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Independent wholesale broadband and leased-lines aggregator, VeloxServ, which is used by a fair few retail UK ISPs and alternative networks (altnets), has expanded their ‘Unity Partner Portal’ to add a bunch of new features that “simplify service management, improve operational efficiency and provide partners with greater visibility and control“.

The portal now enables partners to search availability across all integrated supplier networks from a single interface (i.e. making it easier to identify the most appropriate connectivity solution for customers). Partners can also benefit from fully integrated end-to-end ordering and they’ve added real-time order monitoring capabilities provide greater visibility of delivery progress, as well as the ability to request updates directly through the platform.

VeloxServ said operational support has also been strengthened through integrated diagnostics for CityFibre, Vodafone and ITS Technology, enabling partners to investigate and resolve issues more quickly without leaving the portal. On top of that there’s also enhanced user profile management, improved invoice visibility and an API that has entered testing (i.e. partners will soon be able to integrate Unity directly with their own business systems and automate workflows).

Steven Wood, Head of Sales at VeloxServ, said:

“Our objective has always been to remove complexity for our partners. As our supplier portfolio continues to grow, it’s increasingly important that partners have a single platform that brings everything together in one place.

The latest enhancements to Unity are all about improving efficiency, reducing administration and giving partners the tools they need to deliver an even better experience for their customers. Rather than switching between multiple supplier systems, Unity provides a streamlined, centralised platform that helps partners work smarter.

This is just one phase of our ongoing development programme, and we’re excited to bring even more powerful capabilities to the platform over the coming weeks.”

Further enhancements are already scheduled to be released over the coming weeks, such as Estate Management (i.e. a comprehensive view of customer services from a single dashboard) and the migration of historically manually placed orders into the portal. VeloxServ are also preparing to introduce Radius Management functionality, enabling partners to view live usage information, monitor online and offline status, and suspend user sessions directly through Unity.

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Mobile operator O2 (Virgin Media) has today announced that they’ve switched-on their next-generation 5G+ (5G Standalone) mobile broadband network across more of Oxfordshire in England, which is said to reach more than 450,000 residents across 495 towns, villages and hamlets.

Just to recap. O2’s rollout of 5G+ / 5GSA first began in February 2024 (here) and aims to reach “at least 90% outdoor coverage” in every location they cover. The operator’s latest rollout across Oxfordshire includes locations such as Oxford, Banbury, Abingdon, Bicester, Witney, Didcot, Carterton, Kidlington, Henley-on-Thames, Thame, Wantage, and Farringdon.

The new 5G+ network is currently live across around 86% of the UK’s population. The technology offers a pure end-to-end 5G network that can deliver ultra-low latency times, greater energy efficiency, better speeds (particularly uploads), network slicing, improved support for IoT devices, increased reliability and security etc. By comparison, early 5G networks used a Non-Standalone (NSA) approach, which was hobbled by being partly reliant upon older and slower 4G infrastructure.

The new network is typically available to O2’s customers with compatible devices “at no extra cost“, although we do wish that mobile operators would start giving geographic coverage figures for their 5G+ network as population figures always sound better than the reality often shows.

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Broadband and mobile provider Vodafone has published their new Mobile Market Index (MMI), which benchmarks the UK against nine international peers (inc. USA, Germany, France, Spain, South Korea, Australia, Norway, Singapore and Hungary) to assess the environment facing Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) in each.

Overall the UK places 8th in the new Mobile Market Index, above France and Spain, for Operating Environment (i.e. reflecting the factors that affect a mobile operator’s ability to operate and invest) and 9th for Consumer & Market Outcomes (i.e. outcomes consumers and operators experience as a result of the operating environment). But take this all with a pinch of salt as it reflects Vodafone’s own vested interests in the changes they’d like to see.

Otherwise, the Index highlights how UK operators face the “second highest energy costs and planning red tape“, while the UK is ranked 7 out of 10 for the pipeline of relevant skills. The cumulative impact of these pressures affects the service MNOs are able to provide the UK in comparison to other countries.

