Thales and Australian commercial carrier Telstra are working with Microsoft and Arduino to pave the way for scalable security for connected internet of things (IoT) devices by implementing a solution that enables trusted and secure end-to-end communications between devices and the cloud.

The FCC provided guidance to commercial mobile radio service (CMRS) providers on filing certifications of compliance with the E9-1-1 location accuracy benchmark that requires CMRS providers to provide, as of April 3, dispatchable location or X, Y location (latitude and longitude) information within a tolerance of 50 meters for 70% of all wireless 9-1-1 calls. CMRS providers must certify compliance with this benchmark no later than June 2.

AT&T added a new cell tower to enhance Long Term Evolution (LTE) coverage and help give residents and first responders faster, more reliable wireless service in Rancho Tehama, California. The new site will give Rancho Tehama’s first responders access to the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) nationwide network.

A paper published by IEEE found that distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks launched from a mobile phone botnet pose a significant threat to the availability of 9-1-1 service. The authors are Yisroel Mirsky and Mordechai Guri with Ben Gurion University in Israel.

President Donald Trump signed the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act (H.R. 4998) into law, saying the bill will help secure America’s telecommunications supply chain.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST’s Public Safety Communications Research (PSCR) division launched the CHARIoT Challenge, an augmented reality (AR) and internet of things (IoT) competition. The challenge consists of two contests for innovators to design new AR interfaces and emulate IoT data to advance public-safety communications.

First responders in the East Carroll Parish, Louisiana, area are getting a new, purpose-built cell site by AT&T as part of the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) network. The site is located in Lake Providence.

Ericsson signed an agreement to acquire 100% of the shares in Genaker, a provider of mission-critical push-to-talk (MCPTT) solutions.

Wireless carriers said they are working to meet the FCC’s proposed April 2020 initial compliance deadline for 9-1-1 location accuracy, but the metrics shouldn’t be made more stringent. The carriers also said more emphasis should be placed on handset-based solutions for delivering Z-axis location data.

The International Wireless Communications Expo (IWCE), which was scheduled to take place March 30 – April 3 in Las Vegas, has been postponed due to concerns about the ongoing worldwide COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak.