If you are planning any trips that are off the grid and yet still want access to phone and internet, then you need to become familiar with the Iridium satellite constellation. With satellites orbiting approximately 485 miles above the earth, this network offers global phone and data coverage, no cell towers or Wi-Fi hotspots required.

There are several kits that allow you access to the Iridium system, and one of the best is the Iridium GO! Package. The basic package comes with the Iridium GO! base station, carry case, and AC travel charger with international adapter and is suitable for those who have access to electricity. 

It's priced at $699 but remember that there are additional activation fees and a Iridium network subscription plan required (and this can be quite expensive).

The Iridium GO! Offers 15.5 hours of standby battery life, and up to 5.5 hours of talk time.

For those who genuinely want to go off-grid, there's also a special package that includes not only the Iridium GO! base station and AC travel charger with international adapter, but also comes with a solar charger, two batteries additional, and a desktop charger. This is priced at a heftier $1,095.

There are also marine and aviation equipment packages available.

Iridium GO! supports a full range of global communications using optimized apps:
                    •   Voice calls
                   •   Text messaging
                   •   Email access
                   •   Weather updates
                   •   Customized third-party apps
                   •   Emergency alerts (SOS)
                   •   Photo sharing
                   •   GPS tracking
                   •   Posting to Facebook/Twitter
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If you need to be in communication when off the grid, this is the perfect kit. Yes, it's expensive, and the subscriptions add a great deal more to the cost, but you are accessing a satellite network, not a router in the back of a café!

Microsoft and Oracle recently said they reached an agreement to make their two cloud computing services work together with high-speed links between their data centers, targeting significant business users and uniting against cloud computing leader Amazon Web Services. 

The two companies said the high-speed link between their data centers would start with facilities in the eastern United States and spread to other regions. They will also work together to let joint users login to services from either company with a single user name and get tech support from either company. 

The move comes as both Oracle and Microsoft are courting large businesses and government customers considering moving computing tasks currently handled in their own data centers to cloud providers. 

“With Oracle’s enterprise expertise, this alliance is a natural choice for us as we help our joint customers accelerate the migration of enterprise applications and databases to the public cloud,” Microsoft’s cloud chief Scott Guthrie said in a statement. 

AWS, the largest cloud computing provider, is encroaching on many of those customers, including in Oracle’s historical stronghold in the database market. 

“With this alliance, our joint customers can migrate their entire set of existing applications to the cloud without having to re-architect anything, preserving the large investments they have already made,” Don Johnson, executive vice president of Oracle’s cloud infrastructure unit, said in a statement. 

Microsoft has previously inked a deal with German software maker SAP SE and Adobe to make their services work better together. 

Ed Anderson, a Gartner research analyst, said the move was a clear “jab” at AWS, especially for Oracle. “It’s no secret that Oracle views AWS as a major competitor in the database market,” he said. 

Anderson also said there remained some unanswered questions about the deal, such as whether customers would face data transfer fees for moving large amounts of information back and forth between services. 

But overall, Anderson said the move would likely benefit Microsoft and Oracle by helping their pitch to large businesses already using services from both. 
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“It’s a great way for both companies to be able to hitch their cloud offerings together,” Anderson said.

Regulators in the US have taken a big step toward bringing antitrust suits against American tech giants, but they face a long road ahead.

Amazon, Apple, Google, and Facebook are facing unprecedented scrutiny in their own backyard. The US Department of Justice (DoJ) and the Federal Trade Commission are preparing antitrust investigations into the companies, and plan to divvy up the work. As the news emerged, the firm’s share prices were hammered, a clear signal that Wall Street believes the Feds mean business.

Congress also plans to put the companies under the microscope. The Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives said it's launching a wide-ranging investigation of the market power of the tech giants.

The obvious question is: why now? The European Union has been sounding the alarm about Big Tech’s super-sized influence for years – and imposing massive fines on Google in particular for anti-competitive behavior.

The most likely answer is American politics. Some prominent Democrats, including senator and presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren, have been calling loudly for tech giants to be broken up to stop them harming consumers’ interests. With a presidential election on the horizon, the Republicans likely want to be seen as tough on Big Tech, too. There’s also a widespread suspicion of Silicon Valley’s liberal tendencies. President Donald Trump has a history of trading barbs with Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s boss, and regularly rails against what he sees as social media and search companies’ anti-conservative bias.