“The current environment limits operators’ ability to monetise the full extent of their network and invest sustainably in the digital infrastructure the UK needs to meet the demands of the future. Without action to support investment into UK networks, the Index suggests that the UK risks falling behind its global peers in supporting digital public services, national resilience and economic growth,” said the report.

Operating Environment

Consumer & Market Outcomes

The Index argues that affordability and competition should remain central, albeit alongside a stronger focus on investment, resilience, security and advanced network capability.

VodafoneThree Networks Director, Andrea Dona, said:

“Since the merger we have raised the bar for connectivity in the UK, eliminating thousands of not spots and providing millions of people with access to our fastest 5G speeds.

But we cannot afford to lose momentum. Fast, reliable and quality mobile networks are a fundamental driver of economic growth and prosperity. Which is why we support the UK Government’s efforts to examine the barriers holding back our mobile networks. Bringing the UK’s investment environment up to the standard of our international peers could help to support public services, eliminate digital divides and enable communities to thrive.”

VodafoneThree said it would like to see three policy changes resulting from the Mobile Market Review, including planning reform (i.e. modernise the planning system for the era of 5G connectivity and speed up advanced network rollouts), energy reform (i.e. mitigation on energy costs like other sectors receive) and support for enabling 5G network slicing technology (i.e. Ofcom’s net neutrality rules currently limit network slicing to prevent abuse).

Broadly speaking these points reflect many of the same recommendations that frequently crop up from the mobile sectors via various other reports (e.g. here, here, here, here, here and here). The Government, both through existing legislation, their 10-Year UK Infrastructure Strategy (10YIS), proposed changes to planning rules (here) and the complementary Mobile Market Review (MMR), are already progressing some improvements on the planning side of things. But it remains to be seen how much progress is made on energy and network slicing etc.

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Network benchmarking firm Opensignal has today published a new report, which used device-level measurement tracking of real broadband switching (changing ISP) events across the United Kingdom to find that alternative broadband networks (altnets) grew their market share by 4.4 percentage points in just the last eighteen months (holding 11.4% of UK subscriptions).

The research – ‘Q2 2026 UK Broadband Subscriber Analytics Report‘ – reported that altnets now pass an estimated 66% of UK premises with “superfast broadband coverage” (we’re unsure how they define “superfast“, but the 66% figure appears to be based on INCA’s 2026 State of Altnets report), although the new data shows that they still account for just 11.4% of national broadband subscriptions (this closely aligns to INCA’s earlier figure of 11.9%). Despite this, the additional 4.4pp added in the last 18 months shows a strong positive direction of travel.

The degree to which altnets have an impact also varies depending upon location (some areas, such as cities and towns, have a higher density of choice than others). For example, London and Northern Ireland lead on altnet share (21% and 18%), having gained about a third of that share between Q4 2024 and Q2 2026. This pattern, of altnets recording a big chunk of their wins in the past eighteen months, holds across all twelve UK regions: the switching we are reporting points to where the market reshaping is headed.

The research also found that not all of the main incumbent retail ISPs are losing market share equally. For example, the main BT brand, which exclusively uses Openreach’s national network, fell by 3.4pp over the period and TalkTalk fell by 2.8pp (the latter has had some big challenges to overcome due to financial struggles). But others, such as Vodafone, grew their position by 1pp, partly due to their altnet partnerships with CityFibre and CommunityFibre that help to complement their Openreach base.

One other interesting observation is that Three’s 4G / 5G based Home Broadband product, which could be considered a sort of Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) package, has managed to attract a 2.9% national share – making it bigger than any individual fixed line altnet. The charts below give a good visual summary of all this.

We should point out that some of the providers in the tables above act as both retail and wholesale providers – vertically integrated (e.g. CommunityFibre both builds their own network and acts as a retail ISP, while also offering some degree of wholesale access). Similarly, others, like Zen Internet, are primarily retail ISPs that also help aggregate other altnets via wholesale for different partners / ISPs to harness. Suffice to say, it’s a complex market.

