The Covid-19 lockdown has compelled us to modify our daily routines and habits.A combination of new work from home schedules, home-schooling, creative time, chore time and mental health check ins.In our household: Our son has his twice a week Taekwondo class via Zoom, with 50 other students; My wife
In September, Rain became the only mobile network in South Africa to bring 5G to the country with an initial roll-out to Johannesburg and Pretoria. CEO Willem Roos told Biznews in an interview,“You get speeds up to 700 megabits a second for R1000 a month”. Roos also said that once 5G was in your are
The saying goes that there’s no such thing as a free lunch, so when FNB recently launched a digital account that includes no monthly fees; former CEO Michael Jordaan, who is behind a new digital banking start-up Bank Zero, was quick to point out that it is not totally free. Free banking is a bit lik
Card fraud cost South Africans near R900m last year, according to the South African Banking Risk Information Centre, which also revealed that there had been an 18% increase in combined card fraud last year. The increase is a sign that criminals are very effective in getting their hands on bank custo
Not only is my mobile network provider, Cell C, the worst option in my home-town of Cape Town, but they have a maddeningly automated dial-out service promoting their services nationally. I can barely tolerate call-centres where a person with a prepared list of questions calls me cold at odd hours, k
As you well know by now I’m a bit of a laggard when it comes to personal technology.So the fact that I recently bought a relatively cheap fitness tracker shouldn’t surprise my regular reader.The reason behind my recent purchase… trying to learn how to measure, monitor and manage.As more steps are wa
EDINBURGH — The worst emailer I have encountered is a former boss, who managed via email. She would catch up with her directives at night, leaving a large mountain for me – and all her other direct reports – to address in the evening and first thing every morning. One day, it took me four hours to g
JOHANNESBURG — At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain this week, South African data-network upstart ‘Rain’ announced that it would be rolling out 5G networks in the country over the coming months. No doubt, this will spark a 5G arms race with other big local networks joining in. 5G, in a n
JOHANNESBURG — South Korean electronics giant Samsung has lifted the lid on its new range of version 10 smartphones with promises of 5G connectivity and improved features. In addition, there’s even a folding phone – signifying a trend by phone makers trying to innovate in a market where, for years,
JOHANNESBURG — Under CEO Sipho Maseko over the last six years, Telkom has transformed itself into a telecoms business that has shifted its view firmly to the future of data. A few years ago, the company embarked on a restructuring drive that also entailed trimming down its workforce. When Telkom spu
Now that all my devices are connected to Spotify, I am unsure how traditional radio can survive this innovative onslaught.According to the Diffusion of Innovation Theory (DOI) developed by E.M. Rogers in 1962, I would most likely sit on the wrong side of the bell curve when it comes to using new tec
JOHANNESBURG — The implosion of the cryptocurrency market has continued into 2019 with much downward pressure on the likes of the price of Bitcoin. In fact, it now costs more to mine Bitcoin than it does to buy it, marking a special inflexion point in the market. The only miners that are still in pl
JOHANNESBURG — On average, a broadband connection in South Africa cost about R50 less than last year, according to the latest Cable.co.uk research. Surprisingly, the research also highlights how broadband pricing in South Africa (ranked 93rd cheapest in the world) is now more low cost than that in t
The growth engines of Amazon and Alphabet sputtered last quarter, and after weeks of stock market jitters, investors were in no mood to give them a pass.JOHANNESBURG — These latest quarterly results from Amazon and Alphabet on the surface appear to paint a picture of a US tech slowdown. But as with
Nouriel Roubini, famous for predicting the most recent global financial crisis, has crossed swords with cryptocurrency guru and Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin.JOHANNESBURG — Economist Nouriel Roubini is famous for predicting the 2008/9 Global Financial Crisis (GFC). But this week he took aim at so
Even without well-stocked minibars and 500 thread count sheets, some hotel rooms are hard to leave, as Dominique Herman discovered on a weekend in the winelands.JOHANNESBURG — There’s no doubt in my mind that voice-controlled artificial intelligence technology will increasingly take root in our live
Breaches are not a new phenomenon, and you may be surprised to find out that while the data leaks mentioned above didn’t impact you, others possibly did.By Stuart LowmanA ‘breach’ is typically defined as an incident where data has been unintentionally exposed to the public, and with new data regulat
After Johann Rupert-linked Remgro's decision to buy part of fibre provider Vumatel, the owners of Vox Telecom may see an opportunity to jump on the fibre-sale bandwagon.JOHANNESBURG — Over the last few years, there’s been a fibre-broadband rush in South Africa’s major urban areas as consumers look t
JOHANNESBURG — It’s been a terrible few months for cybersecurity in South Africa as local companies lurch from one data breach to the next. Just this month, it emerged that local traffic fines website, ‘ViewFines.co.za’, had a data breach involving almost 1 million South Africans. (At the time of wr
JOHANNESBURG — In recent years, Facebook has been on an acquisition streak, snapping up just about every major multi-billion dollar valued internet startup it can get its hands on. These have included the likes of Instagram and WhatsApp, while not too long ago it was also in hot pursuit of Snap. The
JOHANNESBURG — While competition in digital offerings in the South African banking space has heated up in recent years, FNB is still managing to keep itself ahead of the pack. Just this week, the bank launched what looks like a groundbreaking innovation: you can now open a bank account with just the
Pansy Tlakula wrote a letter to Facebook demanding answers over the extent of South Africans impacted by the Cambridge Analytica data breach.JOHANNESBURG — Pansy Tlakula, the chairperson of South Africa’s newly established Information Regulator, has only been in the job since October last year, but
JOHANNESBURG — Watching US lawmakers try to pepper Facebook founder, CEO and chair Mark Zuckerberg with questions last week made for entertaining television viewing. The only problem was that Zuckerberg got away without answering much as most of the lawmakers asked silly and often clearly off-topic
JOHANNESBURG — To get an idea of the scale of Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal, one just needs to look at how many South Africans were exposed to the data breach. According to Facebook, only 33 users in South Africa downloaded the controversial quiz app, but it infected 59 777 South Africans.