Tokyo Has 20x As Much Wi-Fi As It Needs (theregister.com) 39
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Register: Tokyo has five million Wi-Fi access points -- and that's 20 times what the city needs, because they're reserved for private use, according to NTT. The Japanese tech giant proposes sharing the fleet to cope with increased demand for wireless comms without adding more hardware. NTT says it's successfully tested network sharing with a scheme that starts by asking operators of Wi-Fi access points or other connections if they're open to sharing their bandwidth and allowing random netizens to connect. In return they get a share of revenue from those connections.
Under the scheme, netizens search for available networks and, as they connect, a contract would be executed allowing a link to be made. That contract would use Ethereum Proof of Authority to verify identities and initiate the back-end billing arrangements before allowing signed-up users and devices to join private networks. The operator of the Wi-Fi access point gets paid, the punter gets a connection, and everything's on a blockchain so the results can be read for eternity. [...] If this all scales, NTT estimates Tokyo won't need to add any more Wi-Fi access points or private 5G cells, even as demand for connectivity increases. The company also suggests it can enable networks to scale without requiring commensurate increases in energy consumption, and that spectrum will also be freed for other uses.
Under the scheme, netizens search for available networks and, as they connect, a contract would be executed allowing a link to be made. That contract would use Ethereum Proof of Authority to verify identities and initiate the back-end billing arrangements before allowing signed-up users and devices to join private networks. The operator of the Wi-Fi access point gets paid, the punter gets a connection, and everything's on a blockchain so the results can be read for eternity. [...] If this all scales, NTT estimates Tokyo won't need to add any more Wi-Fi access points or private 5G cells, even as demand for connectivity increases. The company also suggests it can enable networks to scale without requiring commensurate increases in energy consumption, and that spectrum will also be freed for other uses.
sounds flashy but ... (Score:3)
... if there is surplus wifi access doesn't that mean that nobody needs that access? so why would anybody pay precious ethereum for it?
Re:sounds flashy but ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody wants any of this Web3 bullshit.
Keep in mind that who owns the fiber, and who owns the bandwidth in Japan are two separate companies, where it's always one company in the US.
The most likely scenario to come out of this is that one of the fiber providers who provides 20% of these pipes to these WiFi locations will counter-offer NTT and go "hey, if you operate this specific WiFi unit, we will credit your account/increase your pipe size for it" And the WiFi unit access is then sold to NTT or other carriers. People who use their bandwidth a lot will likely balk at this, but most others already have some form of unmetered bandwidth anyway.
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Under the scheme, netizens search for available networks and, as they connect, a contract would be executed allowing a link to be made. That contract would use Ethereum Proof of Authority to ...
As opposed to, say, anything simpler, faster, and more scalable than Ethereum Proof of Authority, which in practice is pretty much everything in existence. If they'd said they were using 802.11x or RADIUS or something similar then that's standard network engineering used to support the infrastructure they're describing, but what they're talking about is just wanking around with Blockchain. What's the bet this is purely a PoC/tech demonstrator designed to get PR attention?
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The issue is that everyone has their own private wifi network. There is a huge amount of overlap between networks, because people can't share them.
NTT is proposing a scheme that lets people share their wifi networks. In theory it could improve coverage and reduce congestion, especially in the 2.4GHz band. Japanese internet connections are mostly fibre, and ADSL is almost dead with complete phase out due to happen soon. So the bandwidth is there, with the basic connection being 10Gbps, i.e. about 10x faster
maybe if i ask nicely (Score:1)
Re:maybe if i ask nicely (Score:4, Funny)
Don't be silly, you can't email wifi.
You've got to FAX those bits!
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Just go with carrier pigeons. Much more environmentally friendly, or so I’m told.
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Just go with carrier pigeons. Much more environmentally friendly, or so I’m told.
But they tend to scatter their random ideas everywhere...
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Most interesting branch of the discussion and included the only trace of Funny, too.
My main curiosity is why NHK has not mentioned this project. Usually they give a lot of coverage (and free publicity) to NTT, but I haven't heard anything about this idea.
Might be because of the crypto contagion. I thought it was an interesting idea until the summary got to that part of it. I agree that there needs to be an economic model to make it work, but a REAL economic model, not more shadows of Kai-Fu Lee's techno-uti
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FAX, no, you put it on 3.5" diskettes and mail the diskettes to everyone once a week for years on end.
Only in Japanese bureaucracy do you use 3.5 inch diskettes.
Great Idea (Score:1)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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Most of the access points are provided by NTT or other fibre internet providers. They occasionally do firmware updates for various reasons, mostly security but also to fix bugs. There was one recently where certain routers were configured to use a Japanese university's NTP server, which was being shut down.