Generally, Netomnia leads the main pack of altnets with a 2.0% share (mostly via their retail ISP YouFibre and a smattering of smaller wholesale players), just ahead of CommunityFibre and Hyperoptic (both 1.7%). Netomnia is still trading independently while its acquisition by nexfibre awaits clearance by the competition regulator (CMA).

Breaking news.. more to follow..

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Popular video streaming site TikTok, which can be used by those who are 13 years of age or older (18+ for livestreaming), appears to have landed itself in hot water with Ofcom’s enforcement of the UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) over their use of “age inference” technology to identify the age of their users (i.e. this is not something the regulator considers to be “highly effective” for age verification).

The focus around the regulator’s requirement for “highly effective” age verification is often expressed as being something targeted more towards porn and other “harmful” adult content. But in reality, the new requirements also stretch to almost “all user-to-user and search services” in scope of the act (e.g. social media, online forums, tube sites, cam sites, and fan platforms) – both big and small sites alike. Only a few exceptions exist.

The regulator’s related guidance sets out how the legal duty works and makes clear that any age-checking methods deployed by services must be “technically accurate, robust, reliable and fair” in order to be considered “highly effective“. But TikTok currently uses a type of age assurance known as “age inference“, which involves analysing a user’s activity and behaviour on a platform to estimate whether they are a child or an adult (as well as just asking them to input their date of birth).

The problem for TikTok is that age inference is not included in Ofcom’s industry guidance as a method that is capable of being highly effective for this purpose. “Our Age Assurance report published today also raises serious doubts about the effectiveness of some of these models. Our evidence suggests that, in some cases, age inference methods may be failing to correctly detect significant numbers of children, putting them at risk of exposure to harmful content,” said the regulator.

In response Ofcom has opened a new investigation to establish whether TikTok’s age checks are effective in preventing children from encountering harmful content on its platform.

Ofcom Statement

The opening of an investigation does not mean that Ofcom has reached any conclusion about whether the provider has breached its duties. However, where we identify compliance failures, we can impose fines of up to £18m or 10% of qualifying worldwide revenue (whichever is greater).

In the most serious cases of non-compliance, and where appropriate given risks of harm to individuals in the UK, we can seek a court order to require third parties to take action to disrupt the business of the provider. This may require third parties (such as providers of payment or advertising services, or Internet Service Providers) to withdraw services from, or block access to, a regulated service in the UK.

The move isn’t all that surprising as the OSA tends to be targeted towards the largest social media platforms and TikTok are certainly in that grouping. On the other hand, big questions remain over the credibility of age verification requirements in general, not least in terms of the fact that such providers are often unregulated (i.e. can you really entrust your private details to them) and it raises the risk from data breaches.

Back in 2023 the European Policy Information Center (EPICENTER) published a report that summed up some of these challenges quite nicely, not least by highlighting the tendency of politicians to “promise the impossible without fully understanding the dynamics of what they are trying to regulate and without giving sufficient consideration to the side-effects of the proposed solutions.”

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The UK’s fraud prevention service, Cifas, which is home to over 775 members including major telecoms providers such as Virgin Media and O2 (VMO2), BT, Sky Broadband and more, has joined the Global Signal Exchange (GSE) to “strengthen the global fight against” online scams by collaborating to identify, disrupt, and prevent online scams at scale across borders and sectors.

The UK telco industry’s involvement is vital to help reduce scams because, with their help, Cifas members can share scam signals (such as suspicious URLs, domains and internet [IP] addresses) to shut down malicious online content even quicker, and on an international scale.

According to the announcement, online scams were estimated to cost the global economy $579.4bn (over £433bn) in 2025 or almost £10bn in the UK, which is a figure that only seems to increase with each passing year. The new partnership will address this by allowing Cifas to connect its UK network of organisations – spanning industries including banking, retail, insurance, and telecoms – with a rapidly growing global ecosystem of technology companies including Google, Microsoft and Meta, financial institutions, infrastructure providers, and law enforcement etc.

