It May Become Easier to Buy SIMs for Your 'Smart' Machines Soon

To facilitate machine-to-machine communication in devices like CCTV cameras and ACs to be deployed mainly in smart cities, the Department of Telecom will soon issue 'Know Your Customers' guidelines to ensure easy availability of mobile SIM cards for such equipment.The guidelines would allow transfer of SIMs, among others. At present, norms bar transfer of SIMs, mandates strict subscriber verification and do not allow a person to own more than nine SIMs.
"After M2M (machine-to-machine) roadmap, guidelines for M2M specific Know Your Customers (KYC) have been prepared and will be released shortly," Telecom Secretary J S Deepak said at the India M2M and IoT forum in New Delhi.
The DoT is in discussion with Ministry of Home Affairs to finalise these guidelines. DoT Deputy Director General (NT) Rajiv Sinha said these guidelines will be different from P2P communications.
"There will provision to allow SIM transfers because devices will change hands. There will be provision of no tele-verification, most important is there will be some communication allowed. Some SMS, data, and voice but on a pre-defined number," Sinha said.
The SIM that will be issued for M2M services will be in bulk. The rules will be applicable on SIMs purchased in bulk. The new guidelines are required to facilitate development of smart cities which will have devices with sensors that will communicate using SIMs or Internet connection.
Deepak said that government organisation Telecom Engineering Centre and autonomous body Telecommunications Standards Development Society, India (TSDSI), are working actively to foster the development of an Internet of Things ecosystem which facilitates not only M2M communication standard but looks at encryption, privacy , security angle from Indian perspective.
He said that DoT has will soon have a virtual network operator licence - the third licence which seeks to separate network operations from delivery of services.
"Such a VNO licence would help system integrator to get in to agreement with telecom operators for providing M2M services. Various initiatives are under way to make M2M ecosystem throbbing ecosystem where anyone contribute and provide us leadership in this space," Deepak said.
As per experts, the M2M segment is expected to fuel growth in telecom sector at more rapid pace compared to sale of SIM for just mobile communication.

Facebook ‘dark web’ now accessed by over one million users every month

More than one million people are now connecting to Facebook through Tor “dark web” — which maintains privacy and leaves no digital trail — every month. According to Facebook, the growth of Tor over the past few years has been “roughly” linear, noting that some 525,000 people who accessed the service via Tor in June 2015 rose to more than one million in April this year.
“This [Tor] growth is a reflection of the choices that people make to use Facebook over Tor, and the value that it provides them. We hope they will continue to provide feedback and help us keep improving,” TechCrunch reports.

Tor allows anonymous web browsing by sending data through multiple encrypted steps rather than making direct connections that shields the identity of its users. Facebook created a dedicated address for Tor access in October 2014, making it easier for users to connect via Tor and give them privacy.

Facebook also expanded its Tor support at the start of this year by rolling out support for the Android Orbot proxy, giving Android Facebook users an easier way to use Tor. Apple’s iOS platform still does not have Tor support.
Confirming Facebook’s claim, a spokeswoman for Tor said in a statement: “When using Facebook website over Tor, Tor Browser is in charge of that data, so it is anonymous. Of course, someone may post a status update saying that they are at some restaurant, for instance, and that would de-anonymise them.” Tor could be used in countries where internet access or use of Facebook is blocked or censored, the Tor statement added.
“Many people use Tor in countries where the internet is censored, not in order to be anonymous. Tor allows them to access the uncensored internet, including reaching Facebook. In Iran, for instance, Facebook is blocked. So people use Tor to get onto the internet and browse and from there they can reach Facebook,” it read. Privacy activists, hackers, activists and journalists use this “dark web” to communicate securely.

India produces 18.5 lakh tonnes of e-waste per year: Study

India generates about 18.5 lakh metric tonnes of electronic waste per year according to an ASSOCHAM-Frost & Sullivan study. The study noted and this number may increase to 30 lakh tonnes per year by 2018. Mumbai generates the most amount of E-waste at about 1.2 lakh tonnes followed by Delhi-NCR and Bengaluru with 98,000 and 92,000 tonnes respectively.
According to the study , the government, public, and private sectors contribute more than 70% of e-waste, while 15% is contributed by households. The majority of e-waste consist of televisions, refrigerators, and washing machines, with computers and mobile phones making up 20% and 2% of e-waste respectively. The study also noted that that only 2.5% of the e-waste generated by India gets recycled due to poor infrastructure and legislative framework. In addition, over 95% of e-waste generated in the country is managed by the unorganised sector and scrap dealers. It was noted that the biggest e-waste recycling market in India is Delhi with about 30% to 40% of the e-waste generated in the country landing there. Most of the waste that is generated ends up with the informal recyclers due to lack of regulations and improper collection centers. These recyclers use hazardous methods like acid stripping and open air incineration for processing the waste. Not only are these methods unsafe, but also cause pollution by releasing toxins into the environment.
As per the study, about five lakh children between 10 to 14 years are employed as child labourers and work without any protection or safeguards. DS Rawat, ASSOCHAM Secretary General said, “It is a matter of concern that most of our e-waste is handled in the most unscientific way by scrap dealers, who may be inadvertently handling radioactive material, as was brought to light in the past in a Mayapuri (west Delhi) case.” ASSOCHAM’s report strongly advocated the need for a legislation that will prevent the entry of child labour into the collection, segregation and distribution of e-waste. The report also suggests tacking the issue of e-waste by e-waste collection centers easier to reach and training informal recyclers about proper recycling techniques