Politics aside, there’s plenty for antitrust watchdogs to sink their teeth into. Amazon is accused of using data from its online platform to gain an unfair advantage over other sellers. The EU has already punishedGoogle's manipulation of search results to favor its businesses. Apple’s fighting a private lawsuit which alleges its 30% take on apps sold in its apps store is an abuse of monopoly power. And Facebook dominates the digital ad market together with Google.

Critics such as Warren have used sporting analogies to justify calls for breaking up the tech giants. “You can get to be the umpire in a baseball game, or you can have a team in the game, but you don’t get to be the umpire and have a team in the game,’ she tweeted earlier this year.

If any of the tech giants are found guilty of anti-competitive behavior, they’re likely to be hit with Hefty fines and other sanctions. That may not be enough to satisfy people like Warren, but trying to force through a breakup of one or more of the companies will be tough to do because:

1.Big tech firms have generally made their services available for free. US antitrust law focuses primarily on whether a monopolist has harmed consumers by driving up prices and restricting investment in a market. While firms like Facebook and Google certainly aren’t paragons when it comes to things like privacy, they’ve provided a cornucopia of free stuff to consumers and invest heavily in R&D. That doesn’t mean they can’t be sanctioned for abusing their market power to, say, manipulate search results in ways that drive up prices. But it would be hard to prove they have harmed consumers broadly in the eyes of the law.

2.They aren’t “natural monopolies” like those found in, say, the utility industry, where the cost to enter a market is so vast other companies are dissuaded from doing so, allowing incumbents to drive up prices. The challenge would-be rivals face is to overcome the “network effects” that underpin the big tech companies’ success. A service like Amazon has a magnetic attraction for buyers because they know they will find plenty of the sellers on its platform. And as more buyers roll up, even more sellers will want to join. This will undoubtedly deter competition, but it’s not illegal.

3.Big tech firms dominate data gathering and use insights to provide even more free services. The vast number of customers using their products mean Big Tech firms benefit from what’s helpful to think of as a data snowball. The more customers they attract, the more data they can harvest from them. That information is then used to tailor new services that attract even more users. This cycle is even more powerful in the era of AI, which relies on crunching vast amounts of data for its efficacy.
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The Microsoft precedent: None of this may deter US regulators, who can draw on Microsoft’s experience in the 1990s for inspiration. The DoJ tried to split Microsoft up to stop it bundling its Internet Explorer web browser with its dominant Windows operating system. The effort failed, but the bruising court battles harmed the company’s reputation and curbed its anti-competitive instincts. History could be about to repeat itself in the internet era.

Amazon has plans to establish a constellation of 3,236 satellites in low Earth orbit to patch up areas with poor or no internet connectivity.

Amazon's planned push into satellite-delivered broadband is taking shape under Project Kuiper, details of which appear in three documents filed with the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) last month. Kuiper Systems LLC filed the reports.  

The documents reveal Amazon plans to put 3,236 satellites at three different altitudes. There would be 784 satellites orbiting at an altitude of 367 miles; 1,296 satellites at 379 miles; and 1,156 satellites at 391miles.  
An Amazon spokesperson confirmed the existence of Amazon's satellite broadband ambitions, noting that it was a "long-term project that envisions serving tens of millions of people who lack basic access to broadband internet.”

The company is also planning to partner with other companies to bring the project to reality.  

That could make companies in the space-broadband race, like SpaceX and OneWeb, potential rivals or partners. The FCC in November authorized SpaceX to deploy and operate 7,000 satellites in very low Earth orbit to deliver broadband. 

OneWeb, which has $2 billion in backing from the likes of Airbus, Coca Cola, Softbank, and Virgin, in February, launched six satellites with the same ambition. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin space venture already has a contract to launch satellites for OneWeb and TeleSat. 

Meanwhile, Facebook, Boeing, and LeoSat have revealed plans to beam the internet from space. Alongside SpaceX's FCC authorization, the regulator also authorized spectrum in the US for both TeleSat's and LeoSat's space broadband systems.   

