Pierre Dandjinou, ICANN VP of GSE in Africa, stresses a point during the media roundtable.

By Our Reporter

A media roundtable brought together leaders of regional and global Internet organizations to share perspectives on African representation in the Internet ecosystem, and participation in shaping the Internet’s future.

Led by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), and attended by the Internet Society’s Uganda Chapter, and AfRegistrar, the media roundtable took place during the Africa Internet Summit (AIS) at the Kampala Sheraton Hotel.

ICANN has been actively seeking to help raise awareness and build capacities around the domain name system, and the Internet in general across Africa. As part of this, it has been supporting and holding several workshops in the region.

“Africa’s digital potential is rising, which makes it imperative for the continent to claim its voice in the global Internet governance and protect its interests” stressed Pierre Dandjinou, ICANN VP of GSE in Africa. “With this in mind, ICANN is committed to providing equal opportunities to inform the region’s different communities about the domain name industry, and working with them on how best to not only strengthen Africa’s online presence, but also improve their participation within ICANN. Uganda is no exception.”

ICANN helps people connect to each other online. This happens through its coordination of parts of the Domain Name System (DNS), which is at the very root of the Internet functions. It translates computer host names into IP addresses, as well as the Internet Protocol addressing system used to route Internet traffic. Thus, ICANN plays a specific, technical role, acting in the global public interest as the trusted steward of these unique identifier systems of the Internet. With every email, video chat, or online purchase, ICANN is touched in one way or another. Also, ICANN helps protect the resiliency and security of the DNS and of Internet at large.

“We need to have this dialogue about the Internet now, and not later; as Africa is not outside the realms of the Internet. Every policy made about the future of the Internet concerns us, too. So, we need to join the decision-makers, and not stay as bystanders” said Lillian Nalwoga, the President of ISOC Uganda Chapter.

The Internet penetration in Africa is around 37%, still lagging behind with respect to the global penetration rate which is at 57%.  Internet access is among the many other obstacles Africa has to overcome with respect to its integration into the global digital economy, including the domain name business.

“AfRegistrar will work closely with African Regulators, African Union and Private Sector to enable the emergency of a vibrant Internet Environment for the African Economy, with a good and active Internet Governance, in an active and harmonized Broadband Policy and Regulation for African countries” reiterated Mouhamet Diop, Chair of AfRegistrar.

Upgraded TECNO SPARK 3 Series with AI Bright Camera launched.

By Staff Writer

It’s that time of the year when phone manufacturing companies come up with different handset models. TECNO Uganda has today officially launched its newest Series smartphones, the TECNO Spark and the Spark 3 Pro at Sheraton Hotel.

According to Tecno, the two new handset Models are said to be the latest of the Spark Series with improved Camera features among other awesome things. The Camera comes with Artificial intelligence technology (AI Tech) as opposed to their predecessors that is the Spark 2 and 2 Pro.

Both phones run a 9.0 pie Android operating system with a 6.2-inch display LCD capacitive touchscreen with a Trendy and classy appearance. The phones come with improved storage capacity and run 4G LTE.

Definitely the new Series tick the boxes its predecessors failed to.

Some of the Specifications of the spark 3 include:

• 6.2-inch capacitive display touch screen with an aspect ratio of 19:9
• Runs Android 9.0 pie operating system (pre-installed on the phone)
• 4G LTE
• Face ID
• 32GB internal storage
• Quad-core 2.5GHz Media Tek Helio A22 with up to 2GB RAM minimises lagging of applications and renders multi-tasking possible respectively.
• Finger print Sensor
• 3,500 mAh Li-ion battery
• 8MP selfie camera and 13MP + 2MP rear cameras with a LED flash for Bright and better Crisp pictures in poorly lit areas.

Other specifications include Bluetooth V5.0, 3.5mm earphone jack, Wi-Fi, sensors i.e. fingerprint sensor, proximity sensor, G-sensor and Ambient Light sensor, powerVR GE8320 GPU stationed on the phone chip provides quality graphics.

“The success of these latest series Spark 3 and 3 Pro respectively is deemed to surpass its predecessors” narrated the Tecno mobile Uganda Marketing Manager, Gladys Liu speaking at the launch at Sheraton Hotel.

These comments come in review with a positive shift in the sales performance of the Spark 2 and 2pro

The Tecno Spark 3 Series are available in 4 colors; Midnight Black, Bordeaux Red, Aqua blue and champagne Gold.

The smartphones are now up for sale in various smartphone online stores and shops with price tag of UGX429,000 and UGX 489,000 respectively effective of today Monday 6^th 2019.

By independent.co.uk

A new WhatsApp update seems set to stop people screenshotting their private conversations.

The new feature – which comes as part of a suite of security changes, in line with the app’s commitment to privacy – seems strangely integrated.

It doesn’t appear to block someone taking screengrabs of your chats, perhaps to avoid them being shared with other people, according to WABetaInfo, the blog that first reported on the changes. Instead, it means that you turn on the app’s highest security settings, you won’t be able to take grabs of your own.
The change comes as part of an authentication feature that has been long rumoured but is yet to appear within WhatsApp. That feature allows people to set fingerprint access to conversations, adding a further layer of security so that people can’t get access to your phone and read or send private messages.
However, enabling that fingerprint security feature also turns on the conversation screenshot blocking option, meaning that it isn’t possible to take pictures of your own chats.

It is not clear why the feature works that way, and WABetaInfo expressed confusion about the way it works.

“We do not know why WhatsApp decided to prevent screenshots when fingerprint is enabled, and personally I don’t know if users like the idea,” it wrote in the blog post announcing the discovery.

It is possible for apps to both notify people that things have been grabbed, as with Snapchat’s stories feature. Apps can also ban screenshots entirely – as with Netflix, which stops people from taking screengrabs of its videos – and it appears that is the option that is being enabled within WhatsApp.

The details on the new screenshot blocking come from a very early version of the app that is available to some users on Android. That serves as a testing ground for new features, some of which are changed or removed entirely before they make it out to the public.