International Telecommunication Union

[Commentary] Facebook’s recently-introduced OpenCellular project hopes to deliver wireless Internet access to the 10 per cent of the world’s population that lives in the most remote places – outside the range of existing cellular networks, and with no access to the Internet.

OpenCellular is linked to a flurry of recent Facebook projects to connect the 4 billion still unconnected. These include the Telecom Infra Project to develop new infrastructure access and backhaul – and Aquila, a solar-powered drone with the potential to be instrumental in adding services outside of existing network reach. While the moves are expected to help improve lives, they are also important for Facebook’s market growth. OpenCellular is not expected to face the same regulatory hurdles as Facebook’s “Free Basics” which was banned in India. OpenCellular is less likely to have network neutrality challenges. Instead of enabling multi-tiered services, it is a low-cost, flexible and durable way for service providers to provide cellular and wireless Internet connection speeds where it was not viable to do so until now. However, there are challenges for Facebook to expand further use of its social networking site, and the benefits from the new OpenCellular hardware-based initiative won’t be immediate.

[Mathas writes for the LED and Wireless Networking Design Centers on EDN]

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) information and communications technology (ICT) Facts and Figures 2016 features end-2016 estimates for key telecommunication/ICT indicators, including on mobile-cellular subscriptions, Internet use, fixed and mobile broadband services, home ICT access, and more.

ICT Facts & Figures 2016 shows that developing countries now account for the vast majority of Internet users, with 2.5 billion users compared with one billion in developed countries. But Internet penetration rates tell a different story, with 81% in developed countries, compared with 40% in developing countries and 15% in the Least Developed Countries. By the end of 2016, more than half of the world’s population – 3.9 billion people – will not yet be using the Internet. While almost one billion households in the world now have Internet access (of which 230 million are in China, 60 million in India and 20 million in the world’s 48 Least Developed Countries), figures for household access reveal the extent of the digital divide, with 84% of households connected in Europe, compared with 15.4% in the African region.

Broadband is vital to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It plays a vital role in improving global sustainable development by supporting the provision of basic needs such as education and healthcare, helping to lift people out of poverty through e-commerce and job growth, monitoring climate change and planetary processes, and bridging the digital gender divide. But in order to achieve these ambitious goals, we must ensure that broadband is rolled out to include the 4.2 billion people around the world who are offline today. Yet, affordability and access remain key barriers, leaving billions of people unable to benefit from its potential to boost economic growth and development.

The Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development issued a statement urging policymakers, the private sector and other partners to make deployment of broadband infrastructure a top priority in strategies to accelerate global development and progress towards the sustainable development goals (SDGs). The statement was presented to the 2016 High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, which is meeting in New York City from 11-20 July to guide global efforts on the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.

In the statement, the Commission outlines the myriad ways broadband can improve global sustainable development. These include addressing basic needs such as education and access to information, helping lift people out of poverty through e-commerce opportunities and job growth, improving health services, monitoring climate change and planetary processes, and bridging the digital gender divide.

[Commentary] Mobile is particularly suited to connecting the unconnected in emerging markets where often remote and rural areas remain all but unreachable for meaningful fixed line deployment.

The distances are too great, the geographies too extreme, the potential customer base too unpromising from an average revenue per user (ARPU) point of view.

Mobile telephony has already proved the great facilitating technology in many such areas, bringing real change, creating economic ecosystems on a very local scale, enabling emerging markets to leapfrog developmental stages. Access to the Internet and its applications, services and products is, after all, is what broadband is about.

[Commentary] People with visual impairments have been struggling with accessibility for a long time, and we urgently need to make sure that accessible information and communication technologies (ICTs) are available for all, especially those in developing countries.

Thanks to advances in optical character recognition (OCR) -- a technology that converts printed or typewritten text into a format that can be accessed by screen readers -- there have been some improvements. However, much technical content remains inaccessible.

For people living in poverty and those in rural areas, the challenges are multiplied. Battling these obstacles has made me determined to change things for the disability community.