Should Amazon's plans come to fruition, its satellites would provide about 95% of the world's population with coverage between latitudes 56ºN to 56ºS. The two parallels circle the Earth at about the latitude of Sweden and below Australia.  

Amazon will still need to get approval from the FCC and other regulators around the world to move forward with Project Kuiper. 

Satellite internet today is typically costly. However, there is hope that satellites in low Earth orbit will be cheaper and offer lower latency.
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Amazon said it would "of course look at all options" when asked whether Bezos' Blue Origin would have the edge over others for launching the Kuiper constellation.

Networks today are subject to many threats including ransomware, cryptocurrency-miner threats, or state-sponsored hackers.

In line with other security industry pros, Microsoft has confirmed in its 24th annual security intelligence report that ransomware has taken a backseat to pesky cryptocurrency miners. 

But the company also warns that supply-chain attacks are on the rise. These are where an attacker uses a supplier or business partner to spread an infection. 

Past examples include the NotPetya not-ransomware outbreakthat caused over a billion dollars in losses for global firms and the Dofoil BitTorrent attacks. 
    
"Supply-chain attacks are insidious because they take advantage of the trust that users and IT departments place in the software they use," Microsoft warns in the report. 

"The compromised software is often signed and certified by the vendor, and may give no indication that anything is wrong, which makes it significantly more difficult to detect the infection. They can damage the relationship between supply chains and their customers, whether the latter are corporate or home users.

"By poisoning software and undermining delivery or update infrastructures, supply-chain attacks can affect the integrity and security of goods and services that organizations provide."

While attacks are changing and Windows 10 built-in security is improving, the company's advice to customers remains the same. However, there are conflicting data about the best approach to staying secure.  
Microsoft recommends only using software from trusted sources, though this 'security hygiene' measure could be undermined in a supply-chain attack. 

The company also recommends "rapidly applying the latest updates to your operating systems and applications, and immediately deploying critical security updates for OS, browsers, and email."

Deploying patches quickly is generally a good idea. However, Microsoft recently revealed that vulnerabilities in its software are most likely to be exploited as a zero-daybefore the company has even had a chance to release a patch. 

However, its other tips don't present obvious security conflicts.  

"Deploy a secure email gateway that has advanced threat protection capabilities for defending against modern phishing variants," Microsoft warns, adding that businesses should "Enable host anti-malware and network defenses to get near real-time blocking responses from the cloud (if available in your solution)." 

The other important measures organizations should take include implementing access controls, and teaching employees to be suspect of messages that ask them to divulge sensitive information. 

Microsoft also recommends keeping "destruction-resistant backups of your critical systems and data" and using cloud storage services for online backups. 
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"For data that is on premises, regularly back up important data using the 3-2-1 rule. Keep three backups of your data, on two different storage types, and at least one backup offsite," says Microsoft.

For years, IBM has offered corporate customers its Watson data-crunching technology – but only if they used it on IBM’s cloud computing service. Now, to expand Watson’s reach, IBM is also making it available on competing cloud services.

IBM said recently that it would allow businesses to use some of IBM’s Watson-related software with underlying data that is stored in rival cloud data centers like Microsoft’s Azure and Amazon Web Services. Customers will also be able to use Watson with data stored in their own data centers.

“It is enabling a level of openness that hasn’t been available to date,” said Rob Thomas, IBM general manager of data and AI.

The move marks a departure for IBM, which, until now, hasn’t seemed anything but open with its cloud computing service and Watson technologies. In 2016, for example, then-IBM CFO and current IBM senior vice president of global markets Martin Schroeter told analysts during an earnings call, “Watson runs on our cloud, and our technology will run on IBM’s cloud.”

But IBM is now shaking up its strategy to broaden Watson’s appeal. The change of heart comes as IBM’s public cloud languishes in third place, at best, in terms of market share behind AWS and Microsoft Azure.

Dan Kirsch, a research analyst at Hurwitz & Associates, called IBM’s new service “really significant” because businesses are increasingly seeking technology that’s not dependent on a single vendor.

Nick Patience, a founder and research vice president for 451 Research, said the move is “an acknowledgment by IBM that it’s a hybrid cloud world,” referring to firms wanting to use more than one cloud computing vendor as well as keeping some software running in their internal data centers.

