Intel @ MWC14: Our Love Story with Mobile – Transforming Wireless Networks

Written by Bernadette Andrietti, Vice President, Sales and Marketing Group, Director, Europe, Middle East and Africa Marketing, Intel Corporation Bursting with product launches, new technologies and insights from the biggest names in mobile, the recent Mobile World Congress was as exhilarating as ever.  Each year the show is a heady reminder of just how fast developments […]

How ‘small’ is Europe in Big Data?

One of the major current debates in ICT is the one of open big data. Last December, Neelie Kroes, the Vice-President of the European Commission for the Digital Agenda, made a speech in the European Data Protection Congress in Brussels for the importance of data in the modern world and the numerous opportunities that arise […]

No better year for the EU’s weak chain links

The European Parliament issued a Press release this week with the ambitious target to inform us all about what is bound to change in our lives this year, resulting from the application of EU laws. It mentions the mercury ban in thermometers and some new rules in recycling of electrical and electronic equipment, the legislation […]

Advocate General ‘outlaws’ Data Retention Directive

The shallowness that the European Commission shows, while asked to protect the basic civil rights of EU citizens and companies, was ostentatiously proven in the case of the Data Retention Directive. According to the Advocate General of the Court of Justice of the European Union, Cruz Villalón, the Directive doesn’t provide the basic guarantees that […]

Microsoft’s YouthSpark: a kiss of Life to European Youth from the European Parliament

Two weeks ago, on 14 November, the European Sting attended the event at the European Parliament, organized by the European Youth Forum and YouthIntergroup, titled “Internships: a Call for Quality”. Here we present the third piece of our Special Edition “European Youth & Employment”. This piece reflects the Industry’s perspective, and particularly the ICT sector’s […]

Galileo funding: A ‘small’ difference of €700 million

A ‘small’ difference of €700 million appears in the funding of the European GPS Galileo-EGNOS programme for the 2014-2020 period. After the funding of the project got the green light in the plenary of the European Parliament, the legislators issued a Press release with a reference to its cost saying, “the programme’s €6.3 billion budget […]

Parliament asks for the termination of EU-US bank data deal

The European Parliament finally voted in favour of the suspension of EU-US bank data deal, in response to NSA snooping. “The EU should suspend its Terrorist Finance Tracking Program (TFTP) agreement with the US in response to the US National Security Agency‘s alleged tapping of EU citizens’ bank data held by the Belgian company SWIFT”, […]

While EU Open Days 2013 discuss the 2020 strategy, Microsoft shares a glimpse of EU 2060

As we move towards the middle of October, the most important annual events in Brussels start taking place one after the other. Last week it was the turn of the 11th European Week of Regions and Cities under the annual open dialogue forum series called Open Days 2013. The event offered the opportunity to EU […]

GSMA Mobile 360: Connecting Cities, Connecting Lives, Connecting Europe

Traditionally the first week of September in Brussels is the time when you see grumpy faces walking around the European Quarter thinking that the time they were lying on a beach is over for good. Most EU stakeholders did not miss their flight back and neither did the powerful network of influencers. One of this […]

Commission caps charges on card and Internet payments and enforces competition

It was high time that the European Commission tried to arrest the over-exploitation of European consumers by a handful of banks and credit card providers. This week Joaquín Almunia, Commission’s Vice President responsible for competition policy, and Michel Barnier, EU Commissioner in charge of internal market and services presented one draft regulation and one directive amendment, […]

The US bugged Europe: Is this news?

It took a new wave of publications by major European media (Der Spiegel, Guardian) about the bugging of EU’s and EU member states’ offices in the US by the American secret services, to wake up the European Union leaders. Yesterday all three European Union presidents and at least two Commission vice presidents issued statements asking […]

Is Data Privacy really safe seen through Commissioner’s PRISM?

It was last Friday that the European Commissioner for Justice, Viviane Reding, had a ministerial meeting in Dublin with Mr Eric Holder, U.S. Attorney General. The topic of the meeting would have normally been the ongoing discussion on the transatlantic data privacy agreement. That would have been effectively the 15th round of negotiations to bridge […]

EU Council: Private web data to be protected by…abusers

Protection of citizens and businesses web data is still a pending issue in the European Union and internet companies may, probably legally, sell to marketers names, telephone numbers, mail addresses and consumer profiles including personal details. The existing privacy laws are twenty years old and far from effectively protecting our data from being sold and […]

The European Internet is not neutral and neither is the Commissioner

How many times were you out with friends and wanted to show them a new cool video on Youtube through your smart phone but buffering was unbelievably slow? What about the time you had a cheap pay-as-you-go subscription and you wanted to save money using Viber to call your friends for free instead of giving […]

Amazon, a pair of shoes and my Data Privacy walks away

Try to remember the last time you shopped from Amazon. Most likely you are another happy consumer that has enjoyed the benefits of e-shopping in terms of service, price and delivery time. It is also highly possible that you already master the plethora of reasons not to get into your car and experience all that […]

The European Commission to stop Buffering

At last some good news for the European online gamers and Skype users. The European Commission has decided to fund a big research on how to fight internet lagging and make European Internet move faster without the need to have expensive changes in the network infrastructure. Following the steps of the increasing American research on […]

The big five EU telecom operators in dire straights

British Telecom, Deutsche Telekom, France Telecom, Telecom Italia and Telefónica constitute the exclusive club of major telecom operators in the European Union. The very oligopolistic character of the market has prompted the European Commission some years ago to forcefully introduce ground breaking changes in the EU telecom market. Towards the end of 2009 the Commission […]

Telecommunications and Internet: A Jungle with no principles?

Since the last World Conference on International Telecommunications in 1988 our planet has become a completely different place. It is not any more the bi-polar globe we knew until the fall of the USSR, which ended the division between communism and capitalism. Today there is only capitalism and more…capitalism. During the 1990s and the 2000s […]
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