Vote for toughest net neutrality bill passes in California

Last year’s FCC decision to repeal net neutrality was arguably the most unpopular tech policy decision in the history of the modern internet. The repeal not only resulted in an unprecedented public backlash, but prompted numerous states to immediately begin exploring new state-level alternatives in the wake of the FCC’s retreat. California lawmakers rallied enough …

Telkom CEO says South Africa connection charges could trigger job cuts

JOHANNESBURG, Aug 27 (Reuters) – South Africa’s plan to slash the fees mobile firms charge each other to terminate calls on their networks proposed by the regulator could hurt revenue and lead to job cuts, the fixed line and mobile operator Telkom said on Monday. The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) on Aug. …

Rights groups ask Google to cancel its plan to launch Dragonfly, a censored version in China

Leading human rights groups are calling on Google to cancel its plan to launch a censored version of its search engine in China, which they said would violate the freedom of expression and privacy rights of millions of internet users in the country. A coalition of 14 organizations — including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, …

Trump administration might explore regulating Google searches for bias

The Trump administration on Tuesday said it would explore regulating Google — an effort that would challenge protections around free speech online — in response to the president’s allegations that the tech giant manipulates its search results to prominently display negative stories about him and other Republicans. In the United States, regulating search results could …

Africa’s first commercial 5G service launched in Lesotho

Vodacom Group has announced that it has created Africa’s first standards-based, commercial 5G service in Lesotho using 3.5GHz spectrum to initially deliver Fixed-Wireless Access broadband services to two enterprise customers in Lesotho. The immediate benefit of 5G technology for Vodacom subscribers in Lesotho includes the quicker deployment of broadband services with fibre-like speeds. With early …

Google clarifies that it continues to track users even if they’ve disabled the location setting

Google has revised an erroneous description on its website of how its “Location History” setting works, clarifying that it continues to track users even if they’ve disabled the setting. The change came three days after an Associated Press investigation revealed that several Google apps and websites store user location even if users have turned off …