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One of ISPreview’s eagle-eyed readers recently spotted that mobile network operator O2 (Virgin Media) had uploaded an interesting new page on their website, which doesn’t appear to have been meant for public consumption and depicted three new full fibre (FTTP) broadband packages under the ‘O2 Broadband’ branding.

Seasoned industry observers will recall that O2 previously ran their own fixed broadband ISP, which reflected what they acquired from BE Unlimited some years earlier in 2006. But all that changed in March 2013 after Sky (Sky Broadband) agreed to buy their fixed broadband and phone business for upwards of £180m (here). At the time of the sale O2 had about 560,000 customers, which was down from a peak of 671,000 in 2010.

The situation changed again in May 2020 after Liberty Global (Virgin Media) and Telefonica (O2) reached a complementary 50-50 joint venture deal to merge their respective fixed broadband and mobile network businesses in the United Kingdom (here). The merger ultimately resulted in both providers working to offer a new range of mobile and broadband bundles (Volt packages), but O2 opted not to resell its own broadband packages.

Fast-forward to last week and one of ISPreview’s readers (credits to Chris) accidentally spotted an interesting addition hidden within O2’s website (o2.co.uk/shop/o2-broadband), which made mention of an O2 Broadband service offering three full fibre packages – Classic 500 Full Fibre (£10 per month), Plus 1000 Full Fibre (£15) and Ultimate 2000 Full Fibre (£20). All on a short 12-month minimum contract term and applying O2’s latest pricing policies.

The section appeared to be a temporary holding page, not least because the “Choose this package” option and other parts didn’t function, while the proposed pricing looked unrealistic – or perhaps indicative of a trial product. The packages were not a million miles from the sort of trial pricing that giffgaff used before they fully launched their own Full Fibre packages using the VMO2 built nexfibre network last year.

At this point it’s hard to imagine O2 setting up a page as specific as this unless they actually had an ambition to launch such products, although the web page promptly vanished as soon as ISPreview queried it (they’re now redirecting it back to the VMO2 Volt package info. page). As you’d expect, the official line from VMO2 is carefully crafted to avoid either confirming or denying that they might have plans to launch such products in the future.

A spokesperson for VMO2 told ISPreview:

“The page you’ve seen doesn’t reflect a commercial proposition, we regularly test and explore new products and features as part of ongoing development work.

We’ll keep you updated if we have anything to share.”

The move to launch such products, if it ever does come to pass, would of course reflect somewhat of a strategic shift in how VMO2 positions its branding and products. Such a change would also raise questions over how the existing Volt bundles between Virgin Media and O2 might be handled going forward, as well as perhaps causing some speculation over the future position of both brands more generally.

Regular readers will recall that Telefonica’s strategic review appeared to cause quite a bit of upheaval last year (here, here and here), although the recent move by nexfibre to acquire Netomnia for £2bn (here) appeared to indicate that the shared parentage was still firmly committed to working closely together. Time will tell.

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The Scottish Government (SG) has this morning announced that they’ve just passed the 100,000 premises milestone – reflecting those who have benefitted from their publicly subsidised £697m Reaching 100% (R100) project with Openreach, which is rolling out gigabit speed full fibre (FTTP) broadband to remote rural areas.

Starting with a recap. The R100 scheme is contracted to reach a total of 112,939 premises by March 2028 – split across three contracts – in areas that lack access to “superfast broadband” (30Mbps+). The most challenging LOT 1 (North Scotland and the Highlands) area is expected to cover around 61,000 premises by 2027/28, while LOT 2 (Central Scotland) was due to reach 32,000 by 2023/24 and LOT 3 (South Scotland) targeted 22,000 by 2024/25 – the latter two have largely already been achieved.

Just for some wider context. Back in January 2026 some 84% of premises in Scotland could access a gigabit-capable (1Gbps download) broadband ISP network and this falls to 75% when only looking at FTTP technology (here). Ofcom currently predicts (here) that Scotland’s full fibre (FTTP) coverage could reach up to 91% by January 2029, then rising up to 93% for gigabit-capable broadband (FTTP + Hybrid Fibre Coax / cable).

