| 2014 ISPA Awards launched- new testing and new categoriesThe 2014 ISPA Awards is now open for entries.Now in its 16th year, with 16 categories across the spectrum of the internet industry, there are two new categories this year: Best Business Use of Cloud and Best Use of Digital. Best Business Use of Cloud is to reward those enabling businesses to utilise what cloud technology has to offer and Best Use of Digital is for the ISP or technology company that ran the best digital campaign.
For the first time, our testing partner Thinkbroadband has a web-based tester, opening up testing across any platform and minimising the need for testing agents. It is free to enter the ISPAs, and please click here to see a list of all the categories.
Registration form can be found at http://ispa.thinkbroadband.com/. The black tie awards ceremony will be taking place in July 2014.
We have also re-designed the sponsor packages for 2014, so please contact us on 0203 397 3308 or awards@ispa.org.uk.
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ISPA ConferenceThe 8th ISPA Conference took place at K&L Gates in the City of London. As well as a high profile speech from Minister for Crime & Security James Brokenshire MP, there were panels on content streaming, broadband infrastructure, the future ISP and online safety and some key points from the conference are below:
- Cyber security and keeping customers secure is essential for the future of the industry.
- The way people that consume content has changed dramatically - 50%of iPlayer requests now come from mobiles and tablets.
- Government needs to design a new approach post-2015 to avoid previous errors.
- The ISP of the future will be diverse and use a variety of technologies and transmission methods.
- Politicians must fully understand the subtleties required in dealing with legal content and not apply the black and white methodology of illegal content.
Over 100 delegates attended the conference and you can see a summary of the conference here on Storify. Thank you to K & L Gates for hosting the conference and thanks to broadband and landline provider Sparta Telecom for sponsoring the drinks reception. Individual panels were sponsored by RealNetworks and Netsweeper and are profiled below.
We appreciate any feedback and if you attended, please fill in the short survey here. We will be sharing details soon of our 2014 events for and please check our twitter page @ISPAUK for more information. |
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 RealNetworks creates products and services that make it easier for people to access and enjoy digital media on the devices and platforms they choose to use. Whether its music, movies, games, live streaming video, or apps that help them keep close to the people who matter most, RealNetworks thrives on giving people the fresh and entertaining experiences they deserve—whenever, wherever they want.For more information visit http://www.realnetworks.com/home.aspx
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 Filtering web content
Filtering web content is a sensitive issue regardless of the location or cultural imperatives. It is also an issue that is marked by an increased attention and legislation from countries of all types.
There are certain kinds of web content people agree can and should be blocked: child pornography is universally despised and there can be little argument with the social and moral value in blocking it. Many countries require removal of such content found on computers, and in some cases there is the requirement to block access to these kinds of sites abroad. This is the minimum level of blocking that will occur.
In contrast, some countries (like China, Cuba, North Korea and Iran) employ exhaustive controls to tightly control access to content. For most countries, reality lies in between these two extremes, where legality and societal mores drive that country’s position in the spectrum of web filtering.
For most nations, there are three broad concerns when considering regulation and web filtering:
- Social/political requirements – this might include blocking hate speech, racist or terrorist content and related information. Depending on the political environment and social mores, this mandate may be narrower or broader, for example blocking pornographic content.
- Economic concerns – the increasing value of web-based transactions as well as the sheer impact of internet traffic volume imposes economic factors in the web filtering equation. For the former, this translates into lost taxation revenues (and similar issues). For the latter, the challenge is more in terms of the technical and infrastructure challenges faced by telcos who are faced with compliance while offering increasing levels of speed and throughput in a globally competitive market.
- Intellectual property and copyright – there is increasing concern around online copyright infringement and illegal downloading has been a topic of discussion for many years now. Increasingly, the media industry is putting pressure on government to legislate limitations (if not solutions) to protect their eroding market.
Typical Web Filtering solutions can be cumbersome, expensive and have scalability issues in an ISP or Telco environment. Netsweeper technology offers a solution which scales to the large throughputs of ISP and Telcos compared to enterprises, while providing a means to provide web filtering across their entire network without introducing risk or latency to the network.
For more information please visit http://www.netsweeper.com/ |
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| ISPA responds to further calls to regulate contentA follow up Prime Ministerial summit took place this month looking at proposals to block certain search terms relating to illegal content. As founding IWF members, we think the UK internet industry has led the world in combating online child abuse images. However, Government needs to properly equip and resource CEOP and law enforcement to tackle child abuse content at source. You can see our full statement on the issue here.ISPA has been working with members to analyse and improve the government’s policy towards combatting extremist materials online. ISPA is pleased that the government has signalled a partnership approach and in a difficult area, ISPA will ensure the views of industry are heard and solutions are workable and effective. |
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ISPA facilitates connection vouchers meetingA major part of the ‘super-connected cities’ programme is a scheme where government provides funding for SMEs to help pay for the cost in installing superfast broadband. A number of ISPA members and council representatives attended an event jointly co-ordinated with Bradford and Leeds City Councils to discuss how to implement the scheme across the two cities.We will provide updates to members on similar meetings. The scheme will be rolling out in various cities across the country.
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New member profile- Satellite InternetSatellite Internet is a specialist satellite ISP serving homes and businesses in rural and hard-to-reach areas all over the UK and Eire and is a division of BeyonDSL which was launched in 2001.Satellite Internet joined to keep up to date with regulation and meet representatives from other ISPs. Satellite broadband offers an alternative method of reaching out to new areas and over the years, the price has fallen and speeds increased.
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