Welcome:   Lock your Broadband

With Virgin boasting increased uptake of services and great broadband deals being thrown around, no better time to remind people the importance of locking your broadband:

Virgin Media has experienced its fastest period of growth ever in the last three months, with strong demand for broadband and television services. The company have said that they added more than 38,000 cable customers since the beginning of the year and the average amount each customer was paying increased by more than 5%. Customers who opted to take up three services was up 61% and those who left the service was just 1.1% - a record low. Chief executive Neil Birkett commented that Virgin Media were pleased with the results, but that traditionally the second quarter would see a slowdown due to a period of housemoving, but they expect this to pick up again towards the end of the year.

The editor of DailyMusicGuide.com, John Russell has suggested that the habits of music fans will change as a result of faster speed internet services. He thought that moving music to cloud based systems and onto MP3's will increase. He said that music lovers will start to trust the storage systems more and will have less fear of losing their entire music collection.

Research from Point Topic has found that 4 million children in the UK still do not have access to broadband at home. This represents 35% of all families in the UK with children. The research company points out that these children will have a lower earning power and are likely to generate increased social costs compared to those who have good internet access. They suggested that at an average of £500 per year, the total cost to the government over a 40 year working life could be £80bn.

Tmico, the business internet provider has announced a new range of fibre to the cabinet broadband packages with speeds of up to 40Mbps. Upload speeds could also be as high as 10Mbps. Trefor Davies from Timico has said that they are committed to providing a high quality network built to cope with high demand. Price and package details are yet to be released but the service will be available from May 10.

New research from Garlick has found that 30% of London households have weak security settings on their routers and 5% say they have no security at all. 65% use the WPA security settings which is the best form of security on a WiFi network. Tom IIube from Garlick says that not using these security settings is much the same as locking your door but telling a burglar where to find the key. He points out that people need to be aware they they can be prosecuted or disconnected for activities performed through their ISP, even without their knowledge.

UK consumers have more choice than ever according to broadband comparison site TopTenBroadband. They point out that Talk Talk, Virgin Media, BT, O2 and Orange are all offering limited period three months free deals at the moment. Talk Talk are offering the deal on their Essentials package, which is already considered the best value broadband package available in the UK. Virgin Media is offering a 10Mbps service which will be £12.50 after the initial three months. Finally BT offers three months free to those who buy the broadband and Anytime home phone bundled package.

Sky has announce it will be upgrading its broadband service and will be offering customers up to 20Mbps from the beginning of June. Two new packages will also be available. Sky Everyday Lite will be free for those with a Sky telephone package or £5 for those without. It has a 2GB cap. Other can opt for Sky Unlimited for £7.50 per month for those with a phone service or £12.50 for those without. This has no cap, fair use policies or traffic management for movies and TV downloads and on-demand services.

Almost 2000 broadband and phone users were left without a service this week after thieves stole copper cabling from Farningham in Kent. Six cables were cut in 5 places. It is the second time in less than a year that this has happened in the area. BT said that more than 2 miles of cabling has had to be replaced which is a very complex and time consuming job. Local people have complained that they have been unable to do work from home during the disruption. † [last update: 29.04.10]

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