The latest announcement confirms that the R100 programme has now passed the milestone of 100,000 premises, although the actual figure from the subsidised contracts with Openreach is 97,491. The SG have thus reached the new mark by including the figure of 6,239 from premises covered by their complementary R100 voucher scheme (total: 103,730 premises); that’s up from a total of 96,347 premises in January 2026.

The figures below also include a small amount of additional build (aka – overspill), which catches the extra premises that Openreach picks up while working within the same areas on the R100 build (we don’t know how big this is for each area).

Business Minister, Tom Arthur, said:

“Fast, reliable internet is essential for modern life – it supports businesses, enables remote working and helps people access services and stay connected with friends and family. Across Scotland, this investment is already delivering real benefits and transforming lives and livelihoods.

Reaching 100,000 connections is a significant milestone for the R100 programme and our wider investment in Scotland’s digital infrastructure.

We will continue to work with our delivery partners, including Openreach, to maximise the impact of this investment and extend the benefits to more homes and businesses across the country.”

Robert Thorburn, Openreach Partnership Director for Scotland, said:

“This is a fantastic milestone for Scotland. Delivering almost all of these connections, our engineers have worked in some of the most challenging locations to bring full fibre to communities that need it most.

It’s about more than infrastructure – it’s about opening up opportunities and helping rural areas thrive for the long term.”

The R100 roll-out is still ongoing, but Openreach (BT) and GoFibre have long since secured several publicly subsidised Project Gigabit broadband roll-out contracts for Scotland (here, here and here), which will extend FTTP to an additional 139,000 premises in remote rural areas (i.e. focusing on the bits that R100 fails to reach) via an additional public subsidy total of around £288m.

You can see the latest progress for most of those mentioned above over here, although GoFibre’s latest contract for North East Scotland doesn’t yet show, which we assume is because they’re currently reaching the end of the pre-build survey phase (first connections are expected to be delivered sometime this summer).

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Shropshire-based independent ISP Aquiss has today joined the small to modest sized group of internet providers able to offer speeds of 1.2Gbps and 1.8Gbps via Openreach’s national Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network, both of which will initially be sold at half price for the first six months of service.

The press announcement for this actually came in at the unusual time of around 8pm on a Friday night, so we’re playing catch-up a bit this morning. But as usual all of their new packages include unlimited usage, a 12-month minimum contract term, free installation, a pledge of no annual mid-contract price rises (excluding the discount offer for new customers), a static IPv4 address and static IPv6 addresses (/56). But new customers will be expected to supply their own broadband router, and you’ll need something beefy to do such tiers justice.

The 1.2Gbps package (average speeds of 1,000Mbps down and 100Mbps up) is currently being priced at £28.50 per month for the first six months of service (£57 thereafter), while 1.8Gbps (average speeds of 1,650Mbps down and 110Mbps up) will set you back £30 for the first 6 months (£60 thereafter). We’re unsure quite why the average advertised upload speed differs slightly between the two as they have the same base 120Mbps profile.

Martin Pitt, Managing Director of Aquiss, said:

“These speeds represent the very finest broadband experience available today. We’ve always believed that families who appreciate quality, reliability and thoughtful service deserve connectivity that matches their refined lifestyle. By being among the first to bring 1.2Gbps and 1.8Gbps packages to the Openreach network, we’re offering our customers an exquisite, future-proof digital foundation they can truly indulge in.”

Aquiss claims to be “among the first” to launch these tiers via Openreach, but in fairness there are quite a few ISPs now able to offer it (e.g. Zen Internet, iDNET, EE, Freeola, Vodafone etc.) and many of those began doing so between 1-2 years ago. Most of those will also bundle an included router.

