Research by Queen’s University Belfast into making the UK more resilient to a cyber attack has been recognised through the award of an ‘Academic Centre of Excellence in Cyber Security Research’ status by GCHQ in partnership with the Research Councils’ Global Uncertainties Programme (RCUK) and the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS).
One of only eight UK universities selected to become a Centre of Excellence, Queen’s will benefit the UK by:
Enhancing the UK’s cyber knowledge base through original research
Providing top quality graduates in the field of cyber security
Supporting GCHQ’s cyber defence mission
Driving up the level of innovation
Queen’s, as part of the award, will receive £50,000 to further develop its work in this area and along with the other seven Centres of Excellence will help make the UK government, business and consumers more resilient to cyber attack by extending knowledge and enhancing skills in cyber security.
The Cabinet Office have announced that the CloudStore, which is a new way for Government to buy IT products and services, is open for business.
The CloudStore is the first of its kind in the UK for public sector ICT procurement and is part of the G-Cloud programme which aims to transform the way that Government uses information and communications technology. This is done by moving away from custom built and hosted IT to cloud based services bought as commodities on short term contracts.
The CloudStore is an online catalogue of over 1,700 information and communications services available to the UK public sector, and contains details of each of the suppliers and their services.
The services include:
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
Platform as a Service (PaaS)
Software as a Service (SaaS)
Specialist services such as configuration, management and monitoring.
The prestigious ITLG-Irish Times Innovation Awards, to be held in Silicon Valley next month, includes four local companies as finalists who will be aiming to beat off competition from sixteen other hopefuls.
Belfast based companies, Aepona, Phlok and RepKnight are competing in the category for Mobile/Social Media/Web while Bangor based Smyth Research are competing in the Hardware/ Semiconductor category.
The 20 companies were selected by the Irish Technology Leadership Group (ITLG) following an extensive review of approximately 100 companies at a series of pitch sessions at DCU and University of Ulster Belfast last October and November.
Following the announcement by the Irish Times, RepKnight’s CEO John Reid stated that this was a “great opportunity to showcase our technology and it’s applications to the leading industry executives in Silicon Valley and Stanford and will help to forge relationships”.
The awards will be presented as part of the ITLG Innovation Summit taking place in Santa Clara, California, on March 12th and 13th. The Irish Technology Leadership Group (ITLG) is a network of Irish and Irish-American executives in Silicon Valley which provides mentoring and support to start-ups looking to break into the US market.
For a full list of the finalists check out the article in the Irish Times.
This article was first published on EamonnMallie.com
97% of Northern Ireland residents have access to superfast broadband1, the highest proportion of any region within the UK. So why are only 60% of Northern Ireland households taking up this service?
Ofcom have published “The first Communications Infrastructure Report” which details lots of interesting facts that no local news outlet seems to be paying much attention to.
Access to the Internet is pretty much a human right these days and you can access the Internet for free at your local library. What student would prepare for an assignment without conducting some form of Internet research? I’d guess that nearly every single office job requires the Internet whether for email or browsing.
The Internet, therefore, is as much a utility as our water supply and is an essential every day service that we need.
So why then has there not been a media frenzy about these figures? Naturally the report does not cater for the need of our tabloid media but it definitely does need reported on.
The BBC reported “Northern Ireland broadband service criticised” which is a misleading headline in my opinion. Yes the report suggests that more could (and should) be done to improve access to broadband, but 97% of us here in NI already have access to superfast broadband. I have it and I’m about to get upgraded to a 30Mbit/s connection. What have you got? 1 in 4 have less than 2Mbit/s which means that you will really struggle to stream video online and most likely your skype call will be pixelated. In my view this is unacceptable and easily rectified with a simple call to your ISP.
Percentage receiving less than 2Mbit/s
Each area has been ranked from 1 to 5 on the percentage of broadband connections that have modem sync speeds of less than 2.2Mbit/s.