 “We are confident in the IBM cloud that if clients try our products anywhere, they will eventually be drawn to IBM cloud and the uniqueness it provides,” said Thomas.

Although companies are concerned about being locked into a specific company’s cloud infrastructure when it comes to particular software and IT products, Patience said they are currently in the early stages of using AI and are still willing to upload their corporate data to cloud services like AWS and rely on them for machine learning software. Being locked into a particular vendor when it comes to machine learning projects isn’t yet much of a concern, but IBM is betting that will change.

He continued: “You could say IBM is trying to take back the initiative in machine learning here. The Watson brand has lost a little bit of luster over the years as others have come along. They are trying to take it back.”

You may have recently gotten a message from your bank that, yes, you should read and act upon.
The message being sent by many banks involves a small, but crucial change affecting check deposits made using bank mobile apps on smartphones and other devices.

Depositors must now include the phrase “For Mobile Deposit Only” underneath their signature on all checks deposited using mobile apps. Some banks are also suggesting you add "For Mobile Deposit Only at (Bank Name)" or "For (BANK NAME) Mobile Deposit Only."

This new endorsement requirement, instituted by the Federal Reserve, officially went into effect July 1. It applies to all mobile deposits at all financial institutions, such as PNC Bank, Capital Oneand Legend Bankin Texas.

Without the inclusion of the new phrase, banks say the check may be returned with the notification that your “deposit was rejected due to restrictive endorsement."

The change is meant to protect banks from fraud, which can occur when a check is accidentally, or intentionally, presented at a bank after it already has been deposited via mobile. 

"It’s not like there was rampant fraud, but it was just an area they wanted to tighten up," said Michael Diamond, senior vice president of payments at Mitek Systems, which has digital transaction technology used by more than 6,100 banks.

"This is the banks taking care of themselves," Diamond said. "The channel is very, very, very safe, and the growth is great. More and more people are using it." 
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Case in point: Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said last month that during the April to June period, more customers deposited checks using the bank’s mobile app than in person at bank branches. Overall, 76% of all deposits come through ATMs and mobile deposits, he said.

Sometime in early 2019, the self-driving e.GO Mover bus will hit the streets in Germany. The electrically powered vehicle can transport up to ten people, with a battery that lasts for ten hours or so.

And, it's powered by the cloud – the Microsoft Azure cloud platform, to be exact.

While autonomous vehicles powered by the cloud are not new, e.GO Mover highlights how artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and edge computing projects are increasingly coming together to power smart cities. Amazon Web Services (AWS), for example, boasts customers including DriveAI, nuTonomy, TuSimple, and Mapillary—all of which work on autonomous vehicle systems.

Google Cloud Platform also lists best practicesfor building a connected vehicle solution for autonomous driving and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication on its platform as well.

The growth of such a trend is enabled by the availability of powerful AI tools on these cloud platforms. Machine learning tools are crucial to the development of such autonomous systems, and public cloud giants make them much more accessible. This helps the growth of IoT projects in smart cities as well.

Of course, the cloud on its own will not be able to drive the digital transformation of smart cities fully. Improved latency through next-generation 5G connectivity will also play a role, as autonomous vehicles and IoT devices will be able to send and receive critical data while operating more readily.

But, what happens when connectivity is spotty? That's when edge computing comes into play. Edge computing occurs when data is processed at the same location where it is collected. This means that autonomous vehicles or IoT devices will need some compute power on-board to be able to analyze the data they're receiving, without having to send it over a network to be processed and sent back.

Edge computing is especially crucial in autonomous vehicles, as the potential danger posed by poor operations is immense.
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As more and more cities begin to embrace digital transformation, these three technologies will play an integral role in their future. And, as city officials start to rely more and more on these tools, we may see network operators, public cloud vendors, and IoT providers operating similarly to the way our utility providers operate today.

No doorman? No problem. Amazon introduced a new delivery solution for apartment complexes that promises to deliver both convenience and safety (alongside your actual package, of course). Meet Hub by Amazon, a container that allows for the storage of packages so that they’re not just strewn about a lobby, or worse yet, potentially stolen. The Hubs look just like traditional Amazon lockers, but instead of being installed in public spaces and businesses, they’re instead located in apartment and condominium complexes.