NTT also replaces routers periodically as it updates its network, or adds new features. That happened with the upgrade to 10Gbps, and the addition of 8k TV streaming.
They could also charge users for a new
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I doubt that the Ethereum blockchain network actually has the capacity to do any useful work.
It totally choked under load while NFTs were popular, to the point where most new NFT launches happen on Solana now.
First section seemed fine, then... (Score:4, Insightful)
I saw the phrase "share of the revenue". Uh, what? What revenue?
Then they mentioned "Etherium", and I realized this is just another flailing attempt by latecomers to the Ponzi scheme known as crypto to get somebody, ANYBODY, interested again so that maybe, someday, they could become relevant and eventually cash in the way the early adopters did.
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The revenue from offering the service to access those wifi networks. Japan has had several such schemes for a couple of decades now, where you pay a monthly fee and can access various commercial WiFi networks that appear in places like trains stations and shopping centres. They have been getting less popular lately, since data caps for cellular contracts are going up. Cellular is available almost everywhere, where as those WiFi networks are fairly sparse.
NTT's plan to use existing broadband routers to creat
And when someone does something illegal? (Score:4, Insightful)
Will the feds come knocking on YOUR door when someone randomly uses your network connection to do something bad? This seems I’ll advised.
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Illegal activities are not allowed in Tokyo.
I know what you're getting at and yes, Tokyo is free of the kind of urban crime that occurs so much in the US and elsewhere (I have lived there). But such activities as Internet child porn is the kind of offense that can occur in Tokyo. An any scheme to allow consumers to rent out excess WiFi capacity has to include a Section 230 equivalent that insulates the consumer from consequences for illegal usage of the encrypted, rented-out part of his bandwidth.
AND...why would there be any need to use cryptocurrenc
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Will the feds come knocking on YOUR door when someone randomly uses your network connection to do something bad?
Tokyo is not a city in America.
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On the other hand, it's a great defence if you are doing something illegal to say "but my wifi is open so you can't prove it was me."
NTT could mitigate it by having the guest wifi use a VPN, which they do not log. That would make sense anyway, as it would protect the owner of the wifi from the potential for guest users to access their local network in any way, and protect guest users from having their traffic snooped by the owner.
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It doesn't seems to target residential Wi-Fi. And if it does, the most likely way it will work is that customers routers will have two separate networks with two external IP addresses: their home network and a captive portal managed by the Wi-Fi service provider, if someone does something bad with the public network, the police will knock on the service provider door, who is supposed to have collected whatever data a public Wi-Fi provider is supposed to have collected.
People like private things. Just look at how many (Score:2)
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You could, but most of the negative impact of cars -- emissions, fuel consumption, accidents, maintenance, manufacture, disposal -- scale with the number of miles driven. Those impacts wouldn't be reduced by car sharing.
Where do my ugly monkey NFTs come in? (Score:2)
There must be a place for my monkeys because after Caroline screwed over SBF (metaphorically speaking), my monkey's value has dropped to an all time low.
I hope NTT does also add NFTs to their product so I can still make back my investment.
Allowing random people to connect to your network (Score:3)
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Nothing goes wrong. This isn't America. Most wealthy countries in the world are absolutely flooded with people offering free wifi to anyone who asks and in some cases even open access points. Nothing goes wrong. Your scary scenario is literally situational normal.
Solution looking for a problem? (Score:3)
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This is one of the few times where a blockchain actually makes sense.
With traditional public wifi networks, the user has to authenticate after connecting. Usually that means a login web page. It can be sped up with cookies or an app that silently accesses the web page, but it's not seamless. There will be drop-outs in the connection when roaming, while the new router authenticates. If the authentication server is down, nobody can connect.
A blockchain that every router constantly updates with subscriber info
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WiFi does not always solve lack of 5G (Score:4, Interesting)
There are five million access point in Tokyo ... (Score:2)
That's a fact
It's a thing we can't deny
Like the fact that I will love you till I die
Not compromising my network security. (Score:1)
Nope.
I know there are ways to tighten up public access security.
DO NOT CARE!
Even if it was 1010% secure, it's still someone freeloading on my connection.
NO.
Wait! What? (Score:2)
Tokyo has homeless people in RVs than want to freeload off residents WiFi?
This was proposed in Seattle some years back and that's what it boiled down to.
Godzilla (Score:2)
If you want to create a Godzilla and summon it, this is how you do it. Bombard Tokyo with 20X of its Wi-Fi needs and Godzilla will level the city, again, as he did in the 1950s but back then it was pachinko machine parlors and Raymond Burrr. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [slashdot.org]">Godzilla hates Raymond Burr. Wait, I hate Raymond Burr!
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