The security of enterprise information systems against malware once only involved ensuring the security of all PC clients and servers within a physically limited and often also physically secure environment such as an office.

However, the more recently growing number mobile smartphones, many of them personally owned and used for both personal and company use, anywhere and at any time has posed increasing security challenges to enterprise ICT systems managers.

For example, Morgan Stanley forecast that the number of smartphone sales worldwide would exceed the number of PC sales in 2012, while IDC forecast 270 million smartphone shipments worldwide in 2010 compared to 174 million in 2009, and by 2012, 73% of global enterprise workforces will be on mobile.

Meanwhile, a study by KRC Research and Synovate involving 6,000 smartphone and tablet users across 16 countries found 44% of them used their device for both personal and business use, while a tiny 4% use them strictly for business, while 81% admitted to using their devices to access their employer's network without its knowledge or permission, while 58% did so every day.

No spectrum in the 700MHz band (710 to 790 MHz) for digital pay TV has been allocated to YTL just yet, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia a Commission (MCMC) clarified in a press release dated 28 November, 2010.

This follows a report in The Malaysian Insider which quoted The Straits Times, Singapore as saying:-

“Singapore’s The Straits Times said the prime minister will meet senior telco officials next Monday to defuse the widening controversy over the 700MHz spectrum said to be given to tycoon Tan Sri Francis Yeoh’s YTL to operate its hybrid television service slated for end 2011. It can also be used to widen its broadband service.”

The MCMC clarified that the licence which it had issued to YTL Communications on 30 August 2010 was a Content Applications Service Provider (CASP) licence which allows YTL to provide Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) service over its 2.3GHz WiMAX network.

YTL Communications already has a license in this spectrum for its WiMAX broadband service and IPTV is just one of the services which it can provide in this band as part of its WiMAX service, just as TM does over its Unifi fibre broadband, and which Maxis is planning to do over fibre as well.

The MCMC further clarified that at this stage, it is assessing  a detailed business plan by YTL for the roll out of digital pay TV and not WiMAX mobile services as reported, and that it had not issued YTL any spectrum in the 700MHz band as yet for digital pay TV, so what is said in these media reports and blogs is inaccurate.

He said the Universal Service Provision (USP) makes it mandatory for all telecommunications firms to contribute six per cent of their annual income to a USP fund to develop Internet connectivity in rural areas.

"There is no specific area to develop and expand Internet connectivity, although development is focused on Sabah and Sarawak. The idea is for all areas in the country to attain the necessary infrastructure. We cannot leave any areas unserved, especially in East Malaysia."

On Monday evening, we received a press release from the MCMC dated 1 November, 2010, in which it confirmed that the balance in the USP Fund was indeed down to RM380 million from RM4.53 billion as of 20 September, 2010, after it had allocated about RM4.15 billion for disbursement to eight USP-related projects, including RM1 billion to distribute 1Malaysia Netbooks to qualified Malaysians.

Telekom Malaysia (TM) launched seven new premium channels for its HyppTV Internet Protocil Television (IPTV) service at The Curve in Petaling Jaya on Saturday, 9 October, 2010.

They are MUTV (Manchester United TV channel), Universal Channel, SyFy Universal, Warner TV, BabyFirst TV, Screen RED and a new HD channel, iConcerts HD, and they add to the 22 linear TV channels and 20 video-on-demand (VoD) channels on HyppTV.

HyppTV was launched in March 2010, together with TM's UniFi residential fibre broadband service.

These seven are part of TM’s ongoing plan to provide its customerse with additional foreign and domestic content to increase and diversify HyppTV's range of content.

HyppTV is available to all UniFi residential customers as part of the service’s triple-play offering comprising Phone, High Speed Internet and IPTV services – which include free and pay channels, as well as VoD and interactive content.

Growth in the Asia-Pacific smartphone market is expected to skyrocket in the coming years and by 2015, Frost & Sullivan forecasts that 54 percent of all devices sold in the region will be smartphones, up from only five percent in 2009.

Smartphone sales in Asia-Pacific are rapidly increasing in all markets, as developed markets like Japan and South Korea are switching from feature phones to smartphones, while operators in emerging markets are pushing smartphones to entice users to upgrade from 2G to 3G service.

Mobile social networking has also proven to be a big driver of smartphone adoption in all Asian countries.

“Smartphones are critical to every operator’s mobile broadband business case, as a smartphone user’s ARPU (average revenue per user) typically increased by 25 to 100 percent after adoption depending on the market,” says Frost & Sullivan industry manager Marc Einstein.