Best of all, the Hub isn’t just for Amazon deliveries – instead, if your mother wants to FedEx a care package to you while you live your big city dreams, the package can reside safely in Hub until you have finished with your 12-hour workday. Neither senders nor recipients have to make any specifications when it comes to getting their packages delivered – you still input your regular shipping address, and the Hub merely serves as a temporary stopover until you return home. When you’re ready to pick up, use a personalized pickup code to open the corresponding door and access your delivery.

“We’re always striving to make things easier for our customers. Building on Amazon’s expertise in locker solutions, the Hub addresses frustrations from property owners, carriers, and residents concerning package delivery,” Patrick Supanc, director, Amazon Worldwide Lockers and Pickup, said in a statement. “Now half a million residents in some of the premier properties in the country have access to the Hub, Amazon’s latest delivery solution. The Hub simplifies delivery for residents, offering quick and secure access to packages, day or night. For delivery providers, it offers a single, convenient location for package drop-off and gives property managers time and resources back to focus on other priorities.”

This could serve as a huge help to folks who live in buildings with tricky delivery schedules. You will no longer have to worry about staying home to wait on a package to arrive, nor will you have to remember to ask your building staff about that delivery that was supposed to come last week. Building managers will likely also appreciate the convenience offered by Hub – rather than requiring property staff to declutter a lobby or send packages to the proper apartment unit; everything can be centralized in Hub.
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Already, Amazon says that several of the largest residential property owners in the U.S. have signed up for Hub and that more than 500,000 apartment dwellers already have access to the amenity. If you’re interested in petitioning your building to include one of these handy lockers, you can request Hub by Amazon at the newly dedicated homepage.

Forget stumbling through a customer-support page – the future of commerce won't be found by surfing the World Wide Web. 

Soon many of the tasks we now do via websites and brand-specific apps will be handled through messaging and voice platforms like iMessage, WhatsApp, and Amazon's Alexa, according to Alex Spinelli, the chief technology officer at LivePerson.

Today, companies like Home Depot, T-Mobile, and Discover manage customer-service chats with LivePerson. Though chat technology is seeing a resurgence thanks to the proliferation of smartphones, LivePerson was founded in 1995 as a web-chat alternative to 1-800 numbers and call centers. 

LivePerson's new vision means no more awkward drop-down menus, no more shopping carts, and definitely no more URLs. 

"Our thesis is that conversation is a more natural way of interacting with brand services," Spinelli said. "It will become the dominant way that people interact in their digital lives."

It may seem like a big leap from the present day, but Spinelli envisions a world five years from now in which there are no websites and very few apps. 

"The whole app catastrophe that lives on your phone is overwhelming," Spinelli said. "On my iPhone, I have 127 apps that need updating. You can't keep up." 

Meanwhile, people will continue to interact with screens. In Spinelli's vision, the e-commerce shopping experience of the future starts when a carousel of items pops up at the bottom of the screen. The shopper browses the carousel, clicks the item they want, and instantly pays through a system like Apple Pay. All of that happens within a chat window. 

And that vision isn't too far off from what's already on the market today. 

Apple and Google are prepared for this future.  Earlier this month, LivePerson announced a new offering called LiveEngage for Voice Assistants, which lets customers start interacting with a brand through a voice assistant like Alexa while hanging out at home and then move that conversation over to chat on a mobile device when they leave the house. 

The big idea behind LiveEngage is that customers can have one continuous conversation across multiple modes of communication – something that dovetails with the bigger vision of LivePerson. 

Spinelli joined LivePerson in March after five years at Amazon — first as director of Amazon Search, and later as global head of Alexa OS, the operating system behind Amazon's famed voice assistant. 

When he learned that both Apple and Google added conversational commerce products directly into their smartphone operating systems, he decided to make the move to LivePerson, where he could embrace the trend head-on. 

Apple Business Chatlaunched in beta mode with select brands last year. It's designed to let customers find brands on iMessage and interact with them using dynamic features that manage everything from scheduling an appointment to making a purchase. 
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Google's Android has a similar option with its business-focused Rich Communication Services, currently in beta.