Google Planning Satellite Constellation for Internet Access

Google is planning a comprehensive satellite network to provide Internet connectivity to areas without such access. The plan calls initially for 180 small, high-capacity satellites in low Earth orbit, with more possibly launched in the future. Previous attempts to launch similar projects were reportedly fraught with both financial and technical problems. Google hired Greg Wyler, founder and former CEO of satellite-communications startup O3b Networks, to lead the venture, estimated to cost between $1 and $3 billion, a price tag that could increase based on factors including the number of satellites ultimately used. (SlashDot)(MarketWatch)

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Tech Giants Pledge US$9 Million for School Broadband Access

Digital learning is increasingly the norm in classrooms across the US; however, many schools do not have the backbone capability that would allow classrooms to have sufficient data transmission or bandwidth. Foundations started by Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates contributed a combined $9 million to the nonprofit EducationSuperHighway, a San Francisco-based nonprofit designed to address connectivity issues. The US government has a goal of ensuring 99 percent of students have high-speed Internet connections within five years. Now, about 80 percent of schools in the US have connections that are too slow or are isolated with connections prone to crashing. It costs between $30,000 to $50,000 per school to install broadband, with additional costs associated with installing fiber optics into the school. What’s driving the push? Lower cost of tablet computers and increased funding for digital learning, plus the advent of computer-based testing to meet Common Core academic standards. Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, told the Associated Press the challenges run much deeper than having broadband access. Roughly half of American children live in poverty and many students don't have technology at home. (The Associated Press)(Tech Crunch)

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Modern Privacy: More Access to Cells than Toilets

Posted on March 27, 2013 by Katja Keuchenius

What ‘s happening to privacy in today’s world? On first sight it seems to get bigger. Most people in the world now live in a city, feeling pretty anonymous. An even bigger number of people don’t have to defocate out in the open anymore, but have access to a toilet. And then there’s this growing amount of people that can talk in private on their cells. But beware, these are false senses of privacy.

In Nature’s Scientific Reports researchers from Massachusets and Belgium published their findings on what you can do with mobility data. With probably thousands of other people permanently moving around you, it might feel as if your own whereabouts easily get lost in the data pool of all the others. But it turns out the way you move around is very unique.

If someone knows just four recent locations of your phone, they can allready trace your identity, at least in 95 percent of the cases. And it’s not only the phone calls you that make you traceable. Think about all the apps that retrieve your geographic location and the wifi spots you use.

Mobility data is nowadays among the most sensitive data currently being collected. And more and more people are getting plugged into this data pool. UN just found out that out of the 7 billion people on our planet, 4.5 billion people have access to working toilets, while 6 billion have access to mobile phones.

Photo: Flickr, Scallop Holden
Source: Time, Phys.org
de Montjoye YA, Hidalgo CA, Verleysen M, & Blondel VD (2013). Unique in the Crowd: The privacy bounds of human mobility. Scientific reports, 3 PMID: 23524645

cell phone privacy

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