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Indigenous Connectivity Summit 2019

by arlie | Sep 30, 2019 | Events | 0 comments

Including Indigenous voices in the decisions and solutions that shape the Internet is a vital part of closing the global digital divide.

Each year, the community-led Indigenous Connectivity Summit brings together Indigenous leaders, community members, community network operators, Internet service providers, researchers and policy makers with a common goal: connecting Indigenous communities to fast, affordable and sustainable Internet.

The 2019 Indigenous Connectivity Summit will host a two-day conference that focuses on building partnerships, advocating regulatory changes, and sharing success stories of community networks throughout Canada and the United States.

Fourth Summit on Community Networks in Africa

by arlie | Sep 30, 2019 | Events | 0 comments

The Internet Society is at the heart of the Internet community and active in conferences and events around the world, many of which it organizes or supports directly.

Together we promote the creation and growth of Community Networks, increase collaboration between community network operators in the region, and provide an opportunity for them to engage with others.

Community Networks provide an alternative and sustainable solution to address the connectivity gaps that exist in urban, remote, and rural areas around the world. In Africa, where these gaps are more evident, a recent survey was able to identify 37 Community Networks initiatives in 12 African countries, 25 of which are considered active. Many more Community Networks have come up after the report, in part, thanks to the training and the experience that have been shared in the previous Summits held in Kenya and South Africa. Among them is the Kondoa Community Network, in Tanzania, which will be featured in this year’s Summit.

The 4th Summit on Community Networks (CNs) in Africa will take place in Dodoma, Tanzania from 28 October – 2 November 2019. The Summit hopes to promote the creation and growth of community networks, increase collaboration between community network operators in the region, and provide an opportunity for them to engage with other stakeholders.

The main activities planned include:

Training Workshop: 28 – 29 October 2019
Community Network Summit Plenary: 30 – 31 October 2019
Site Visit to Kondoa Community Network: 1 – 2 November 2019

Full Agenda

Deep Dive: How Do Banks Score on Privacy and Security?

by arlie | Sep 30, 2019 | governace | 0 comments

In April 2019 the Internet Society’s Online Trust Alliance published its 10th annual Online Trust Audit & Honor Roll assessing the security and privacy of 1,200 top organizations. The Banking sector includes the top 100 banks in the U.S., based on assets according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). Banks had a standout year, with a dramatic increase in scores across the board. Let’s take a closer look.

Overall, 73% of banks made the Honor Roll, putting the banking sector 4th behind the News and Media (78%), Consumer Services (85%), and the U.S. Federal Government (91%) sectors. In the previous Audit, only 27% made the grade. This large jump is due to improvements in all three scoring categories: email authentication, site security, and privacy.

Banks, like most sectors, came close to 100% adoption in the two main email security technologies studied in the Audit: SPF (93%) and DKIM (87%). In addition, banks saw a marked improvement in how many sites implemented both both technologies at 87% in 2018, up from 60% in 2017. This puts banks among the most improved sectors in this area.

DMARC builds on SPF and DKIM results, provides a means for feedback reports and adds visibility for receivers on how to process messages that fail authentication. Banks also did well in DMARC adoption, with the second highest adoption rate (70%) of any sector, second only to the U.S. Federal Government (93%).

Site Security

Though banks did well in overall site security (and led in areas such as lowest occurrence of cross-site scripting), there were a few areas for improvement. They had by far the highest rate of malware on the sites (10%, vs an overall average of 2%). They also had one of the lowest adoption rates for presence of a vulnerability reporting mechanism (6% vs an overall average of 11%). In light of recent large data breaches, it is especially important to provide a way for security researchers to report vulnerabilities in an efficient way.

How Could Consolidation Impact the Internet in the Future?

by arlie | Sep 30, 2019 | Uncategorized | 0 comments

How will consolidation impact the Internet’s technical evolution and use?

In 2017, the Internet Society published a comprehensive study to better understand the forces of change that will shape the Internet over the next five to seven years: The 2017 Global Internet Report: Paths to Our Digital Future. These forces, or “Drivers of Change,” were identified through extensive consultations with experts in and out of the Internet Society’s global community. The drivers encompass technological, economic, regulatory, security, and network-related opportunities and challenges for the Internet of the future. Among the driving forces our community identified was the Internet economy.

Specifically, the community identified a concern that a lack of competition and increased market concentration could have severe implications for the Internet’s technical evolution and use. Our goal for this new report was therefore to explore trends of consolidation in the Internet economy, guided by the central question: Are there trends of consolidation in the Internet economy, and if so, how will consolidation impact the Internet’s technical evolution and use?

Importance of the internet

by arlie | Sep 30, 2019 | Uncategorized | 0 comments

Internet Economy

The Internet economy, as understood in this report, is broadly defined as the economic activities that either support the Internet or are fundamentally dependent on the Internet’s existence.