Eurobites: Facebook's smart glasses trigger privacy fears in Italy – report

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Deutsche Telekom lands new deal with Asahi; BT enters the quantum realm; MTN gets an upgrade from Nokia.

Iain Morris, International Editor

September 13, 2021

2 Min Read
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  • Italian authorities are reportedly chasing Facebook for more information about its latest smart glasses, announced last week in partnership with Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica. According to a Reuters report, Garante, the Italian watchdog, is worried about compliance with privacy laws, especially when it comes to children. Fear seems to mirror that about smart speakers such as Amazon's Alexa products – dubbed smart microphones by critics who say they allow the tech giant to snoop on conversations in people's homes. Camera technology installed in smart glasses would conceivably upload data to Facebook and other providers, prompting the same anxiety about abuse of personal data.

    • Brewery group Asahi Europe has chosen Deutsche Telekom for a global SD-WAN service that will apparently replace older MPLS services it had been using for corporate communications. The deal covers about 200 sites and will cover the provision of managed and security services. Deutsche Telekom was already an infrastructure partner for Asahi, having offered managed services to the company since 2014. Its latest contract extends the partnership between the firms for another five years.

    • BT has been carrying out trials of a technology called Quantum Key Distribution at its research facility in Ipswich. The trials are based on products developed by Lumenisity, a Southampton University spin-off, and could feasibly improve network security and boost bandwidth for more advanced communications. The system uses hollow core fiber cable that replaces the solid glass used in most optical networks with air. The effect, says BT, is less interference and improved performance.

    • South Africa's MTN has turned to Nokia for some new "cloud-native" products it says will support the subsequent introduction of 5G services. The cloud infrastructure and IMS tools should initially help MTN to provide voice services over broadband, WiFi and 4G networks, but they would ultimately allow voice to run on 5G as well. The deal represents new business and a market share gain for Nokia, claimed the Finnish vendor in its statement.

      — Iain Morris, International Editor, Light Reading

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About the Author

Iain Morris

International Editor, Light Reading

Iain Morris joined Light Reading as News Editor at the start of 2015 -- and we mean, right at the start. His friends and family were still singing Auld Lang Syne as Iain started sourcing New Year's Eve UK mobile network congestion statistics. Prior to boosting Light Reading's UK-based editorial team numbers (he is based in London, south of the river), Iain was a successful freelance writer and editor who had been covering the telecoms sector for the past 15 years. His work has appeared in publications including The Economist (classy!) and The Observer, besides a variety of trade and business journals. He was previously the lead telecoms analyst for the Economist Intelligence Unit, and before that worked as a features editor at Telecommunications magazine. Iain started out in telecoms as an editor at consulting and market-research company Analysys (now Analysys Mason).

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