Your Tech Story

internet services

Can I Get Free Starlink Internet Service?

Can I Get Free Starlink Internet Service? 

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By

Starlink, an ambitious project by SpaceX, aims to revolutionize global internet connectivity by utilizing a satellite internet constellation. 

With its promise of high-speed internet in remote and underserved regions, it has captured the attention of many individuals eager to explore the possibility of accessing this service for free. However, a closer look at Starlink’s costs and business model reveals intriguing insights into the potential for complimentary access.

Can I Get Free Starlink Internet Service?

Image Source: ts2.space

To access Starlink’s internet service, users are required to make an initial investment in hardware comprising a satellite dish and a Wi-Fi router. These one-time hardware costs, along with a monthly subscription fee, form the financial backbone of the service. Despite the initial expense, the monthly fee is competitive, particularly considering the unparalleled connectivity it offers in areas where traditional broadband services fall short.

The Quest for Free Service: Reality Check

As of the most recent updates in 2023, SpaceX and Starlink have not introduced any standard programs for free individual internet service. The established business model necessitates customers purchasing the requisite equipment and subscribing to the service. While there might be occasional trials or discounts, a completely free service is not part of the current offering.

However, avenues exist for potential assistance. Some governmental or non-profit initiatives aim to aid low-income households or communities in accessing internet services, potentially including satellite internet from providers like Starlink. Programs such as the FCC’s Lifeline program in the United States offer subsidies for eligible consumers. These programs, though limited, present possibilities for reducing the financial burden of internet access.

Also Read: How to Download Videos from X (Formerly Twitter)?

While the quest for free Starlink internet service directly from the provider remains unfulfilled as of the latest information, avenues exist for potential assistance through government or non-profit programs. The costs associated with hardware and subscriptions remain, but initiatives like the FCC’s Lifeline program offer hope for mitigating these expenses, ensuring a broader spectrum of access to high-speed internet, especially in areas lacking traditional connectivity.

As Starlink continues to expand and evolve, monitoring official sources for updates and exploring available assistance programs can be crucial for those seeking affordable internet access.

Verisign

Verisign – The American Company Famous For Web Domain Name Registry.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By

Verisign is a famous American company known for
its authoritative domain registry business. While surfing the internet, we
visit several web pages every day. If we notice the URL of these web pages, we
can find .com, .net, etc at the end of the addresses. These are known as domain
names and when an individual or a company wants to launch a website online, it
needs to be registered under a certain domain name. Verisign is responsible
domain name registry for two of the most extensively used domains, namely, .com
and .net. It is the main business of the company apart from which it offers a
variety of security services. 

About Verisign

James Bidzos established Verisign Inc in April
1995. The company’s headquarters is based in Reston, Virginia, US. It is responsible
for operating a diverse array of network infrastructure with two top-level
domains in the internet root nameservers. It is also responsible for
country-code top-level domains like .cc and .tv and also back-end systems for
top-level domains like .gov and .edu. This is the core business unit of
Verisign and apart from that it offers distributed denial-of-service (DDoS),
security services for cyber threats, etc. 

Verisign also had an authentication business
unit that was sold to Symantec in 2010. The deal was closed at $1.28 billion
and it included Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate, Verisign Trust Seal,
public key infrastructure, and Verisign Identity Protection Services. The
ownership again changed in 2017 when Symantec sold it to DigiCert. Verisign
also let go of its Security Service Customer Contracts to NeuStar Inc in
2018. 

Verisign
Image source: wikimedia.org

History Of The Company

Verisign was originally a part of the RSA Security certification services business unit. The parent company is an American-based business that specializes in network security using encryption. Verisign was formed as a spin-off in 1995 and this newly formed company received the RSA-held licenses for key cryptographic patents. These licenses were set to expire in 2000 and it was also a time-limited agreement. The new company that was formed operated as a certificate authority (CA) to ensure trust for the internet through digital authentication. 

