Police and counter-terrorism authorities are investigating acts of arson against mobile phone masts in the United Kingdom. Industry association GSMA said it condemns these acts of violence designed to weaken communications networks in a time of crisis.

The White House established a committee “to assist the FCC in its public interest review of national security and law enforcement concerns that may be raised by foreign participation in the United States telecommunications services sector.”

Samsung Electronics demonstrated what it called the world’s first video call on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud platform using mission-critical push-to talk (MCPTT), data and video (MCPTX), a communications capability developed for first responders.

DAMM appointed Simon Riesen as senior solutions manager.

PCTEL announced that the board of directors terminated the company’s previously announced share repurchase program.

A critical new initiative is underway to accelerate the development and adoption of mission-critical services (MCS) including mission-critical push to talk (MCPTT), mission-critical data (MCData) and mission-critical video (MCVideo) for critical broadband.

Kaleyra supported the Italian Red Cross (CRI) with a free text-message service designed to help volunteers and citizens dealing with the emergency caused by the spread of COVID-19. Through a single number, 4353535, the association can recruit health workers in the affected areas, effectively manage queries from citizens and communicate more quickly with all its volunteers in urgent situations.

Vertel, Australia’s largest privately owned telecommunications carrier, and Ondacomms, an Australian wireless communications company, partnered to supply Grasshopper Environmental with a wide-area radio solution for its fleet vehicles.

Direct mode, also called device-to-device (D2D) communications — or more precisely, the lack of it — is seen to be one of the main risks in moving from narrowband professional mobile radio (PMR) technologies exclusively to broadband Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP)-based solutions. However, at times, the root cause is lost in the discussion.

Comms Connect New Zealand in Wellington has been postponed until 9 – 10 September because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, Comms Connect Sydney has been postponed as well.