[Sawhney is a rising sophomore at Stanford University]

[Commentary] The Aspen Institute in cooperation with the MacArthur Foundation recently launched a National Report on Learning and the Internet following a year of in depth research and public input.

The Task Force included educators, policymakers, researchers, nonprofits and experts in technology, security, privacy and sociology. The report provides an in depth assessment and suggests 4 pillars that support the central vision for a “Learner at the Center” approach.

• Equity of access for all whether hardware, software, technologies or infrastructure
• Interoperability of learning, devices, technology and platforms
• Digital literacies for the digital age
• Trusted Environment

[Tate served as Federal Communications Commissioner]

[Commentary] For operators with copper assets in the access network, there are two primary reasons for G.fast within FTTdp (the Broadband Forum’s ‘fibre to the distribution point’ architecture, which extends fibre to distribution points very close to the customer premises).

Firstly, it allows them to get to market more quickly with viable offerings able to compete, in ‘value-for-money’ terms, with end-to-end fibre (FTTH, fibre to the home) and the next update of the DOCSIS-based connections that offer high-speed Internet access over cable (coaxial or hybrid fibre/coaxial cable), a medium originally designed to deliver TV and sound programs to a mass audience.

Secondly, speed to market is coupled with a lower cost of deployment, making use of existing telephone wiring.

The cost of extending fibre to an individual customer premises can be prohibitive in variety of scenarios, such as in an apartment block with thick walls already wired with legacy copper, where FTTH deployment would be slow and expensive.

[Johnson is Chief Executive of UK based analyst house Point Topic]

The results of an International Telecommunication Union test event have highlighted the need for phone manufacturers to improve their products’ compatibility with car hands-free systems.

The event found that an overwhelming majority of the phones tested would cause shortfalls in the audio quality of hands-free-supported conversations, a concern that automobile manufacturers say could be resolved through greater cooperation from phone manufacturers.

In a plea to solve a persistent problem, major car manufacturers, including Mercedes and Toyota, with hands-free terminal (HFT) supplier Bosch, have issued a strong call to mobile phone manufacturers to perform standardized tests on the behavior of their products within hands-free systems and to participate in the ITU-T Study Group 12 standardization work that develops interoperability tests.

Serious faults were observed in the worst-performing phones; some causing as much as a three-fold decline in voice quality, others completely failing to acknowledge that they had been connected to a vehicle’s hands-free system. Quality degradation of this extent has led to customer complaints to the car manufacturers, and experts say could give rise to safety risks as it could encourage drivers to use their phone by hand while driving.

[Commentary] The Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, one of the committees in the UN human rights treaty bodies system, adopted its General Comment No 2 on the issue of Accessibility.

The General Comment to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) aims to provide guidance to all relevant stakeholders, such as states and international organizations, on how to ensure accessibility for persons with disabilities. Without access to the physical environment, transportation, information and communication, including information and communications technologies (ICTs) and systems, and to other facilities and services open or provided to the public, persons with disabilities would not have equal opportunities for participation in their respective societies.

Many observers have argued that access to information and communication is a precondition for freedom of opinion and expression and should be included in the Convention. The CRPD is the first human rights treaty of the 21st century to explicitly address the importance of ensuring access to ICTs.

The importance of ICTs lies in its ability to introduce a wide range of new services, transform existing services and create greater demand for access to information and knowledge -- particularly for underserved and excluded populations, such as persons with disabilities. Article 12 of the International Telecommunication Regulations enshrines the right for persons with disabilities to access international telecommunication services. Taking into account other relevant International Telecommunication Union (ITU) recommendations, this Article could serve as a basis to reinforce State Parties’ national legislative frameworks.

The strict application of universal design should ensure full, equal and unrestricted access for all potential consumers, including persons with disabilities, in a way that takes full account of their inherent dignity and diversity. Accessibility of information and communication, including ICTs, should be achieved from the outsetbecause subsequent adaptations to such technologies may increase costs, thus making these services less affordable for persons with disabilities.

It is therefore more economical to incorporate mandatory ICT accessibility features from the earliest stages of design and production.

[Damjan Tatic, PhD, is legal expert, disability activist and a scholar from Belgrade, Serbia]