From 1995 to 2010, Verisign operated on a large scale and in various sectors from military to retail applications. It had more than 3 million certificates that making it the largest CA in the world. But in 2010, it sold its authentication business unit to Symantec, and the same year the company announced that it would be moving from California to Northern Virginia. Verisign started acquiring different companies after a few years of the spin-off. In 2000, it acquired Network Solutions that was responsible for operating the domains .net, .com, and .org. The company operated these domains under an agreement with Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers and the United States Department of Commerce. 

Business Growth And Expansion

The acquisition of Network Solutions formed the
powerhouse of the core and the largest business unit of Verisign. After three
years, Verisign decided to divest the Network Solutions retail but at the same
time retained the business of domain registry. It was a very flourishing
business and since it became the center of Verisign the company put its maximum
focus on domain registry. By the end of 2010, the company reported annual
revenue of $681 million which was 10 percent more than that of 2009. Verisign,
over the years, has also faced many controversies regarding domain names,
especially from the US government. 

James Bidzos – Founder And CEO

James Bidzos is the founder and CEO of the
domain registry company, Verisign. Initially, he was not appointed the CEO of
the company. But, after the resignation of Mark McLaughlin in 2011, James
became the next CEO. He is also the Chairman of the Board of Directors at
Verisign. In 1986, James joined RSA and according to him, the company was a big
failure as there was no product and customers. It was under his leadership that
RSA developed an encryption toolkit and landed contracts with Motorola and
Novell. He also served as CEO of RSA before the spin-off in 1995. 

KT Corporation

KT Corporation – Story Of The Largest Telecommunication Company Of South Korea.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By

KT Corporation, being the first telecommunication company in South Korea has become a dominant entity in the country. The company grabbed the market when it had no competition and till now it is thriving with more than 23,000 employees. Joong-Soo Nam founded the company in 1981 in Seoul, South Korea. The largest shareholder of the company is the South Korean government’s National Pension Service which owns a 12.19 percent share of the company. Hyeon-Mo Koo is the current CEO of the KT Corporation.

About the Company

KT Corporation is the first and largest company in the telecommunication sector of South Korea, has multiple subsidiaries. The company also has a wide range of products which includes internet services, mobile telephony, credit card, digital television, etc. Though KT Corp offers several products, it mainly dominates the local landline and broadband internet market in South Korea. The company provides fixed-line services to around 90 percent of the total users of the country and 45 percent of the total internet users. In 1994, the company sold its wireless affiliate Korea Mobile Telecom but was again back in the wireless market in 1997 with the creation of personal communication service (PCS).

KT Corporation
Image source: www.koreatechtoday.com

History of the Company

Back in 1981, KT Corporation was founded as a public utility and it has made an immense contribution towards making the country a major IT hub. The foundation of the company changed the entire telecommunication scenario for South Korea. KT Corporation started growing so rapidly that after three years it became the tenth company in the world to develop an electric switch TDX-1. In 1987, the company successfully installed an automated nationwide long-distance network. The same year, the company also started a public video conferencing service, established a software and line technology research center, opened a new business division, and embarked on a joint partnership with AT&T.

In the upcoming years, the company rolled out a bunch of new services like telecommuting pilot service and international call coupon service. By 1993, the company installed nearly 20 million telephone lines which were big proof that South Korea was having a change of scenery and becoming a part of the IT society. The company launched two satellites in two consecutive years and also completed the construction of the 4th Boeun satellite earth station. From 1997, the company started acquiring many businesses including PCS and CT-2 business licenses, and founded KT Freetel.

In 1997, KT became a government-invested institution and started two new services. In 1998, KT was listed on the stock exchange and it also commercialized the telephone voting service. Next year, the company also got listed in the foreign stock exchange and it was the first company in Korea to announce that the Y2K problem was solved. At the beginning of the 21st century, there were several discussions and plans for the privatization of KT Corporation.