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A couple of Sky Broadband’s customers have recently notified us that their 900Mbps full fibre (FTTP) package on Openreach’s national network suddenly started delivering speeds of up to nearly 1.8Gbps, which is despite such a tier being unavailable to Sky’s subscribers. But those hoping for the launch of faster packages via the same network may be left disappointed, at least for now.

The download speed of 1.8Gbps is the fastest currently available to consumers via Openreach’s national network, although Sky only sell speeds up to an average of 900Mbps (1Gbps). Customers can get faster speeds on the CityFibre side of Sky’s network (up to 5Gbps), but that’s different.

Still, the fact that a tiny number of customers suddenly appear to see much faster speeds did initially seem to suggest that Sky Broadband might be preparing new packages for launch in the near future. Sadly, a spokesperson for Sky informed ISPreview that they weren’t currently running any trials that would explain it, although they did say this: “From time to time, there can be small anomalies in what we’re able to offer“.

ISPreview queried whether Sky had any plans to launch Openreach-based packages at speeds beyond the current 900Mbps (average) maximum within the next few months, but Sky told us they had “nothing further to share on this at the moment.” However, it’s perhaps not unrealistic to expect that this might change in 2027, particularly as Openreach may conclude their current pilot of speeds up to 8.5Gbps in that same year (here and here).

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Customers of broadband and mobile providers BT and EE (possibly also including Plusnet) appear to have been suffering from difficulties accessing their online accounts, official apps and webmail today, although the feedback appears to suggest that it might not be impacting every service, subscriber or platform in the same way.

The problems, which started just after 10am this morning (credits to Thinkbroadband for spotting) and also appear to be impacting some product ordering systems, are understood to reflect a Priority 1 service outage that ISPreview has been informed may stem from a supplier-side issue (this is impacting one of the group’s critical/shared platforms).

A notice seen by ISPreview suggests that full restoration could take anything from 12-20 hours, although we suspect it may be quicker than that for some services. The issue does not impact broadband and mobile connectivity itself, only the group’s own websites and apps.

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Customers of broadband and mobile provider EE (BT) will see a number of key changes over the coming weeks and months. According to ISPreview’s sources, the provider will finally add Disney+ (video streaming) support to their pay TV boxes and plans to launch a new loyalty programme for existing subscribers.

Quite why it’s taken the provider so long to add Disney+ support to their TV platform is unclear, although the good news is that it’s definitely coming sometime this summer. We’re also hearing that EE plans to complement their existing ‘Rewards’ scheme with a new programme during the same period, which we believe will be called “One Up“.

At present, we don’t have a lot of information about the new loyalty programme, but we understand it will only be available to customers that take both broadband and mobile from EE. Some of the expected rewards under this programme are likely to include free movies on EE’s pay TV service, as well as discounts on their tech store products and more.

Finally, we understand that EE will be expanding the flexibility of their existing Flex Pay service (handset finance agreements with mobile SIM plans), which currently enables customers “pay for your device in a way that suits you“. Customers can expect more choice of payment periods and the option to pay off at any point or trade-in. Further details should surface once EE issues an official announcement over the summer.

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The fifth annual 2026 UK Fibre Awards event took place last night at the London Marriott Grosvenor Square Hotel, which saw a number of broadband ISPs and full fibre network builders across multiple categories pick up awards for their achievements. Some of the winners included Quickline for ‘Best Rural Fibre Provider’ and Squirrel Internet for ‘Best ISP‘, among others.

The event, which is similar to many existing industry award ceremonies (e.g. the ISPAs and Connected Britain), is currently being backed by telecoms / ICT centric media and event organisation firm BPL Group (including BPL Business Media, Comms Dealer, IT Europa Media & Intelligence and Fibre Provider).

The winners for each category are typically chosen by a judging panel of eight industry and IT experts (here), including various senior managers, analysts and so forth. But there’s not much to reflect the consumer perspective in this group, and no technical testing is performed.

