Category: Vox 4 Thought

Back when you had ADSL and tested your speed by downloading files, you often got very close to the speed of your line, be it 4Mpbs, 10Mpbs or 20Mpbs.

You understood that the ‘missing Mbps’ was due to the Internet protocol overhead that you need to account for, and were happy with your overall experience.

Now, a Fibre infrastructure provider rolls out in your area and you decide to upgrade to a 100Mbps line. You eagerly run the same test again, and based on your past experience, you expect to see a download speed around the 95Mbps mark. But you are horrified to find that the download performance on that file is only around 35Mbps – no matter how many times you redo your test.

You then turn to some of the speed-testing services available on the Internet and the results there too don’t look right to you either.

Internet speed testing platforms are notoriously inaccurate and unreliable, yet too many people rely on them to test their online speeds.

This is because they don’t really understand the multitude of factors that can impact Internet performance, and are therefore  left disgruntled with their Internet service provider (ISP). So what’s going on here?

Some of the misunderstanding can perhaps be traced back to the days of ADSL, when the line was the bottleneck and Internet users became accustomed to upgrading the pipe to get better performance – typically going from a 1Mbps line to a 4Mbps to a 10Mbps line and so on.

However, in the Fibre era, where we are seeing pipes of 50 to 100Mbps, or even 1Gbps, the line is no longer the bottleneck.

Many speed testing platforms have their limitations and either use the incorrect methodology, or overlook important aspects that impact the quality and performance of your connection to the Internet.

Understanding capacity and throughput

Firstly, it is important to understand the difference between capacity and throughput. Capacity – popularly known as bandwidth – is what ISPs sell, and it is a measure of the amount of data per second (Mpbs) that a communication link can transport.

Throughput, on the other hand, is the actual amount of data that is successfully sent or received over the communication link.

Speed tests measure throughput and not capacity, and there are a number of constraints in the system that prevent throughput from ever reaching capacity levels.

For instance, some laptops – even if not connected to the Internet via Wi-Fi, but to the router via a cable – are simply not designed to get to 1Gbps. In addition, the way this laptop is set up – the CPU, the operating system, the browsers and antivirus software – has an impact on throughput speeds.

Another basic mistake that people make is performing a speed test over Wi-Fi, forgetting that the farther they are from their access point, the lower the link capacity. Consequently, as you move further away from your access point, your Wi-Fi throughput also drops rapidly and becomes your overall limiting factor, especially on faster line speeds.

Choosing the right server and latency

Some speed testing services geo-locate users by their IP address and then automatically select the ‘closest’ server when running a test. Unfortunately, their logic is somewhat broken.

Instead of constraining their server selection to ensure it’s connected to the users’ ISP network, they just choose any server, regardless of the ISP network it’s connected to. You then end up with situations where a user in George (for example), whose Fibre access circuit first touches his ISP’s network in Cape Town, runs his speed test to a small WISP’s server in George with only a 50Mbps Internet connection.

In this example, the customer will need to manually override the auto-selection and choose to run the test to a server in Cape Town instead, in order to get a more realistic result.

Yet, the bigger issue is that of latency, which is determined by the overall path (routers and interconnecting links) that IP packets and signals traverse, and is a huge factor in TCP/IP performance. TCP, part of the TCP/IP communications protocol, performs end-to-end error checking of data transmission for reliable and sequential exchange of data.

Back in the 1970s, when the protocol was invented, latency wasn’t an issue, but that’s all changed now, and the protocol itself is a limiting factor.

Keep in mind that while the primary job of the Internet’s routers and that of your ISP is to route IP packets, it’s the end-users’ devices and applications and content providers’ servers that choose to use a protocol (TCP) that now constrains throughput performance to levels lower than the link capacity. And there really isn’t anything your ISP can do to fix this.

Bigger highway, but the same car

Think of it this way. Your car is constrained through its design, aerodynamics and engine performance to achieving a top speed of say, 200km/h when driving down a road with a single lane.

If we upgrade that road to four lanes, can your car now do 800Km/h? No. It can still only achieve 200km/h. But you can now have four cars, each driving at 200Km/h driving down the road at the same time. The same situation occurs over fast Internet links.

Most consumers are totally unaware of the above factors and do not understand that the ‘results’ they get when using one of the many speed testing websites, will vary significantly based on server selection, the mathematical algorithm, process and protocol used to calculate the speed, browser or app technology being used.

