The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is looking for input on a proposed rule to reimburse eligible telecommunications carriers that deployed components from blacklisted firms as part of the Universal Service Fund program.

The FCC said in a Federal Register notice that it plans to modify the reimbursement program and identify “providers of advanced communications service” that will be covered by the agency’s “Protecting Against National Security Threats to the Communications Supply Chain” rulemaking.

Under the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act of 2019, service providers may use USF allocations to replace equipment and services obtained no more than 60 days from companies that pose national risks such as ZTE and Huawei.

FCC also initially required ETCs to report Huawei or ZTE equipment in their inventory and provide cost estimates for replacement work.

In addition, the agency is seeking feedback on potential modifications to application and review procedures, disposal requirements and suggested replacements for risky telecom equipment, management software and virtual communications platforms.

The U.S. Air Force (USAF) has brought four B-1B Lancer bombers to the Pacific Air Forces for bomber task force operations including training activities. On May 1, three of the aircraft went to Andersen Air Base in Guam and one flew to the east of Japan to support training operations before rejoining the others, USAF Academy said Monday.

The overall effort aims to fortify training and strategic deterrence missions with foreign allies and international partners essential to Indo-Pacific peacekeeping. Dyess Air Force Base in Texas sent all four of the bombers, along with 200 personnel from the 7th Bomb Wing.

“Deployments like this allow our Airmen to enhance the readiness and training necessary to respond to any potential crisis or challenge across the globe,” said Col. Ed. Sumangil, commander of the 7th BW.

He added that the effort offers an opportunity to better integrate with foreign partners in joint exercises and operations. The BTF effort follows a previous one in 2019 when Whiteman AFB sent three B-2 Spirit bombers to Hawaii.

Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., is requesting New York-based artificial intelligence technology maker Clearview AI to ensure transparency in the company’s use of data obtained from its facial-recognition offering intended for COVID-19 contact tracing.

Markey wrote a letter to Clearview CEO Hoan Ton-That on April 30 detailing the former’s concerns over the firm’s marketing of its AI offering which may result in ethical biases amidst COVID-19 patient tracking efforts.

According to Markey, Clearview is yet to subject its technology to “rigorous accuracy and bias testing” and address privacy concerns with regards to image deletion in cases of false matches and other errors.

He noted that media reports discovered inaccuracies in Clearview’s claims that an independent review panel reviewed the firm’s technology in line with American Civil Liberties Union standards. ACLU also disproved the company’s claims and “exposed serious flaws with the panel’s assessment,” said Markey.

The senator urges Clearview to identify all government entities that deployed the company’s product and submit the tool for independent assessments by facial recognition experts.

Raytheon Technologies will continue to research advanced radio frequency mixed-mode circuit designs, under Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) Technologies for Mixed-mode Ultra Scaled Integrated Circuits (T-MUSIC) program, the company reported on Tuesday.

“Radio frequency bands are increasingly cluttered, and we need to be able to ‘hear’ through all of the noise,” said Art Morrish, vice president of Advanced Concepts and Technologies at Raytheon Intelligence and Space, a Raytheon Technologies company. “If someone is yelling at you, it’s easy to miss what someone else is whispering. But imagine if you had a way to hear both at the same time. That’s what our multi-function system with mixed-mode electronics seeks to achieve.”

Raytheon Technologies has noted that the systems operate similarly to humans, where the front end of the system is comparable to eyes and ears, and the back end is like the brain. The brain will process what the eyes see and ears hear. In order for the back end to provide actionable information, the front end has to discriminate between the noise and the signals of interest.

The company has stated that the demand for multi-function systems with mixed-mode electronics at the front-end of the system will convert the RF signal into bits. The bits will integrate vital pieces of data that the back-end processes. The conversion will improve the user’s ability to distinguish between the noise, interference and signals of interest across a broad range of frequencies.

Raytheon Technologies has described the overall benefit of its continued research. The company has stated that the technology will not just be small in size, weight and power, but it will enhance it’s the performance.