Privatization of KT Corporation

The privatization plans of the company were announced in May 2001 and the company also celebrated its 20th anniversary. The same year, the company changed its name from Korea Telecom to KT. In 2002, the privatization of the company was finalized. By 2005, KT had a total of 12 subsidiaries, and its total assets summed up to $29.315 trillion. In late 2005, the company established an inter-Korean telecommunication service as it opened a branch office in North Korea for the first time. In 2009, a big merger took place between KT Corporation and its wireless subsidiary KTF. The newly merged entity became the first company in South Korea to launch the iPhone in the Korean market. KT apart from the inter-Korean business has also expanded to other nations like Bangladesh, Brunei, Mongolia, South Africa, Poland, Rwanda, the US, and Uzbekistan.

Hyeon-Mo Koo – CEO of KT Corporation

Hyeon-Mo Koo joined KT Corporation in 2009 as the Senior Vice President of the management strategy department. In the past eleven years, he switched from various positions in other departments and became the CEO of the company in 2020. He studied industrial engineering from Seoul National University and also holds a Ph.D. in management engineering.

Saudi Telecom Company

Saudi Telecom Company – Story of a Saudi Arabia-Based Telecommunication Company.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By

Established in 1998, Saudi Telecom Company offers several products and services in the telecommunication sector. The main products include telecommunication services, enterprise digital solutions, internet services, computer networks, cybersecurity, and other digital solutions. Saudi Telecom Company (STC) serves in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Kuwait. STC’s headquarters are based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The company currently has approximately 17,000 employees and is led by Olayan M. Alwetaid. Let’s know more about this company which once had a monopoly on mobile phones services and fixed telephone services.

Past Events of Saudi Telecom Company

When the company was born in 1998, the company had a monopoly on various businesses in the areas it served. But, eventually, other companies came up and the competition became tough in the telecommunication and digital sector. The company generates the majority portion of its revenue from the subscriber service. Out of the total subscribers of STC, 81 percent are mobile service subscribers. And, these subscribers contribute to 73 percent of the total company’s revenue. In the past two decades, India and the middle east countries have witnessed how rapidly mobile phone users have increased in these nations. STC grabbed this market initially and successfully generated revenue in billions.

By the end of 2007, the total subscribers for the services of STC summed up to 17.3 million. 19 percent of the total company’s subscribers were the fixed-line subscribers who contributed to generating 27 percent of the total annual revenue. This number accounted for 61 percent of the total mobile phone users in Saudi Arabia in 2007. With its business flourishing in Saudi Arabia, the company decided to expand beyond its borders.

The first taken by STC towards expanding internationally was the 25 percent acquisition of the Axis Group- Malaysia. The company is known for working in the telecommunication sector and it was worth $3.04 billion. It was a very strategic move by STC as the Axis Group operated many mobile phone networks in Malaysia and Indonesia. Along with the acquisition of the Axis Group partly, STC acquired 51 percent of the Ntarend Co Pte (a subsidiary of the Axis Group) and also grabbed 26 percent of the third mobile license in Kuwait. After these three details, the net worth of STC became $924.6 million.

Saudi Telecom Company
Image source: eyeofriyadh.com

Strategic Moves by STC

With the acquisition of a part of Axis Group and its subsidiary, the company also became a 35 percent shareholder at Oger Telecom in 2008. When STC acquired some stakes at Oger Telecom, it ran a huge network of businesses which also included investment. The company apart from Saudi Arabia also has business in the Persian Gulf, Africa, and Asia. So, becoming a stakeholder in this company helped STC to diversify geographically. After acquiring stakes in Oger Telecom, STC also partly bought many local and regional companies. This helped STC stay in the business after it lost the monopoly on two of its services in the primary areas. STC is also entering the field of satellite and internet via companies excelling in these fields in the Middle East. In March 2021, STC introduced its largest digital operations centers not only in its homeland but also in North Africa. This data center is established as a part of its cybersecurity business.

CEO – Olayan Alwetaid

Olayan Alwetaid has been appointed the CEO of STC in March 2021. Before becoming the CEO, he led the Consumer Business Unit of STC focusing on digital and other non-core services. Olayan also served as the CEO of STC Bahrain previously in his career. He has more than 20 years of rich experience in the telecom, media, and technology sector. Olayan graduated from King Fahad University of Petroleum and Minerals with an Electrical Engineering degree.