketing share to 18.1 percent. In third place is Google Cloud with a 9.5 percent market share, followed by Alibaba Cloud in the fourth position. In total, cloud infrastructure revenue grew by USD 7.2 billion compared to a year ago, and the current expansion marks “the biggest ever quarterly increase in terms of value, highlighting the continued robust…
The second Payment Services Directive, or so-called PSD2 requirements will come into force on September 14th, 2019. With this deadline approaching, we have decided to examine this matter from the merchandiser’s perspective. In brief, PSD2 is an initiative from the EU aimed at regulating the e-payment environment where banks and fintechs (Third Party Service Providers – TPSPs) currently operate in a largely disorganized manner. There is no consistent, standardized or regulated framework that defines the cooperation between banks and TPSPs. The bank may refuse access by a TPSP to its client’s bank account, preventing the same client or merchandiser from using the TPSP’s services, which may be more convenient or less costly than banking services. To regulate the e-payment market, PSD2 will force banks to grant third-party access to their clients’ bank accounts. Equally important, TPSPs will be regulated – they will have to obtain a license and…
Trinity Cyber, a Bowie, Maryland-based cybersecurity services and solutions startup, has announced the completion of a $23 million funding round led by Intel Capital and other top institutional investors. The company claims that it is taking an entirely new approach to cybersecurity and, with the help of its new technology known as Proactive Threat Interference, is able to “proactively intercept and control cyberattacks” before they even reach the target’s network, thus “reducing risk and increasing cost to adversaries.” Steve Ryan, CEO of Trinity Cyber, said, “This investment by Intel Capital and other strategic backers is significant. I co-founded Trinity Cyber to transform the way the world addresses the cyber problem. No one is doing what Trinity Cyber is doing. No one else can. We make the adversary fail, and we feel this strategic support validates the elegance of our solution.” “As cyberattacks become more sophisticated, technology to counter…
FIX Network, an innovative technology company from Vilnius, Lithuania, has developed a new two-factor authentication (2FA) SIM card and app for protecting mobile data and digital identities. The ultimate goal of the company is to provide comprehensive blockchain-based solutions for mobile devices, enabling subscribers to secure their digital assets and identities by safekeeping private keys on their SIM cards. However, due to the urgent and immediate requirement of securing phone numbers – which may be considered to be the most valuable digital identities – FIX Network will provide a free-to-use 2FA application, together with newly issued and truly subscriber-owned phone numbers that will serve as secure and global digital identities. These numbers will be fully controlled by the subscriber, preventing unauthorized porting or malicious hijacking of the phone number. This 2FA solution will also include the practical ability to recover access to digital identities through user-defined policies that include…
We live in a world of increasingly complex telecom and VoIP services, with subscribers having access to an abundance of cutting-edge products. The fierce competition in the field of communications demands an excellent customer experience in order to attract and retain customers, and to reduce churn. With so many choices on offer, the power has shifted to customers – if faced with a problem, they have come to expect an immediate resolution. Unfortunately, the surveys of customer experience in the telecommunication world reveal that, in general, consumers have a very low opinion of the telecoms industry and are dissatisfied with the support that they receive from their providers. It seems that the reason for this deficiency may be found in the mindset of telecom operators, who devote most of their time and effort to building and managing their VoIP networks, rather than indulging their customers. Satisfactory customer experience in…
Telecommunications giant AT&T and Colt Technology Services, a provider of network, voice, data centre and managed cloud services, have successfully completed the integration of MEF’s Lifecycle Service Orchestration (LSO) Sonata Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) that allow business customers to virtually seamlessly order services across multiple carriers. The two companies claim to be the first in the telecom industry to use MEF’s LSO Sonata APIs to automate the ordering of Ethernet services. Roman Pacewicz, Chief product officer, AT&T Business, said, “There’s no doubt this will change how carriers interact and operate in the industry. Our interactions are now more cost-efficient, flexible and error-free. We kicked off interoperability discussions and trials three years ago and gained important insights that will help create and refine industry standards under the guidance of MEF. The transformation of networks to a dynamic, on-demand, software-centric, cloud-based model opens up opportunities for everyone.” The implementation of the…
NetNumber, the US-based provider of centralized signaling and routing controller (CSRC) solutions, and Voipfuture, the developer of edge technology for monitoring and analyzing voice quality in IP networks, have announced the launch of a fully-automated and intelligent routing system for voice services. This is the industry’s first intelligent platform to conduct traffic analysis for media and signaling, and transform quality information into routing actions. According to the announcement, the system will provide domestic telecommunications companies and international carriers with the capability to automatically reroute traffic in real-time in case of media quality deterioration. The rerouting and route recovery decisions will be based on the specified policies of the communication service providers (CSP). It is stated that the availability of automatic rerouting capabilities allows CSPs to improve quality by choosing more efficient downstream carriers, thereby attracting additional traffic from customers as well as OTTs and optimizing termination costs. Moreover, valuable traffic can receive…
DIDWW, the cloud telephony platform focused on providing virtual phone numbers on a global basis, has recently been assigned a new international shared country code by the ITU (International Telecommunication Union). This organization is the United Nations specialized agency for information and communication technologies, and is responsible for implementing technical standards that ensure the seamless interconnection of networks. In the past, the company highlighted the vulnerabilities and shortfalls of the current number portability procedures and how it was possible that a subscriber could lose their phone number. This problem has become critical due to the fact that phone numbers are increasingly used as a supposedly secure means of identification and authentication in our journey towards full digital transformation. As per DIDWW’s official announcement, the company strongly subscribes to the ITU’s philosophy that the phone number is an asset that must be owned by the end-user, and the company…
The Japanese mobile operator NTT Docomo Inc. and a multinational cyber security and defense company Trend Micro Inc. have announced the launch of a service designed to protect Internet of Things (IoT) devices running on Docomo’s mobile network. The new Cloud Platform Network Security Service from Docomo, which uses Trend Micro’s security platform, will enable the “first-of-its-kind protection” for IoT networks. The provided user-friendly security shield will mainly target Docomo’s customers who are building infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) environments. Akihiko Omikawa, Executive vice president at Trend Micro, said, “The promise and potential of 5G has the world waiting but let me issue a warning for the need for extra protection. Smarter endpoints mean a greater cyber risk to manage. We’re delighted and proud that our technology meets the needs of this global mobile phone leader. Together our joint solution delivers cloud infrastructure capabilities integrated with IoT-ready security customized for modern data centers.”…
The San Francisco-based cloud giant Salesforce has reached an agreement to buy Tableau Software Inc. in an all-stock deal valued at $15.7 billion. By acquiring Tableau, which provides easy-to-use tools for data visualization and management, Salesforce has positioned itself as the latest major technology company to play an important role in helping enterprises analyze data, make smarter decisions, drive intelligent, connected customer experiences, and facilitate innovation. “We are bringing together the world’s #1 CRM with the #1 analytics platform. Tableau helps people see and understand data, and Salesforce helps people engage and understand customers,” stated Marc Benioff, chairman and co-CEO, Salesforce. “It’s truly the best of both worlds for our customers – bringing together two critical platforms that every customer needs to understand their world. I’m thrilled to welcome Adam and his team to Salesforce.” Currently, Tableau has more than 86,000 business customers around the world, including Charles Schwab,…