At the heart of this effort is a system called Scamlink – Cifas’ centralised repository of scam signals, contributed by members and used to detect and disrupt scams. Cifas has already shared its first batch of signals with the GSE, which delivered almost 500 new signals on the first day of operation to enhance the platform’s global intelligence and shut down malicious activity.

Each signal – which includes data such as suspicious URLs, domains, and IP addresses – strengthens the wider network, improving the ability for organisations to act quickly and decisively. These signals are then combined with over 1.3bn data points already processed by the GSE’s advanced analytics engine, which provides a real-time, global view of significant scam activity such as phishing, malware, and spam content.

Mike Haley, CEO of Cifas, said:

“Scams are a global threat and tackling them demands coordinated action across sectors and borders. Through the GSE partnership, Cifas members are helping to identify and disrupt harmful content at scale – with their critical and specialist insight contributing directly to the takedown of scams across jurisdictions.

Connecting into a global network of technology platforms and infrastructure providers ensures our members can take faster, more decisive action. This also marks an important step in Cifas continuing to bring organisations together to enable a truly collective response to stopping scams at source.”

Emily Taylor, CEO of Oxford Information Labs and Co-Founder of the GSE, said:

“Scams don’t respect borders, and neither can our response. Cifas brings deep, specialist intelligence from nearly 800 UK organisations, and connecting that into the Global Signal Exchange means those signals can now drive takedowns anywhere in the world, in real time.

Every partner who joins makes the whole network sharper. That is the point of a shared clearing house: the more the ecosystem contributes, the harder it becomes for the facilitators of fraud to hide.”

Clearly, it’s the scale involved that helps to make GSE such a useful tool and Cifas are now playing an important role in that.

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County Durham-based Everflow, which is multi-utility provider that focuses on UK business services, has announced that they’ve secured a total of £44 million in fresh funding from capital investor BGF and digital bank OakNorth to help the operator expand into telecoms.

The funding appears to be evenly split, with £22m coming from BGF and the same from OakNorth – making this one of the largest deals of the year in the North East. Founded in 2015 as an intermediary between water wholesalers and commercial customers, Everflow has more recently evolved into a nationwide, multi-utility provider achieving 30% year-on-year growth over the last 3 years and serving more than 120,000 premises.

The company’s expanded offering, which now includes waste management and connectivity services (i.e. broadband and phone), allows SMEs to manage multiple business utilities through a single provider relationship. The latest funding round will support the company’s expansion across the UK, enable diversification into new sectors (e.g. telecoms) through customer growth and M&A, and to expand its 250-strong team.

Everflow also expects to adopt AI to enhance internal business processes and Evie, the company’s modular platform that unifies all services within a single system.

Craig Dallison, CEO of Everflow, said:

“We set out in 2015 with a clear goal. To make utilities simple for SMEs, while bringing greater choice, improved service and better value to businesses relying on the UK’s water retail market. This investment comes at an exciting inflection point for Everflow, and BGF stood out as the partner to help us continue to grow at pace.

As a home-grown business in the North East, we’re proud of our expansion over the past decade. But we’ve also helped our customers operate more sustainably by reducing water consumption and cutting carbon emissions. These outcomes reflect our commitment to delivering both commercial and environmental value for the organisations we work with.”

Original article Total Telecom:Read More

The post Nokia launches AI-RAN platform appeared first on Total Telecom.

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Spectrum Comms Solutions, which specialises in building telecoms infrastructure and fibre optic broadband / Ethernet networks (both for themselves and for other providers), has revealed that they’re looking to maintain and expand their passive network (inc. Dark Fibre) in places such as Leeds, Manchester, Sheffield, Birmingham, London Docklands and other UK regions where “data centre clusters require secure interconnection“.