The solution will be able to detect the faintest of signals amongst a broad range of frequencies and noise. It will then process the noise with precision and speed, enabling the identification of the object emitting the signal, even if it’s slow-moving or very small.

The potential designs will be collectively researched by Raytheon, commercial, aerospace and defense companies and universities. The designs could form the foundation out of future Department of Defense-relevant capabilities, including communication links, multi-function RF systems and next-generation electronic warfare and radars.

“What’s different here is all of this could happen on a single chip,” said Morrish. “Nobody has done this type of mixed composition before.”

About Raytheon Intelligence & Space

Raytheon Intelligence & Space delivers the disruptive technologies our customers need to succeed in any domain, against any challenge. A developer of advanced sensors, training, and cyber and software solutions, Raytheon Intelligence & Space provides a decisive advantage to civil, military and commercial customers in more than 40 countries around the world.

Headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, the business generated $15 billion in pro forma annual revenue in 2019 and has 39,000 employees worldwide. Raytheon Intelligence & Space is one of four businesses that form Raytheon Technologies Corporation.

BlackBerry Limited has announced that BlackBerry Radar will expand its distribution reach with more than 12 new channel partners having signed on in the past six months to grow the company’s monitoring solutions, the company reported on Tuesday.

“We continue to open up new business and sales channels for BlackBerry Radar that were previously untapped and we are confident that each will serve as growth engines for our business, fueled by demand for asset-monitoring technologies that provide transportation business owners with the most aggregate view of their operations,” said Christopher Plaat, SVP and GM, BlackBerry Radar.

With the expansion, BlackBerry will have significant growth opportunities for its Radar offering and the company’s intelligent, data-driven asset monitoring devices, BlackBerry will improve business automate operations and improve utilization of trailers, containers and chassis.

Of the partners, AttriX, A provider of telematic solutions for the transportation industry, will join BlackBerry. AttriX has integrated its offerings to provide fleet owners visibility to all the company’s assets. With its partnership with BlackBerry Radar, AttriX customers can manage their trucks, driver performance and now their trailers within this partnered all-in-one fleet and asset management solution.

Big Wheel Strategies, another announced partner, has worked with carriers from 50 trucks to mega-fleets. The company has helped carriers implement solutions to better utilize information to improve utilization, fuel economy, risk, compliance, and turnover. The addition of BlackBerry Radar to its toolkit now allows Big Wheel Strategies to offer tethered and untethered tracking.

Gray Box Solutions, a company that has specialized in data and system integrations with a focus on telematics, has integrated BlackBerry Radar data into Transportation Management Systems (TMS), with a view to providing clients with full visibility of their assets.

Additionally, Inroute México has partnered with BlackBerry Radar to now provide customers with trailer tracking capabilities, enabling fleet owners to have previously unavailable visibility into their operations and allowing them to better optimize their assets and improve utilization.

Sitrack, based in Mexico, will be BlackBerry Radar’s first ever international distributor. The company will now offer customers in the Mexican market the ability to track and monitor assets, giving customers comprehensive transparency into their vehicles, trailers and freight.

Targipsum, in partnership with BlackBerry, will offer end-to-end tracking solutions for customers looking to optimize fleet performance, and the Owl Solutions will work with BlackBerry Radar to give its customers access to trailer and asset data to complement its existing solution.

BlackBerry Radar will serve as an asset monitoring solution that provides information, including location, motion, mileage, temperature, humidity, door open/close status, and cargo status on an intuitive on-line dashboard.

The solution will collect data than conventional GPS-based track and trace solutions and uses this information to build a 360-degree visualization of a customer’s assets. All data will be transmitted and stored securely on a cloud platform, which will maintain the privacy of user information at all times.

About BlackBerry

BlackBerry (NYSE: BB; TSX: BB) provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments around the world. The company secures more than 500M endpoints including 150M cars on the road today.

Based in Waterloo, Ontario, the company leverages AI and machine learning to deliver innovative solutions in the areas of cybersecurity, safety and data privacy solutions, and is a leader in the areas of endpoint security management, encryption, and embedded systems.  BlackBerry’s vision is clear – to secure a connected future you can trust.