It is important that Internet users have at least a basic understanding of these factors, instead of reading too much into speed tests, which will almost always be misleading and inaccurate.

So, is there even any point in getting a higher capacity Fibre link?

Actually, yes. Many applications establish multiple concurrent connections to get around the limitations of the TCP/IP protocol. YouTube, for example, fires up 12 connections when you click on a video. As the number of user devices and use cases just keeps on increasing over time, links eventually become congested at certain times of the day and then users start experiencing the effects, such as video quality degradation or buffering, slow browsing or downloading, and more.

On higher capacity links however, applications are much more responsive as they don’t step on one another and users can complete certain activities without having to wait as long as they would otherwise have to.

As South Africa enters the ninth week of the nationwide lockdown, the business focus has shifted from enabling employees to work remotely to now planning for what the new normal is likely to look like.

This requires CIOs to balance existing organisational priorities with ways of becoming more adaptive to the changing environment. Critical to this is decisive decision-making that positions the business for growth.

For small to medium-sized businesses that do not have all the skills in-house to transform their IT environments, decision-makers should consider going the outsourcing route.

By partnering with a managed service provider (MSP) that can deliver everything – from a Cloud-readiness audit through to helping identify the technology gaps that exist between the business strategy and what is already in place – the company can manage its spend and can more easily scale up (or down) as market demands require.

A further advantage of going the outsourcing route is getting access to the depth of knowledge a partner that is an expert in its field can provide. This will help inform the Cloud-readiness audit by providing a better understanding of where new technology investments will make the biggest impact as the organisation transitions to a Cloud environment.

An important element driving this agility centres on engaging with the right partners to enable efficiencies.

By leveraging the respective strengths of these partners, an organisation can enhance its own. For example, during the rush to equip people with the tools required to work from home, a company might have relied on a hardware partner to supply and support laptops on a month-to-month basis, instead of having to make a long-term commitment. The supplier gets the benefit of new business while the company can remain focused on meeting customer demand.

Prepare for the Cloud

CIOs should also consider implementing systems that help the company reintegrate operations for a post-lockdown world. This entails identifying how best to balance the ‘new’ culture of remote working with a traditional one that was more geared towards an office environment.

Throughout this, a CIO should remain cognisant of what is required for the business to be considered Cloud-ready. But more than simply having connectivity and laptops for remote workers in place, this requires a foundation built around effective cyber-security. Security systems must always be adapted to reflect the changing business landscape with companies adhering to best practices.

Read: Protect your business with this cyber-security toolbox

These best practices are informed by globally recognised standards such as the ISO 27001 that specifies a management system intended to bring information security under management control and gives specific requirements around aspects of data security.

Users need to be continually educated on what constitutes good cyber-security practice as it pertains to working from an office environment and what they need to be aware of when working remotely.

Nowhere is this more important than when it comes to meeting demand for collaboration tools.

In a post-lockdown environment, employees will continue accessing data and working on documents from anywhere they have a reliable Internet connection.

However, this will lead to increased cyber-security threats due to the increasing number of entry points now into the business back-end. It is therefore critical for cyber-security solutions to reflect this and encompass more than just anti-virus and firewalls.

If remote working is going to be part of business operations moving forward, then the CIO should work with the HR department to update policies and incorporate measurable deliverables as part of this. For their part, employees need to understand what is required of them and how to deliver the productivity required in this rapidly-evolving environment.

New business models

It is inevitable that technology-enabled business models will become more critical to organisational success in the future. Having said that, every company should find its own way forward – there is no off-the-shelf strategy that can fully anticipate all the unique requirements of each business.

However, the success of the remote working environment will likely lead to companies reducing the size of its office space. This will bring about cost-savings on leases that could be passed on to employees.

Think of the competitive advantage an organisation can derive from offering remote working perks such as connectivity and power solutions as part of its staff packages.

Of course, remote working is not without its risks.

The uncertainty around electricity supply in the country means CIOs should consider how best to equip remote workers with power supply solutions that are more effective (and environmentally-friendly) than traditional generators.

With load shedding expected to return in the winter months due to an increase in demand, companies need to start examining the options available to them.

Read: Addressing the power challenge for remote workers

Given how the new world of work will likely see employees spread across a number of locations, CIOs need to have oversight of the effectiveness of the IT systems in place.

Being able to use a centrally managed IT system that provides an integrated view of all devices, applications, infrastructure, security, and other components behind a single pane of glass is essential.