“The Asia-Pacific market is particularly interesting for smartphones as there has been significant uptake in emerging markets like China, India and Indonesia, even among prepaid users,” he adds.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan (http://www.wireless.frost.com), 2010 Asia-Pacific Mobile Device & Smartphone Outlook, finds that the incremental data usage from smartphones will generate over US$38 billion for operators in the Asia-Pacific region (18 Asia-Pac countries, including Japan), up from just over US$1.3 billion in 2009.

Despite the massive growth in smartphone sales, there are still many factors impeding sale of the device in many markets. According to Einstein, “Eighty percent of Asian mobile users use prepaid cards, and in fact in many markets are as high as 97 percent, making smartphone subsidies impossible for most users. Furthermore, there is a lack of public Wi-Fi, particularly in emerging markets which has been a smartphone saviour in the USA and other developed markets.”

October 6, 2010 -- Mobile payments (m-payments) in Asia-Pacific are expected to record transactions worth more than two-fold from 2009 revenues of US$1.6 billion, in five years. In 2015, Frost & Sullivan estimates that m-payments could exceed billings of US$3.6 billion, at a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 14.8 percent (2010-2015).

Frost & Sullivan industry analyst Shaker Amin attributes this growth to technology innovations and operators’ initiatives - particularly with NFC (Near Field Communication) - as well as rising consumer demand in both the developed and emerging markets.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan (http://www.wireless.frost.com), 2010 Asia-Pacific Mobile Payments Outlook - 18 Asia-Pac nations including Japan - finds that contactless payments via the NFC channel will increase in popularity to account for 23 percent of all m-payments in 2015, from only 12 percent last year.

The SMS method which accounted for nearly 82 percent of total transactions in 2009 will likely remain the dominant mobile payment channel till 2015, albeit dropping to about 67 percent by then.

Other payment channels such as WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) and DMB (Direct Mobile Billing) contributed small fractions to m-payments in 2009, with adoption levels not expected to rise through to 2015.

“Having one of the most advanced mobile cultures in the world, Japan and South Korea lead the region in the adoption of mobile payments,” Amin says.

He adds that the relatively less developed mobile markets such as China, India, Indonesia and the Philippines, where access to traditional banking services is highly skewed against the rural mass population, are showing rapid take-up of mobile banking services including person-to-person (P2P) transfers and remittances.

“Even in emerging markets such as Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka - although limited to mostly SMS-based bill payments and micro credit transfers - m-payments services are increasingly becoming popular,” he continues.

Amin explains that these [emerging] markets also have good potential for mobile remittance services due to the large population of workers residing in other countries - Malaysia for example. “International remittance sent out from the significant migrant worker population in Malaysia is a lucrative business. This is significant for Malaysian operators as this segment of the population also has high mobile penetration; more than 90 percent of all migrant groups have mobile devices,” he says. He adds that operators’ initiatives in enabling remittance services - along with m-wallet and top-up/transfer services - have helped the mobile payments market in Malaysia, which, until recently, remained tepid and limited to bill payments.

Jalur Lebar Nasional Sdn Bhd (Jalenas) will begin deployment of its fibre metropolitan network in Kuantan, Pahang from October, its recently appointed chief executive officer, James Angelone told Comm & Tech Asia on the sidelines of its Hari Raya Aid Il Fitri open house on 28 September.

This will make Jalenas Malaysia's first open-access fibre network operator and Jalenas will next follow with deployment in Johor Baru in the first quarter next year.

The deployments will be implemented by four outside-plant contractors.

“By the end of 2011 we expect to cover another eight cities or 10 cities in all and by Septenber 2011, we expect our network to be passing an additional 18,000 subscribers per month,” said Angelone.

An open access operator provides and operates the network but does not provide services to end-users over it. Instead, it leases capacity on its network to third party applications and service providers, such as IPTV providers, fixed and cellular service providers, Internet service providers, enterprise communications service providers and others who provide service to end users over its network.

A cellular service provider may lease capacity on the open access provider's network to use in backhaul connections from its base stations to its network core, instead of deploying their own network, and since the network is shared between multiple applications and services providers, it not only is cheaper for them but also providers opportunities for many providers who can compete on providing their services, without having to worry about network operations. 

Proven business model

“For example, in South Korea, where the open-access model is practised, I could get a 100 Mbps connection to my home for only US$30 (RM93) per month and homes there all have Ethernet ports as a standard fixture, just like running water and electricity,” said Angelone, who spent 22 years there with Samsung.

This is a proven business model in many developed countries and in many ways it can be compared to an airport which many airlines use but seldom own or a shopping mall, where the the mall owner does not sell anything directly to the shoppers but leaves this to their diverse types of tenants instead.

