Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Nokia offers more managed services; WHO gig for T-Systems; EU helps Ukraine against Russian cyberattacks.

Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe

February 23, 2022

3 Min Read
Eurobites: Vodafone aims squarely at device 'circularity'

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Nokia offers more managed services; WHO gig for T-Systems; EU helps Ukraine against Russian cyberattacks.

  • Vodafone has announced a "circular economy" initiative to ensure more handsets are reused or recycled, at the center of which is an agreement with Recommerce, a specialist in phone refurbishment. Starting in Vodafone's European markets this spring, customers will be offered a range of new or revamped services, including insurance for new phone purchases, faster repairs, as well as a new digital platform making it easier to trade in their existing phones for a newer model. According to a 2019 European Economic and Social Committee study, keeping a handset for an extra year can reduce its lifetime carbon dioxide emissions impact by up to 29%.

    • Nokia has introduced two new managed services offerings which it says will help telcos deliver a better customer experience and realize faster returns on their 5G investments by making better use of intelligence gathered from their network data. The first, Operations Transformation, is described as a multi-year service intended to help telcos enhance their operations through "cloudification" and automation. The second, Operations Intelligence, uses AI-driven analytics to allow telcos to pinpoint problems on their 5G networks and address them accordingly.

    • The World Health Organization has chosen Deutsche Telekom's T-Systems unit to help it develop a digital gateway that will enable QR codes on electronic vaccination certificates to be checked across national borders whilst complying with the strict data privacy laws of the European Union. In the spirit of transparency, the ongoing work on the software is being made public on the developer platform Github.

    • As the political situation in Ukraine becomes increasingly ominous, the European Union has put together a cyber rapid response team to help defend Ukraine from cyber attacks. As the BBC reports, the team comprises cyber experts from Lithuania, Croatia, Poland, Estonia, Romania and the Netherlands.

    • Sources have told Reuters that Telecom Italia (TIM) is expected to reach a decision on KKR's proposed takeover by the middle of March. In November KKR announced it wanted to buy up troubled TIM in its entirety and take it private, at a cost of €10.8 billion (US$12.2 billion). (See Telecom Italia faces $12.2B privatization bid from KKR.)

    • Ofcom, the UK communications regulator, has proposed a range of measures that it says will make it harder for scammers to use UK operators' networks. According to the watchdog, almost 45 million were targeted by scam calls and texts last summer, the cyberpests taking advantage of the public's increasing use of online platforms to carry out their day-to-day lives during pandemic lockdowns. Under Ofcom's new proposals, for example, all telephone networks involved in the transmission of a call will be expected to block numbers that are clearly "spoofed," or imitated.

    • Ireland's Data Protection Commission is expected to consult fellow European Union regulators in April on its ongoing investigation into Facebook's EU-to-US data transfers of personal data, which are mainly carried out for advertising-related reasons. As Reuters reports, the worst-case scenario for Facebook would be an outright ban on such data flows, and the social media company has warned that such a decision would be "devastating" for its business.

    • Dutch police subdued a gunman in an Apple store in central Amsterdam yesterday (Tuesday) after he held several people hostage there for several hours, Sky News reports. One local broadcaster suggested the stand-off was the result of an attempted armed robbery, with witnesses reporting hearing shots fired inside the store.

      — Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

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About the Author(s)

Paul Rainford

Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

Paul is based on the Isle of Wight, a rocky outcrop off the English coast that is home only to a colony of technology journalists and several thousand puffins.

He has worked as a writer and copy editor since the age of William Caxton, covering the design industry, D-list celebs, tourism and much, much more.

During the noughties Paul took time out from his page proofs and marker pens to run a small hotel with his other half in the wilds of Exmoor. There he developed a range of skills including carrying cooked breakfasts, lying to unwanted guests and stopping leaks with old towels.

Now back, slightly befuddled, in the world of online journalism, Paul is thoroughly engaged with the modern world, regularly firing up his VHS video recorder and accidentally sending text messages to strangers using a chipped Nokia feature phone.

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