Refocus IT spend

Despite the uncertainties of what the post-lockdown business world will entail, CIOs should keep the following things in mind to help focus their spend:

• Cyber-security must be a priority
• Managing the connectivity requirements of remote users – Fibre provides an ideal environment as it also enables employees to make calls using VoIP technology, significantly reducing mobile call expenses
• Have Cloud-enabled systems that allow for remote work including collaboration tools, hosted PBX systems, and virtual private networks
• Consider embracing hardware-as-a-service where the company can rent hardware based on their requirements and upgrading it as needed
• Centrally managed IT system that manages all devices and users from a singular console that also ensures asset management is done with the right policy management in place
• Supporting home users with access to reliable power supply solutions for when load shedding resumes.

CIOs can create opportunities for their organisations by following a focused approach towards what the new normal could look like. Underpinning this is a basis built on cyber security and Cloud-centric tactics.

Throughout this, the CIO should keep the requirements of the business stakeholders firmly in mind to help navigate the complexities of this new environment.

Even though it is still unclear what the workplace of the future will look like, remote working is likely to form an integral part of it.

With many companies using the past several weeks to migrate to the Cloud, their attention must now turn to overcoming one of the most significant challenges likely to arise – South Africa’s unreliable power infrastructure.

A key learning that has emerged is that it is possible to have a portion of employees working effectively from home. The massive office space of the past will be supplanted by a smaller environment consisting of mainly meeting rooms and areas where some individuals can still work from. This will see reduced leases bringing about significant cost savings.

Read: Welcome home – it’s business as usual

But even though the Cloud facilitates remote working, it can do little to mitigate the continuous threat of load shedding. Of course, power failures are not limited to this country but encompass the entire continent.

So, while decision-makers are keen to have some people working from home and only coming into the office for an occasional meeting, the reality of load shedding will be a massive issue to ensure that employees remain productive at home.

Rethinking approaches

Very few companies have given any thought to how power outages will impact home-based workers. While investments have been made to ensure that those working from the office are not impacted by load shedding, chances are that employees at home can likely be down for several hours a day.

This means that if a company is giving serious consideration to remote working, it must extend its business continuity strategy to incorporate those individuals working from home.

It is no longer a case of simply having a home office, but rather repositioning it as an office at home with all the related elements required to be productive.

Things such as Fibre connectivity, laptops, printers, webcams, secondary displays, and so on, are all key components.

In this environment, the biggest challenge will centre around the productivity of staff at home. What happens if an employee is unable to work for three or four hours a day? If a company focuses on output-based deliverables, then it becomes easy to identify when someone is not working.

Read: Remote Working: It’s not that bad

But if a person’s performance at home is compared to what it is when they are in the office, a more innovative power solution is required.

Beyond a generator

Having innovative power solutions in place means employees can no longer blame load shedding as an excuse not to work. But better power solutions that can help deliver up time for anything from four to five hours are critical.

A concern is how these solutions will be funded. Companies can likely bundle a power solution along with a Fibre offering for remote workers that is deducted from their salary.

But, if an organisation saves on reduced office space, then it can pass those savings on to the employee and cover the costs of their connectivity and power solutions provided deliverables are met.

This requires a power solution that is not generator-based.

Generators are noisy and dirty with many homeowners’ associations already banning them. Therefore, something battery-based using the latest technology is more suitable.

So, even though the connectivity issue has largely been dealt with, the home-based worker of the future will need to have access to an alternative power solution when the inevitable likely starts happening again.

Find out more about a battery-based alternative for staying connected while working remotely here.

We live in a culture of oversharing… like that pretty design on your cappuccino, exotic holiday moments or a workout at the gym – they all get posted on Instagram or Facebook, right?

In this digital age, every single moment of our lives is being documented by our friends and family in a way that isn’t too dissimilar to the tabloids. There is a big argument to be made that there is no such thing as privacy anymore. However, unlike celebrities, who have learned to manage their privacy, we seem to flock to the paparazzi, rather than away from them.

While there may be things that were considered private 20 years ago that aren’t anymore, the general concept of privacy and our expectation for it still exists. In South Africa, privacy is a fundamental constitutional right to which every single person is entitled.  In terms of South African law, the more you protect your privacy, the more privacy you have.

Reasonable expectation of privacy

Start by asking the question: is there a reasonable expectation of privacy in a particular set of circumstances? For example, if a photograph is taken of you while you’re fully clothed and out in public, you are unlikely to have a problem with it; but if you’re naked in the shower and someone sneaks a photo you will definitely be up in arms.