The plan was revealed as part of the company’s application for Code Powers from Ofcom, which are typically sought in order to help speed-up deployments of new fibre networks and cut costs, not least by reducing the number of licences needed for street works. The powers can also help with supporting access to run new fibre via Openreach’s (BT) existing cable ducts and poles (PIA), which is something that Spectrum Comms plans to do.

Just to be clear. Spectrum Comms does have their own network activities, but they’re more of a civil engineering firm that builds networks for their partners in the UK, as opposed to being an alternative network (altnet). The new application is thus arguably more about making such build activity more efficient in order to support data centre clients, including edge computing, AI, 5G, Internet of Things, and cloud growth.

“The Applicant’s proposed network and system of infrastructure would consist of both active/lit electronic communications services and passive infrastructure services respectively. This includes high-capacity bandwidth, DWDM and wavelength-based services, together with dark fibre, duct, chambers, sub-duct, fibre routes and associated passive telecommunications infrastructure,” explained Ofcom.

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Broadband and mobile operator VMO2 (Virgin Media and O2) have today decided to complement Ofcom’s new anti-scam rules for telecoms providers (here) by publishing their first quarterly Scam Index, which among other things reveals that more than 18.5 million adults in the UK have been targeted by scammers in just three months.

The new index is intended to bring together VMO2’s internal data alongside consumer research to track how frequently people are targeted, how vulnerable they feel, the impact on victims and whether threats are escalating to provide a “complete and up-to-date picture of how criminals are operating“. But the operator’s first summary only seems to offer a very limited high-level overview.

According to the results, VMO2 has blocked more than 1.4 billion scam texts to date and is flagging almost 100 million suspicious calls to customers each month before they even answer the phone. In June 2026, the operator flagged more suspicious calls than at any point in its history, warning the public to stay alert.

Meanwhile, some 36% of survey respondents say they see at least one scam every week, while 19% have been informed their personal information has appeared in a data breach and 33% of those who lost money to scams were left out of pocket, with the average loss reported by victims being over £1,800.

The most common scam trends seen were fake delivery messages (63%), online shopping scams (58%) and fake account suspension messages (56%), showing how scammers use believable requests, realistic websites and urgency to trick victims.

Top 10 Scams – April to June 2026

1. Delivery Scams: Fake Royal Mail / DPD / Evri texts about held parcels, redelivery fees, or tracking updates. (63%)
2. Online Shopping Scams: Messages about an order you haven’t placed or fake websites where paid-for items never arrive (58%)
3. Account Suspension Scams: Claims your Apple, Microsoft, PayPal, Netflix, Amazon, or social media account will be locked unless you verify details. (56%)
4. Banking / Finance Scams: Fake messages claiming to be from your bank or payment provider about suspicious activity or account verification. (49%)
5. Tech Support Scams: Messages or calls claiming your device is infected or account compromised, urging you to call support or install software. (48%)
6. Prize / Lottery scams: “You’ve won!” messages for competitions you never entered, often requesting fees or personal information. (47%)
7. Government / HMRC scams: Fake tax refunds, grants, fines, National Insurance problems, or legal threats claiming to be from HMRC or other government departments. (46%)
8. Telecoms Scams: Fake alerts from O2, EE, Vodafone, etc., about bill issues, SIM swaps, or upgrades. (43%)
9. Friends / Family Impersonation Scams: Fake profiles, mobile numbers or hacked accounts pretending to be family, friends, colleagues, or verified accounts requesting money or codes. (33%)
10. Investment / Crypto Scams: Get-rich‑quick schemes, fake trading platforms, crypto doubling, or bogus celebrity endorsements. (33%)

The operator is once again encouraging consumers to remain vigilant and to report suspicious messages to the 7726 service (many modern Smartphones will have a button to help you do this). These reports are used by the telecoms companies to investigate and block mobile numbers used by fraudsters, so help to refine their blocking services. This makes it easier to identify new trends and block messages faster.