Winners of the UK Fibre Awards 2026

Best Rural Fibre Provider

Winner – Quickline Communications
commended – GoFibre

Best Urban Fibre Provider

Winner – Cambridge Fibre Networks
commended – MS3 Networks

Best Wholesale Platform

Winner – AllPoints Fibre
commended – Zen Internet

Take-Up Champion Award

Winner – Cambridge Fibre Networks
commended – 4th Utility | Rise

Best Customer Experience

Winner – Cambridge Fibre Networks
commended – Lightning Fibre
commended – Wessex Internet

Best ISP

Winner – Squirrel Internet
commended – 4th Utility | Rise

Best Hardware Supplier

Winner – Technetix Group
commended – Sterlite Technologies

Best Software Supplier

Winner – Buyapowa
commended – Strategic Imperatives

M&A & Investment Award

Winner – Truespeed
commended – Grain

Best Sustainability Programme

Winner – Omelcom
commended – giffgaff

Community Champion Award

Winner – Quickline Communications
commended – Lightning Fibre

Best Professional Services

Winner – GOS Consulting
commended – NETS International

Best Company to Work for

Winner – Virgin Media Business Wholesale
commended – L3 Optics

Best Training & Development

Winner – NETS International
commended – Cable Telecommunications

Marketing Team of the Year Award

Winner – Wessex Internet
commended – 4th Utility | Rise

Sales/Commercial Team of the Year Award

Winner – 4th Utility | Rise
commended – Connect Fibre

Delivery Team of the Year

Winner – Freedom Fibre
commended – Lightning Fibre

Executive Leadership Team of the Year Award

Winner – 4th Utility | Rise
commended – Ogi

Best Innovation

Winner – Strategic Imperatives
commended – Voiceflex

Best Overall Fibre Provider of the Year

Winner – MS3 Networks
commended – 4th Utility | Rise

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Internet provider YouFibre, which is the retail ISP arm of alternative network operator Netomnia (Substantial Group) and offers full fibre (FTTP) broadband speeds of up to 7-8Gbps, has today revealed that they’ve finally topped the 500,000 customer mark after completing the integration of Brsk’s base into their UK operations (up from 460,000 in Feb 2026).

YouFibre now serves customers across more than 150 UK towns – from Londonderry to Llanelli, Durham to Dover, Swansea to Stockton, and Scotland to the South West. Netomnia’s national network currently covers 3 million premises RFS (11th Jan 2026) and they expect to reach c.3.5m in the near future.

Netomnia has long held an ambition to extend their FTTP network to reach 5 million UK premises by 2027 (inc. 1 million customers by 2028), although that now seems likely to be a target that will be merged into nexfibre’s future roll-out plans (depending upon the CMA’s competition review).

Ryan Battle, Managing Director Sales & Marketing, said:

“Half a million customers is a number we’re genuinely proud of, but what means more is that nearly 90,000 of them took the time to leave us a review, with us maintaining an Excellent rating on Trustpilot. Broadband is one of those things people only notice when it goes wrong, so when customers go out of their way to say something positive, that tells us we’re getting it right. We’ve grown quickly, we’ve brought two brilliant brands together, and we haven’t compromised on what matters most: brilliant value Full Fibre, being fair, and delivering what we promise.”

Prices for YouFibre’s broadband packages start at £24 per month for symmetric speeds of 200Mbps on a 12 month fixed-price term and rise to £99.99 for their top 7Gbps tier. All packages include free installation and a Wi-Fi 7 router.

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The UK Government (DSIT) has today published its response to a planned revision of the Telecommunications Security Code of Practice (2022), which will update the code to reflect changes in what sort of specific security measures public telecoms providers (broadband, mobile etc.) must take in order to protect their networks from attack.

Just to recap. The original code was an extension of the wider Telecommunications (Security) Act 2021 (summary), which itself was originally introduced to restrict the use of Huawei’s kit in UK telecoms networks, while also imposing a variety of changes to make related networks safer from cyberattack.

The law and its supporting Code handed new powers to the Government and Ofcom, enabling them to intervene in how network operators run their business, manage supply chains, design and even operate networks. Fines of up to 10% of turnover or £100,000 a day can even be issued against those that fail to meet the required standards, albeit tiered to different sizes of provider.

However, the code is designed to be periodically updated as “new threats emerge and technologies evolve“, which is what the government proposed to do last year when it launched a related consultation (here). The government has now responded to that consultation with their planned revisions to the draft code (here) – see tracked changes (PDF).

Many of the changes are focused on providing additional guidance and clarity, particularly in relation to how operators should handle evolving technologies like mobile eSIMs, Small Cells, modern encryption and APIs etc. The code has also been updated to reflect the need for tackling hostile-state-linked attacks, while separately opting to partly roll back on the proposed addition of ‘Business Support Systems’ – respondents felt this was too broad and risked bringing a wide range of IT systems into scope that are not relevant to network security (business support systems are still technically covered, in certain circumstances).

The update also reemphasises the need to take a holistic, risk-based approach to the Code of Practice, which aims to encourage delivering a security approach that considers the Code in its entirety, rather than taking individual security measures in isolation. But this is still sometimes at odds with Ofcom’s compliance monitoring approach that drives some providers towards more of a ‘checklist’ approach.

Overall, most of the changes appear to be fairly small to modest, although we’ve only skimmed through what is quite a long and laborious read. The revised draft will now need to be laid before parliament before being formally introduced. The draft covers a much wider set of changes than we can easily summarise here, so those with an interest are advised to read it.

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Network access provider Openreach (BT) has today revealed that their Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband ISP network has now passed an important milestone by covering 1.25 million premises (81%+) across Wales (up from 1m at the end of 2024), with take-up already said to be “approaching” the impressive 50% mark (across the UK it’s 38.27%).

All of this work supports Openreach’s wider investment of up to £15bn in deploying full fibre technology to cover 25 million UK premises by the end of December 2026 (currently on 23m). After that, there’s a further ambition to reach up to 30 million premises by 2030, but the build plan for the 2027-2030 period and final coverage target has yet to be confirmed.

Take note that the figure of 1.25m (81%+) above only reflects the coverage delivered by Openreach’s FTTP network, while the overall reach of full fibre in Wales is around 86%, which includes work by Virgin Media (inc. nexfibre), Ogi and Netomnia etc.

Openreach’s service, once live, can be ordered via various ISPs, such as BT, Sky Broadband, TalkTalk, Vodafone and many more (Openreach FTTP ISP Choices) – it is not currently an automatic upgrade, although some ISPs are doing free automatic upgrades as older copper-based services and lines a withdrawn.

Martin Williams, Openreach’s Partnership Director for Wales, said:

“This is an important moment for Wales and a clear sign of the progress being made to improve digital connectivity across the country.

Across the UK we’re seeing more people choose Full Fibre as it becomes available, and it’s encouraging to see that momentum reflected in Wales too, with more households starting to experience the everyday benefits – whether that’s working from home, studying, running a business or staying connected.

But these upgrades don’t happen automatically. Many homes and businesses could already benefit from better broadband today, and I’d encourage people to check what’s available where they live and speak to their broadband provider about upgrading.”

Separately to this, the Pembrokeshire County Council (PCC) has today celebrated reaching a major digital milestone with 75% of the county now able to access gigabit-capable broadband, which is up from just over 5% coverage in 2019. The announcement notes that 43.7% of gigabit coverage in Pembrokeshire is being delivered by alternative network suppliers, including Ogi, Voneus and local provider Dragon WiFi, albeit with Openreach still playing the biggest role.

Cllr Paul Miller, Deputy Leader of PCC, said:

“Reaching over 75% gigabit capable coverage is a major milestone for Pembrokeshire and demonstrates what can be achieved through partnership working. In 2019, large parts of the county were being overlooked for investment and just 5% could get gigabit speeds. Since 2019, working with partners across the sector, approximately 50,000 homes and business in Pembrokeshire have been connected and while we recognise there’s more to do before we hit 100% the progress so far, particularly given the rural nature of our county, has been incredible.”