Spanish operators have blocked some three million prepay SIM cards from making or receiving phone calls pending their owners registering their ownership details. Users of the unregistered SIMs will get an automatic message played when trying to make a phone call instructing them to visit a local retailer.

The operators were due to completely cut off the phones, but a last minute agreement by Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, gives the SIM card owners up to six months to register their ownership before the lines go dead - and losing any prepay credit they may contain.

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Source: cellular-news

Nigerian operator, Globacom has obtained an operating licence in Cote d'Ivoire. The approval was conveyed to Globacom by the Agence des Telecommunications de Cote d'Ivoire, the telecommunications regulatory authorities of the Francophone country.

The licence will enable Globacom take advantage of its gigantic trans-Atlantic submarine cable, Glo 1, which will branch off to Cote d'Ivoire.  With it, Glo will provide international carrier services for telecoms operators in Cote d'Ivoire, aggregate and carry voice and data traffic into and out of the country. Globacom is in Nigeria and Benin Republic as well as Ghana where it is geared to commercially launch its operations very soon. The telecoms giant is also in the process of securing more licences across the continent.

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Source: Balancingact Africa

Bajo el marco de la Ley del Consumidor, la Subsecretaría de Telecomunicaciones y el Sernac requerirán a la operadora móvil, Claro, un proceso de descuentos que incluya, sin diferencias, a todos sus clientes afectados por el corte de servicio ocurrido entre el martes y miércoles de esta semana.

"No pueden haber clientes de primera y segunda categoría. Todos los usuarios tienen los mismos derechos, independiente de su modalidad de pago", sostuvo el Subsecretario de Telecomunicaciones, Pablo Bello.

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Fuente: Ministerio de Transporte y Telecomunicaciones - Subsecretaría de Telecomunicaciones

EU lawmakers and governments agreed on new rights for Internet users Thursday, aiming to protect them from arbitrary crackdowns on those who illegally download music and movies on the Internet.

EU Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding said a deal was reached after EU governments agreed to EU parliament demands to balance measures against illegal downloaders with a broader set of rights for telecom users.

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Source: cellular-news

Businesses and consumers can look forward to using Chinese characters in their website address to better reach their customers or friends who prefer Chinese web addresses. The Singapore Network Information Centre (SGNIC), the national registry for domain names, will be accepting initial registrations for Chinese Domain Names from 23 November 2009.

This opens up new options for domain names, as anyone can soon register for Web addresses such as .sg so that their target market or audience can better identify with them. SGNIC will offer these Chinese domain names at both 2nd and 3rd levels in all categories (namely, .sg, .com.sg, .gov.sg, .org.sg, .edu.sg, .net.sg, .per.sg). For instance, a 2nd level domain name would be .sg, while a 3rd level domain name would read as .com.sg.

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Source: IDA Singapore

Nigeria’s Federal High Court has stopped the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) from re-auctioning spectrum in the 2.3GHz frequency range. The court ruled that the process must be put on hold pending the determination of a lawsuit initiated by the previous winner of the spectrum, Mobitel. According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms database, Mobitel, Spectranet and fixed-wireless operator Multilinks beat off around 40 other applications for slots in the 2.3GHz band after each of them paid NGN1.368 billion (USD9.33 million) in May 2009 for the frequency used to support to WiMAX technology. Later that month, Minister of Information and Communications, Dora Akunyili, issued a directive for the cancellation of the licensing and the implementation of a new auction, after operators faulted the commission on how the whole process was conducted, especially the one week timeframe given to pay the necessary fees. Mobitel, alleging contractual breach, has challenged the government’s position in court, saying it had fulfilled the requirements. The matter will be heard in court on 17 November 2009.

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Source: TeleGeography

The UAE’s Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) has agreed to issue a ten-year mobile TV licence to the Emirates Mobile Television Corporation consortium, Emirates news agency WAM reports. The concession reportedly includes the exclusive rights to broadcast mobile TV services for five years, ending 31 December 2014, and is thought to be priced at around AED17 million (USD4.63 million). The successful consortium is made up of local telcos Etisalat and Du, as well as Abu Dhabi Media Company, Dubai Media Incorporated, MBC, and Emirates Communications and Technologies Company, a subsidiary of TECOM Investment. The mobile TV service will be based on the DVB-H standard and is slated for launch in the fourth quarter of 2010.

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Source: TeleGeography

The European Commission has called on the Danish telecoms regulator, IT- og Telestyrelsen (NITA), to reconsider its regulatory approach for terminating calls to non-geographic numbers operated by service providers that offer premium rate services to end-users. Unlike national regulators in other EU Member States, NITA regulates the price of these services, setting them at the same level as for "ordinary" termination services. However, terminating calls to service providers are generally characterised by different competitive conditions than terminating calls to end-users and therefore not necessarily subject to regulation.

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Source Europe's Information Society

The Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) was declared the winner by the investment communications group, Africa Investor in Cape Town, South Africa. CCK won the award for its role in seeking to develop regulations that are aimed at alleviating poverty and improving the investment climate in partnership with the private sector.

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Source Capital Business

This report is the fourth in a series published by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and is one of the few publications to monitor global trends in information and communication technologies (ICTs) as they affect developing countries. It serves as a valuable reference for policymakers in those nations and gives special attention to the impact of the global financial crisis on ICTs.

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Source UNCTAD

Despite the National Telecommunications Regulatory Authority's (NTRA) offer of two triple-play licences, operators will not be able to provide voice services without giving Telecom Egypt access to their network. Egypt’s monopoly fixed line provider, Telecom Egypt, has claimed that it will remain the country’s sole fixed line voice provider.

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Source Reuters

Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko has issued a decree overturning a previous decision to transfer certain radio frequencies suitable for 3G mobile applications from the military to commercial networks, citing national security reasons.

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Source Reuters

The Georgian telecoms regulator, the National Communications Commission has cancelled a planned auction of additional radio spectrum in the GSM1800 and UMTS bands. The regulator said that no bidders had submitted applications by the deadline of 5th October.

The Auction was declared failed at the Session held today by the Georgian National Communications Commission.

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Source: cellular-news

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted unanimously today to begin the process of crafting formal rules for "net neutrality," the principle that all content on the Internet should be equally accessible to all users, and that companies cannot discriminate or block one set of content in favor of another.

The Commission agreed at its monthly open meeting to publish a "Notice of Proposed Rulemaking" that would solicit public comment on how best to create rules for ensuring net neutrality, while enabling Internet service providers and telecom networks to continue policing their systems for spam and illegal content.

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Source: cellular-news

Following the European Parliament and Council of Ministers' agreement, in July to modernise European legislation, new EU measures that allow the re-farming of the radio spectrum in the GSM band for new mobile services will foster stronger competition on Europe's telecoms market. The GSM Directive on the use of the radio spectrum will make it easier for operators to provide faster, pan-European services such as mobile internet alongside today's GSM services. They will also boost the roll-out of wireless broadband services.

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Source Europe's Information Society

Although the European Commission withdrew the regulatory intervention of transit services from the list of markets recommended for regulation, British regulator Ofcom have found that transit services provided at a lower network level still warrant ex-ante regulation. The lack of competitive conditions for the provision of such services, especially on routes with low volumes of traffic, therefore, will continue to be regulated.

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Source Europe's Information Society

The Ministry of Transport and Communications in Helsinki has pushed through a law that will force telecommunications providers to offer high speed internet connections to all of the country's 5.3 million citizens, making broadband internet access a legal right.

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Source Guardian