The IT Nerd

If you’ve ever heard the phone ring, look at the call display and seen what you thought was a legitimate number on the display, then picked up the phone to find a telemarketer or scammer on the other end of the line, you’ve been a victim of spoofing. In the telephone sense, it’s when a telemarketer or scammer uses a fake number on your call display to entice you to pick up the phone. It isn’t all that hard to do as there are many services out there that are just a Google search away to facilitate this. This isn’t helping to keep a telemarketer or scammer at bay and the CRTC wants to do something about it:

Canadians can participate in this consultation by sharing their views on:

• the technical solutions available to help them manage unsolicited or illegitimate calls
• barriers they may face to adopting or using these solutions, and
• new and innovative solutions that could help them manage unsolicited telecommunications and illegitimate telemarketing calls.

The CRTC is asking the telecommunications industry to provide a summary of current options and features to block these sorts of annoying calls by Sept. 4. The public consultation is open to comments until Oct. 16. We’ll see what happens beyond that. But this is a good first step with hopefully more to come.

Yesterday, the CRTC released a decision that forces big telcos must open up access to their fiber optic networks to competitors such as Primus, Distributel or TekSavvy. Keep in mind that big telcos are already required to do this with their copper based networks. Thus doing the same thing with fiber optic networks it levels the playing field and fosters competition.

Another change is that competitors are forced to use an “aggregated” model of service. Meaning that they tap into a single point of access and there may only be one per province. Because of that, they pay more because they have to pay to have data shuffled back and forth based on distance. Now the CRTC says that competitors must agree to a “disaggregated” model of service, where they are required to plug in much closer to the final consumer, at a regional point of access.The smaller companies would then have to arrange transport of data from that regional interface to their own offices, either by installing their own fiber optic cable, or by leasing it from an existing company. This is designed to discourage smaller competitors from acting as mere resellers of existing bandwidth. Instead, they in theory would add to the available bandwidth. But it also should reduce the cost that competitors have to pay.

It should be noted that big telcos will be allowed to charge fees for sharing their fiber optic cables in order to make a profit on their investments. The pricing model will be worked out with each company on the basis of actual cost, plus a markup of about 30 per cent. So it isn’t as if they have lost per se. Although I’m pretty sure the big telcos won’t see it that way.

One thing that I should note is that it will take a long time to see the effects of this. So if you’re hoping to switch ISPs to get faster Internet access on fiber optic cable, and the lower prices that come with dealing with an upstart ISP, you may have to wait for a while yet.

Here’s a question that I got in my inbox yesterday:

Hello. The CRTC issued a decision to cap roaming rates that Robellus charges smaller wireless carriers. Do you think it will lower rates for me as I am on Wind and I get significant roaming charges on my bill?

Thanks!

Thanks for the question. First, let me post a link to the CRTC decision that came out yesterday that forces Rogers, Bell, and Telus (aka Robellus) to limit how much they charge the Wind Mobile’s of the world for roaming onto their networks. The reason why the CRTC is taking this action is this:

The CRTC has found that there is an insufficient level of competition among the national wireless companies – Bell, Rogers and Telus – in the provision of wholesale roaming services. These companies can maintain rates and impose terms and conditions that would not prevail in a competitive market. Other Canadian wireless companies need to obtain these services under reasonable rates, terms and conditions in order to offer comparable broad or national wireless coverage to their own customers.

As such, the CRTC will regulate the rates that Bell, Rogers and Telus charge other companies for wholesale wireless roaming services. The CRTC has set interim rates for these services effective today, and is requiring the three companies to file final proposed rates by November 4, 2015.

Now, this will not make a difference at all. I’ve said it before and I will say it one more time. If you want to have a lower cell phone bill every month, you need to have real competition. That means that the government needs to encourage a big global telco on the scale of a Vodafone or a Deutsche Telekom to come into Canada, set up their own national infrastructure, and go toe to toe with the big three. That would make your bills drop because you’ll have an option that won’t be pushed around by the big three. Now the CRTC decision from yesterday may save you a few cents here and there, but it is not the game changer that Canada truly needs in the wireless market. After all as the CRTC said, there is an insufficient level of competition among the national wireless companies.