The most basic thing you can do to protect your online privacy is to have a private account (there are additional features depending on the platform). If you do not take basic steps like this, you cannot be upset tomorrow if a tabloid magazine features a ten page spread of your family holiday from Instagram, as you haven’t taken steps to protect your privacy, and therefore cannot have any expectation of privacy.

Avoid the pitfalls of ‘sharenting’

Another privacy concern that is important to consider for anyone with children is the concept of ‘sharenting’ – sharing and oversharing of photographs of our children online. Parents are responsible for protecting their children’s privacy and the online space is no different. A good test is to ask yourself if your child would be happy with that content being online when he/she is old enough to appreciate it.

If the answer is no – don’t post it. As soon as your child is old enough to have a conversation around consent, our advice is to ask before posting. In addition, when it comes to your children, don’t post anything awkward or embarrassing, don’t include identifying information (such as a school uniform) and definitely no cute pictures of your naked toddler running on the beach. We know it’s adorable, but there are some creepy people out there.

What can you do to protect your information online?

Once information is out there, it’s out there for good. Remember that the Internet is permanent and so we need to try and protect what we put on social media, as much as possible. Here are some practical ways of doing this:

• Be selective of who you connect with and allow to follow you on social media .
• Make your accounts private and make the privacy settings as strict as possible.
• If you have multiple social media accounts on different platforms, be aware that posts may link to each other (e.g. something you post on Instagram can be shared to Facebook).
• Turn off the location function on your camera and on all apps, except for those that require it to be active e.g. Find My iPhone, Uber, Google Maps, etc.
• Delete or disable old accounts that you don’t use anymore. You never know when your younger self can pop up to haunt you again.
• Rather under-share than overshare.
• Never post in the heat of the moment: anger or sadness can heavily cloud your judgement.
• Always fact-check any news you see before sharing, especially if it seems a bit far-fetched or incites an intense emotional response.
• Remove your third-party plugins on Facebook.

Bullies have always existed but in the digital age, the bullying is worse than ever before.

In South Africa, the consequences of cyberbullying are unprecedented. We are seeing higher than ever incidences of depression, anxiety and behaviour related to self-harm as a direct result of cyberbullying.

This is largely for two reasons:

1. Before smartphones, a victim of bullying could get home from school and have some sort of break from the taunting. Now the bullying is constant and doesn’t end with the school bell.
2. Bullies are emboldened to share content they would never say to a victim in person. This has contributed to the type of content being worse than ever before.

When it comes to cyberbullying, anonymity is the root of all evil. It allows bullies to hide behind the veil of pseudonym accounts on social media or anonymous platforms such as Qooh.me, Ask.FM, etc.

Cyberbullies engage in direct personal attacks – naming and shaming, “slut shaming”, fat shaming, pressuring others to send nudes, revenge pornography and viral sharing of videos in which children are being physically bullied.

Although this type of content is shared on anonymous platforms, the truth is that any platform can be open to abuse. Some platforms are simply better than others at removing offensive content.

 

How do you know if your child is being cyberbullied?

Most victims of bullying won’t reveal what is happening so look out for these common signs:

• Being secretive about online activities
• Being upset or anxious after using a phone or the Internet
• Appearing more withdrawn
• Decline in school academic performance
• Unexpected change in friend circles
• Decline or change in sleep duration and quality.

 

What should your child do if he/she is being bullied?

• Tell a trusted adult (a parent, guardian or teacher)
• Take screenshots to preserve the evidence
• BLOCK the bully.

 

What should your child do if he/she knows that someone else is being bullied?

• Don’t join in. This includes commenting and sharing harmful content or staying in a WhatsApp group which hosts such content.
• Report bullying to a trusted adult (parent, guardian or teacher).

 

What legal options are available if you or your child are being bullied?

• If you know the identity of the bully, and the bullying is sufficiently severe to the extent that it can be said to cause mental, emotional or psychological harm (or inspire the belief that harm could be caused), one mechanism available is to apply for a Protection Order under the Protection from Harassment Act.
• If you do not know the identity of the account holder (i.e. it is an anonymous account or a pseudonym account), please get in touch with the Digital Law Company for possible legal and/or forensic options.
• Almost all social media platforms have a reporting function which allows the possibility for damaging content to be removed. However, if it is an anonymous account, be aware that once an account is removed, it is more difficult to uncover the identity of an account holder.

 

The Cybercrimes Bill has codified many crimes relating to online activities. The chapter on Malicious Communications criminalises the creation or distribution of “a data message” which incites the causing of any damage to property belonging to, or violence against a person or group of persons which is harmful or intimate in nature, and which is distributed without consent of the person involved.

This would include a lot of content which we are loosely defining as “cyberbullying”. The bill will hopefully become law soon and with any luck, reduce the instances and severity of bullying altogether.

Does it sound like your colleagues are speaking gibberish while their image stays frozen on screen, only for everything to speed up to normal moments later? You are not alone.

As handy as video conferencing (VC) applications have been for people working from home during the national lockdown, poor audio and video quality can leave employees frustrated.

The problem here is bandwidth – or actually, the lack of it. This can be either in terms of your external connection to the Internet, or even your own WiFi network. Popular

VC platforms such as Microsoft Teams, Zoom or Vox Air, require 1.2Mbps for a peer-to-peer high definition (HD) video calls, while other platforms may require even more.

At first glance, this might not seem like much, but previously we never made too many VC calls from home. And if we did, no one else was there – kids were in school, partners at work. You had all the bandwidth for yourself. Now, you and your partner might both be on video calls, while your children stream their learning sessions or have their own video calls with fellow classmates -a all at the same time.

Add this to the fact that group calls require more bandwidth than peer-to-peer calls, owing to more video content being uploaded and downloaded – group HD video calls will require 1.5Mbps of bandwidth while higher resolutions will require as much as 3Mbps – and you and see how things can quickly become bottlenecked.

Your connectivity

What technology are you using to connect to the Internet? A key difference during this time is that we are not only consuming huge amounts of content – as was usual with our streaming and online gaming – we are also creating our own content as part of our jobs, with a need to upload.

Given this need, ADSL – where upload speeds are a fraction of download speeds – has shown itself to be woefully outdated when it comes to the requirements of the modern work from home environment. Some users have turned to mobile or fixed-mobile technologies, but these suffer from high contention rates – as more users join the network or a particular base station, the lower the speeds become – and exorbitant data costs.

In order to create a quality remote working environment, it has become clear that Fibre has become the rising star of connectivity. While it is still geographically restricted, some infrastructure providers such as Frogfoot have started targeting smaller towns as a matter of priority. Apart from offering higher speeds and stability, the cost-effectiveness of Fibre is unmatched when it comes to the data being offered.

In fact, affordability has seen many customers turn to uncapped options to do away with data bundle headaches altogether.

To assist corporates with the sudden and unexpected shift toward remote working, some Internet providers are even offering Fibre-to-the-Home bundles that companies can purchase – along with other productivity tools – for their employees. As an added bonus, Fibre lets you ditch your landline altogether and use Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), which offers far more competitive call rates. With number portability, you can keep your existing number too.

Your home network

If you have a stable high-speed connection and still experience problems, the next link in the chain to look at is your WiFi network. WiFi signals get weaker the further away you are from the router and can also be deteriorated by barriers such as thick walls. If possible, the best option is to move your router to a more centralised location – the closer your router is to the centre of your coverage area, the better your reception will be throughout the house.

If your home is large and requires consistent network speeds, then it might be a better option to consider getting a mesh WiFi system which, unlike a WiFi extender, is designed to create larger coverage with more bandwidth.

With kids being home and continuously online over lockdown, you may want to put them on a separate wireless network.

Create special rules and settings to limit speeds and block inappropriate sites, while easing the burden on your overall bandwidth.

Lastly, if you live in an environment with many WiFi networks close by, it could be that a neighbour is WiFi heavy at a particular time of the day,  causing your own network to slow down. Consider changing the default channel used by your router – there are many mobile apps to help you find a lesser used channel – or even switching to the less congested 5Ghz network standard if your router and devices support it.

When all else fails

Video conferencing bandwidth requirements are driven by the image resolution, which is how many pixels are on the screen image, and frame rate, which is the ability of the video platform to handle image motion. These will vary from provider to provider.

While this is usually automatically adjusted by most VC platforms, for the best user experience, some browser-based services allow you to restrict the resolution  to reduce bandwidth requirements. This is also possible through the control software of some third-party stand alone webcams. Setting your video resolution to 720p or even lower – such as 576p – will still provide a good-quality browser-based video experience.

If all else fails, consider disabling video unless it is required, such as during introductions at the start of a call, and if it is your turn to speak. Remember content shared during the VC call will still be visible regardless of whether your video is enabled or not.