Sources Archives - Step Water Rentals

FedEx Eyes Freighter Order as E-Commerce Soars -Sources | Technology News

By Eric M. Johnson and Tim Hepher

SEATTLE/PARIS (Reuters) – FedEx Corp is in talks with Boeing and Airbus to obtain subsequent-generation freighters as e-commerce soars, but the shipping large has postponed a shopping for choice amid ongoing labor talks with pilots, business resources mentioned.

The world’s biggest cargo airline is the latest flashpoint for level of competition after Boeing past 7 days launched a freighter version of its 777X to compete with a new Airbus A350 freighter.

Air cargo desire has been stoked by on line browsing, supply chain disruptions and a drop in passenger flights – which typically also carry cargo in their holds.

“Cargo is the only component of the jetliner current market that has absolutely recovered, and is however expanding,” AeroDynamic Advisory analyst Richard Aboulafia explained. “Presented a extremely depressed twin aisle sector, cargo widebody orders are the only ray of hope.”

At just one point FedEx had emerged as a possible launch customer for the 777X, joining Qatar Airways at a White Household signing ceremony, but a decision is not now predicted right before the summer season.

FedEx is locked in talks above fork out and retirement with pilots who argue they assisted provide document profits and manage the economy all through the pandemic – discussions that could be strained by an immediate big-ticket expenditure, two of the people claimed.

“Aircraft acquisitions are strategic company conclusions and we have deferred any new commitments as we examine and prioritize opportunity money investments,” a FedEx spokesperson claimed.

The Air Line Pilots Affiliation, which represents FedEx crew, reported it desires an agreement that recognizes their role. “Substantial bargaining clearly continues to be,” a spokesperson said.

Memphis, Tennessee-dependent FedEx is a largely Boeing customer, with 83{4224f0a76978c4d6828175c7edfc499fc862aa95a2f708cd5006c57745b2aaca} of its trunk fleet utilizing models this kind of as the 777, 767 and 757, and legacy McDonnell Douglas tri-jets, nevertheless it also operates 67 Airbus A300-600s.

Barring surprises, Boeing is witnessed as front-runner to acquire a 777X deal from FedEx though any hold off leaves Airbus an opening to fight for the organization.

Airbus was at the center of an unusual twist very last thirty day period when the Federal Aviation Administration unveiled a proposal to set laser missile defenses on the more compact Airbus A321, a plane that FedEx does not function, only to withdraw its assessment days later.

Investigate into defenses for freighters operating in areas of the entire world going through threats from portable anti-plane programs is not new. But the surprise disclosure, explained by a single resource as inadvertent, joined FedEx to Airbus for the first time in many years.

Airbus and Boeing declined to comment.

For planemakers, the stakes involved in winning freighter orders are specially significant as they try to shore up creation of sister types hit by a prolonged-haul travel slump.

To earn Qatar Airways’ start get for 34 777X freighters, Boeing agreed to change a third of its existing purchase for 60 777X passenger planes to freighters.

Though that limits the amount of net new 777X-relatives orders to just 14, analysts mentioned it offers Boeing better certainty that the fundamental jets will be created and could set the tone for other freighter negotiations.

Airbus has also had to sacrifice passenger jet orders to acquire promotions for its new A350F freighter, in accordance to month-to-month facts.

Boeing’s quickly-to-be-discontinued 747-8, as very well as the 777F and 767F, are not able to be generated following 2027 thanks to emissions regulations.

The freight boom is not devoid of dangers.

People include a fast restoration in passenger flights that would carry the belly space of under-used passenger jets again into service, as very well as unresolved U.S.-China trade tensions.

“Is this demand from customers sustainable, particularly when the international offer chain returns to standard?” Vertical Investigate Partners analyst Rob Stallard stated. “And what takes place to all those aged passenger widebodies that are parked up? It is a large amount less costly to change an previous passenger widebody than to obtain a new plane.”

(Reporting by Eric M. Johnson in Seattle and Tim Hepher in Paris)

Exclusive-Malaysia Telcos Call for Second 5G Provider, Sources Say | Technology News

By Rozanna Latiff and Liz Lee

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Malaysia’s major wireless carriers have recommended the government allow a second 5G service to be set up, according to three sources and documents seen by Reuters, ahead of a cabinet decision on whether to go ahead with a plan for a single wholesale network.

The cabinet will decide by January whether to allow multiple 5G providers, following concern from industry players that a single state-run network could hamper competition, Communications and Multimedia Minister Annuar Musa said last week.

Reuters in November reported an impasse between mobile operators and Digital Nasional Berhad (DNB), the state agency tasked with deploying 5G, over pricing and transparency issues.

DNB plans to launch an initial 5G rollout in three central areas on Wednesday.

Representatives from the country’s six mobile operators met with ministry officials on Monday to propose solutions to the deadlock and their ideas for deploying 5G, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The people, including two telecoms company officials, requested anonymity as the discussions were private.

Four operators – Axiata Group’s Celcom, DiGi.com, Maxis and U Mobile – recommended the government allow two wholesale 5G networks, each to be built and operated by a consortium of carriers, the sources said.

In a presentation seen by Reuters, the operators proposed the consortia commence the two networks in parallel next year and separate them from 2023, “giving Malaysia fast initial deployment and then the security of dual competing networks going forward”.

The two organisations will make use of existing telco assets to “coordinate rollout and collaborate in the first 12-18 months to achieve faster rollout of 5G across Malaysia than any one party”, the slides showed.

The carriers would also be open to proposals that would allow them to own equity in DNB, and asked for greater inclusion in the government’s rollout plans, the sources said.