The Kuantan network will also serve as a proof of concept for third-party service providers, many of which have shown an interest in using Jalenas' network. While Angelone could not name them, they are cellular and WiMAX operators, IPTV operators and others. He also mentioned that a major incumbent fixed infrastructure provider, including of fibre, is actually quite warm to it.

The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC/SKMM) clarified its action which resulted in Star RFM 988 disk jockey, Jamaluddin Ibrahim was taken off the air.

The MCMC's/SKMM's statement on the matter follows verbatim below.

Cyberjaya, 20 August 2010 – Following several complaints received by SKMM on the morning programme, the radio station, Star RFM Sdn Bhd (98.8 FM) is being investigated by SKMM for breach of licence conditions. SKMM       has also   informed the    station regarding the complaints received.

Star RFM Sdn Bhd holds the Content Applications Service Provider-Individual (CASP-I) that requires compliance to licence conditions as stipulated in the licence; which includes prohibition on providing content which may upset the sensibilities and sentiments of any race or religion in this country.

In view of this, SKMM has received complaint against the content that was broadcast on 13 August 2010 by the radio station operated by Star RFM Sdn Bhd which may contain content that may upset the sensibilities and sentiments of races in this country.

Accordingly,    SKMM    evaluated    the  complaint   and proceeded  to investigate the radio station. The purpose of the investigation is to establish whether there is an offence committed. Upon completion of the investigation, the case would be referred to Attorney General for further action.

Any decision with regards to this investigation will be communicated in due course, in accordance with provision of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 (CMA 1998) or any other relevant laws.

In short, SKMM’s concern is only on the compliance of the licence condition to ensure there is no future breach. Issues relating to staffing of any licensee is an internal matter within the organization (the station) to which SKMM is unable to comment.

Any actions taken by SKMM will be in accordance to the licence condition for the radio station and provision of the CMA 1998 or any other relevant laws.

Following heated controversial speculation and comments both in print and online, that the Study on the Positive and Save use of the Internet conducted by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) would lead to government attempts to censor the Internet, the MCMC issued a press release clarifying its stand. We publish the release verbatim as follows.

Cyberjaya, 20 August 2010 – In light of the recent article published in the media regarding the “Study on Positive and Safe Use of the Internet” that is currently being conducted by SKMM, we would like to explain the rationale for the study.

As you are aware, the cyber environment are subjected to the laws of the land as any other activities and content and action can and have been taken against those who have breached Malaysian laws.

SKMM has, in the past and will continue in the future, taken action under Section 263 (2) of the Communications & Multimedia Act 1998 (CMA 1998), in cooperation with the ISPs to prevent access to websites that have contravened Malaysian laws and regulations, including those that concerning online fraud activities and scams, Phishing, obscene materials and identity thefts.

While this effort has been ongoing, SKMM and ISPs have recognized that there are technological challenges in the current method that have been implemented.

The aim of the study is to develop a more effective way to protect the Malaysian public against these websites through an examination of the various technologies currently in the marketplace and case studies of the implementations done in various other jurisdictions. The assistance of the ISPs is significant to help SKMM strategize a better solution that will not be counterproductive to the Malaysian Internet users’ experience and Malaysia’s commitment to no censorship of the Internet.

The study will also help SKMM determine the various other channels that could be used to promote positive and safe use of the Internet, including increasing awareness on Internet safety and increasing Internet self-regulation through the use of existing tools currently offered by the ISPs. The study is like any other studies that SKMM has embarked earlier.

In   2008,   SKMM   has   initiated research   collaboration  with local universities under the Research Collaboration on New Media Content. One of the main objectives of the programme is to build research capacity and knowledge resources in media policy and regulation. It is envisaged that the research collaboration will provide insights and new perspectives into the social impact of networked media content.

Research topics including ”Young People and New Media - Social Uses, Social Shaping & Social Consequences” by Universiti Sains Malaysia, ”Social Impacts of blogging on young adults: how it shapes individual opinions” by Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman) and ”Self-regulatory framework and mechanism in the Malaysian Media Environment” by Universiti Putra Malaysia.

In addition, under the Spectrum Research Collaboration Program (SRCP), SKMM and designated Institutions of Higher Learning (IHL) have agreed to work in a collaborative framework. Another two research were completed entitled "Adoption, Appropriation and Impact of Wireless Technologies on Malaysian Society” by Universiti Teknologi Malaysia and ”The Impact of Wireless Technology Among Malaysian Society” by Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.

All these studies are done to help further understand the Internet. It also an important component of our role as a regulator. We respect the legal provision of not allowing censorship of the Internet as prescribed in the CMA 1998 and will continuously step up efforts in finding suitable approaches to reduce the incidence of online criminal activities or abuses so as to safeguard the Malaysian public
from exposure to inappropriate material online.