Bsnl has no plans to provide 20 GB 3G data for RS.50

BSNL has no plans to offer 20GB of 3G of data for Rs. 50, said Sanjay Kumar, GM, Sales and Marketing, BSNL. “We also don’t know where this story is originating from. As of now we don’t have any such plans,” he told . Earlier today, reports had said that this plan was going to be under the Prime Minister’s Digital India initiative, but it turn out the reports were false.

10 dollars routers blamed in bangladesh bank hack

Hackers managed to steal $80m (£56m) from Bangladesh's central bank because it skimped on network hardware and security software, reports Reuters.
The bank had no firewall and used second-hand routers that cost $10 to connect to global financial networks.
Better security and hardware would have hampered the attackers, Reuters said, quoting an official investigator.
The hackers aimed to steal $1bn but made mistakes that led to the theft being spotted and stopped.
Better defence
A firewall would have made attempts to hack the bank more "difficult", Mohammad Shah Alam, a forensic investigator who works on the Bangladesh team investigating the theft, told Reuters.
The second-hand hardware also meant that basic security steps to segregate network traffic were not taken, he said.
The cheap routers have hindered the investigation, said Mr Alam, because they collected very little network data that could be used to pinpoint the hackers and shed light on their tactics.
The hack took place in early February and involved hackers getting access to the core network of Bangladesh's central bank. They used this privileged access to transfer cash from Bangladesh's account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to other banks.
A spelling mistake in one of the transfer orders alerted bank staff and meant the hackers only managed to steal $81m. This has been traced to accounts in the Philippines and to casinos in the same country. Most of the cash has yet to be recovered.
Bank security experts said the bank should have spent more time and money protecting the network for its central bank.
"You are talking about an organisation that has access to billions of dollars and they are not taking even the most basic security precautions," Jeff Wichman, a consultant with cyber firm Optiv, told Reuters.

China shuts down 2 apple's services

Regulations were unveiled in March that outlawed foreign ownership of online publishing services.
The rules also required that all content shown to Chinese people must be stored on servers based on the Chinese mainland.
Apple said it hoped access to the services would be restored soon.
Online threat
Currently, anyone in China who visits the iBooks store or tries to use iTunes Movies service is greeted with a message in Chinese saying the services were "unusable", reports Reuters. Both services have only been available in China for about six months.
The move has widely been seen as a blow to Apple which is keen to ensure its products are popular and sell well in China, because the region is the second biggest market for its products. The shutdown comes only days before Apple reports its second quarter financial results.
The services were shut down on the orders of China's media watchdog - the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television. The action is believed to be part of a wider attempt by China's government to consolidate its control over the internet and media organisations.
China has defended the restrictions saying online publishing had to be monitored to combat terrorism and foreign ideas that could prove harmful.
The strict rules are also seen as a way to foster the success of indigenous net Chinese firms such as Huawei, Alibaba and Tencent.

India to become second largest smartphone market by 2017: Morgan Stanley

According to the report on global technology and telecom, the country's smartphone market will grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 23 per cent through 2018 and would account for 30 per cent of the global growth during the period.
. . "We expect India to overtake the US next year as the second-largest smartphone market by units. India will grow nearly five times faster than the world's largest smartphone market China, where growth has decelerated," the report said.
It added, "We estimate a 23 per cent CAGR in units in India, compared with 5 per cent over the same period in China. By 2018, we estimate 192 million smartphones will be shipped to India, or 11 per cent of global units."
. . Morgan Stanley said there are only 225 million smartphone subscribers in the country, accounting for 18 per cent of the total population.
. . "The improvement in demographics, as measured by declining age dependency, has been one of the most important factors supporting higher potential growth in India... We expect consumption to maintain a relatively high growth rate, driven by an increase in per-capita income growth and an emerging middle class," it noted.
. . On consumption of data, the report said the country is on the cusp of significant growth in data traffic driven by rising data users as well as growing data usage per user.
. . "We expect India's internet penetration to reach 50 per cent by 2018, up from 26 per cent last year, driven by rising smartphone availability and affordability, online content and changing user behavior," it said.
. . The global consultancy estimates 4G smartphones will account for 75 per cent of 170 million shipments by the next year, which currently has less than 1 per cent subscriber penetration in the country.
. . The report, which is based on 2,600 urban smartphone buyers, said the respondents paid an average of Rs 8,500 for their smartphones and plan to spend 40 per cent more on their next phone.