“We hope there will be continued consultation on the matter, given the deep implications for the country’s digital economy ambitions,” one of the sources said.

Another carrier, YTL Communications, objected to the plan and expressed support for a single 5G network, while Telekom Malaysia said it would back any decision made by the government, the sources said.

DiGi.com, U Mobile, and YTL declined to comment. The communications ministry, Axiata, Maxis, and Telekom Malaysia did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.

DNB said it was not privy to the discussions held.

“We will respect the process adopted by the government and will make our representations at the appropriate forum,” DNB CEO Ralph Marshall said in an email to Reuters.

The government in February scrapped a plan to apportion spectrum to carriers, opting instead for a single shared network in a bid to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and accelerate infrastructure buildup.

Carriers are worried the plan would result in a nationalised monopoly more costly than deploying 5G on their own, though DNB has said it will charge operators less to access its 5G network than the cost they incurred for 4G.

DNB has also offered free 5G services to carriers until March 31 as it seeks to finalise long-term wholesale agreements with operators.

Telekom Malaysia this month became the first operator to sign up for 5G trials with DNB, but did not say if it had signed a long-term deal.

(Reporting by Rozanna Latiff and Liz Lee; editing by Jason Neely)

U.S. State Department Phones Hacked With Israeli Company Spyware – Sources | Technology News

By Christopher Bing and Joseph Menn

WASHINGTON/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Apple Inc iPhones of at least nine U.S. State Department employees were hacked by an unknown assailant using sophisticated spyware developed by the Israel-based NSO Group, according to four people familiar with the matter.

The hacks, which took place in the last several months, hit U.S. officials either based in Uganda or focused on matters concerning the East African country, two of the sources said.

The intrusions, first reported here, represent the widest known hacks of U.S. officials through NSO technology. Previously, a list of numbers with potential targets including some American officials surfaced in reporting on NSO, but it was not clear whether intrusions were always tried or succeeded.

Reuters could not determine who launched the latest cyberattacks.

NSO Group said in a statement on Thursday that it did not have any indication their tools were used but canceled access for the relevant customers and would investigate based on the Reuters inquiry.

“If our investigation shall show these actions indeed happened with NSO’s tools, such customer will be terminated permanently and legal actions will take place,” said an NSO spokesperson, who added that NSO will also “cooperate with any relevant government authority and present the full information we will have.”

NSO has long said it only sells its products to government law enforcement and intelligence clients, helping them to monitor security threats, and is not directly involved in surveillance operations.

Officials at the Uganda embassy in Washington did not comment. A spokesperson for Apple declined to comment.

A State Department spokesperson declined to comment on the intrusions, instead pointing to the Commerce Department’s recent decision to place the Israeli company on an entity list, making it harder for U.S. companies to do business with them.

NSO Group and another spyware firm were “added to the Entity List based on a determination that they developed and supplied spyware to foreign governments that used this tool to maliciously target government officials, journalists, businesspeople, activists, academics, and embassy workers,” the Commerce Department said in an announcement last month.

NSO software is capable of not only capturing encrypted messages, photos and other sensitive information from infected phones, but also turning them into recording devices to monitor surroundings, based on product manuals reviewed by Reuters.

Apple’s alert to affected users did not name the creator of the spyware used in this hack.

The victims notified by Apple included American citizens and were easily identifiable as U.S. government employees because they associated email addresses ending in state.gov with their Apple IDs, two of the people said.

They and other targets notified by Apple in multiple countries were infected through the same graphics processing vulnerability that Apple did not learn about and fix until September, the sources said.

Since at least February, this software flaw allowed some NSO customers to take control of iPhones simply by sending invisible yet tainted iMessage requests to the device, researchers who investigated the espionage campaign said.

The victims would not see or need to interact with a prompt for the hack to be successful. Versions of NSO surveillance software, commonly known as Pegasus, could then be installed.

Apple’s announcement that it would notify victims came on the same day it sued NSO Group last week, accusing it of helping numerous customers break into Apple’s mobile software, iOS.

In a public response, NSO has said its technology helps stop terrorism and that they’ve installed controls to curb spying against innocent targets.

For example, NSO says its intrusion system cannot work on phones with U.S. numbers beginning with the country code +1.

But in the Uganda case, the targeted State Department employees were using iPhones registered with foreign telephone numbers, said two of the sources, without the U.S. country code.

Uganda has been roiled this year by an election with reported irregularities, protests and a government crackdown. U.S. officials have tried to meet with opposition leaders, drawing ire from the Ugandan government. Reuters has no evidence the hacks were related to current events in Uganda.

A senior Biden administration official, speaking on condition he not be identified, said the threat to U.S. personnel abroad was one of the reasons the administration was cracking down on companies such as NSO and pursuing new global discussion about spying limits.

The official added that the government has seen “systemic abuse” in multiple countries involving NSO’s Pegasus spyware.

Sen. Ron Wyden, who is on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said: “Companies that enable their customers to hack U.S. government employees are a threat to America’s national security and should be treated as such.”

Historically, some of NSO Group’s best-known past clients included Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Mexico.

The Israeli Ministry of Defense must approve export licenses for NSO, which has close ties to Israel’s defense and intelligence communities, to sell its technology internationally.

In a statement, the Israeli embassy in Washington said that targeting American officials would be a serious breach of its rules.

“Cyber products like the one mentioned are supervised and licensed to be exported to governments only for purposes related to counter-terrorism and severe crimes,” an embassy spokesperson said. “The licensing provisions are very clear and if these claims are true, it is a severe violation of these provisions.”

(Reporting by Christopher Bing and Joseph Menn; editing by Chris Sanders and Edward Tobin)