1= less than 5%
2= 5% – less than 10%
3= 10% – less than 15%
4= 15% – less than 20%
5= 20% or more
Of course there will be those who argue that you simply don’t need superfast broadband. This is shortsighted and fails to recognise the benefits that come with a fast connection to the Internet. Superfast broadband is now more affordable and the consumer is in a strong position to take advantage of this without having to stretch their budget. Ofcom also reveal that on average we download 17 Gigabytes of data every month. That’s equivalent to about 11 or 12 hours viewing of iPlayer per month. As each year passes we consume more and more content online (up sevenfold in five years) thus making superfast broadband all the more important if you want to watch video online.
Hands up if you have an Internet connected TV? I know it’s not just me. If you have a games console, a Blu-Ray player, an Apple TV or have recently bought your TV then you can probably watch YouTube and other online video content from the comfort of your sofa.
Lots of us have laptops, mobile phones and tablet computers and we use them while we are watching television. I would wager that the majority of the time we are using the Internet on those devices either browsing facebook, playing words with friends, updating all of those apps you downloaded from the App store or even sending an email. OK so nobody sends email anymore, but you get the point, we need the Internet just to go about our normal everyday tasks. If you are a typical household with a mummy and daddy and 2.1 teenagers you’re going to need superfast broadband just to keep everyone happy.
The family I’ve just mentioned will all have mobile phones and statistically speaking more than 2 will have a smartphone and in a couple of years (maybe even just one) everyone will have a smartphone. This will not only apply pressure to the home wifi network but will see massive demand for 3G (and soon 4G) services. In other words, we just can’t get enough Internet!
But, we in Northern Ireland are a bit screwed when it comes to mobile Internet.
If you want 3G on the road you better not actually need it outside Belfast and the main roads.
3G coverage by geographic area
3G coverage by geographic area
Each area has been ranked from 1 to 5 on the level of mobile coverage.
1= 90% or more
2= 70% – less than 90%
3= 50% – less than 70%
4= 25% – less than 50%
5= less than 25%
So how does this actually affect us? Generally speaking when we are at home we can make the best use of the Internet, whether that be watching a High Definition movie or making a video call to a friend who lives on the other side of the world. However, this report should be highlighted not because of how I can get access to the Internet on a personal level, but for the stark reality that many businesses and those who travel for their work are not able to make use of superfast broadband connections whether in the office or from their car. This impacts the local economy. This means we are not as competitive and this means jobs are on the line. You only need to have a quick look at a recruitment agency to see that IT plays an important role within our local economy. The wider view is of course that the Internet provides access to a global market. We can now sell services overseas with literally the click of a mouse. The Internet provides opportunity and superfast broadband will enable our local businesses to compete on the global stage which ultimately will boost the local economy. Simple. Well not quite, but I hope you understand how crucial it is that we not only have access to superfast broadband but that we also avail of its service.
Feel free to leave a comment on the issue of broadband access and whether you think it really matters to the local economy or not.
You can now read your Amazon Kindle books on any browser, mobile or PC and offline to boot thanks to cloud reader from Amazon. Simply visit https://read.amazon.com/ from any browser and you should be presented with this screen:
Cloud Reader by Amazon
On the iPad, once you log in you will be asked to increase the database size. Say “increase”.
You will then be presented with your kindle library.
Your cloud reader library as seen on the iPad
Select a book to start reading. It will open up in a vertical screen like this:
Cloud reader in portrait mode
Or a horizontal one like this. You do of course have the option to restrict which way the book displays by forcing an orientation lock on the iPad.
Cloud reader in landscape mode
Next you will want to create a bookmark for your iPad’s home screen. Do that by selecting the arrow icon next to the address bar in safari and select “Add to Home Screen”. You can rename the bookmark if you wish. When you are ready, simply press “Add”.
How to add cloud reader to your iPad home screen
Here is a screen shot of the kindle cloud reader bookmark icon on the iPad:
What the cloud reader icon looks like on the iPad
The kindle cloud reader gives you the same presentation options you have in native apps such as background colour, text size and brightness.
Cloud reader with a white background
Given that the iPad already has a native kindle app, I’m not sure who will use the cloud reader. What it does do though, is demonstrate that with HTML5 not all applications require a native app. This will be a big draw to developers who will then only need to develop for one application – the web browser. I expect to see more applications go web only in the future.
