Well, I’m fresh from our Members Forum! Once again, there was an informative update on all things IAA – organisational bits and pieces, IX and Member Portal improvements and road map information, a regulation update and an overview of our events for the rest of the year. A big thank you to the IAA Team and to our Chair Matt Enger for facilitating the session. The video is now live on our YouTube channel for those who missed it. It was lovely to hear the voices of those Members that made it, and I’m sure I’ll see a few more of you at our forthcoming social events.
Looking back, we’ve been able to participate in quite a few external events such as IETF 119, held in Australia for the first time in 25 years, allowing us to catch up with many of the Internet’s global technology pace-setters, as well as our own Members and the government representatives in attendance. I gave a fun talk on our WA-IX renumbering exercise, ironically highlighting the seriousness of IPv4 address scarcity. We also attended Apricot, NZNOG and the Associations Forum National Conference, so we’ve been flying the flag and promoting Member interests wherever and whenever we can.
Speaking of governments, various of our regulators have been heavily critical of industry self-regulation and we are quite vocal in their forums to discuss proposals for change. Our relationships with the various bureaucrats are very strong, so we are making real progress in some areas – check out the Advocacy Corner for more information, and please don’t hesitate to send us your views! Our material on the new Financial Hardship Standard has been highly commended by Members as especially useful and frankly more practical than what the regulator provides. Make sure you check it out, along with our other policies and templates, loaded into the portal.
It was a real milestone for us to launch TAS-IX recently, meaning we now have a presence in all states of Australia, although admittedly there is one pesky hard to reach mainland territory we’ve yet to get to! The Tasmanians appreciated the new service, and we hope to get more content down there soon. With government services on TAS-IX, there is the potential to really make a difference to local connectivity. If you’ve got a presence in Tasmania, get on board to see what benefit you can get. Remember it is FREE!
Our 400Gbps services are up and available also, with the NSW-IX core pushing packets happily at that bandwidth. Again new cache services make the capacity there fundamentally important. Our lovely portal continues to improve with new features and bug fixes happening all the time. Stay tuned for more updates!
I’m also really proud to say we successfully re-certified as a Great Place to Work, making it a certified pleasure to lead a wonderful bunch of capable people. It was also really satisfying to have all the team together to work on strategy at the staff retreat recently. Our team building exercise was focused on building artificial hands for people in developing countries – another way we make tech work for people.
Happy peering!
Narelle
Narelle Clark
IAA CEO
Yesterday we hosted our annual IAA Members Forum, aimed to provide all Members with an opportunity to hear our latest news, share their views and ask questions. This marks our second year of running this event.
Members attended via Zoom for what we hope was an informative and productive session. Thanks to all those who could make it.
The proceedings commenced with a presentation to IAA Members covering technical news, events updates, advocacy matters and the general state of affairs within IAA. If you missed it, or would like to revisit it, head to the IAA YouTube channel and you can also view the slide deck.
If you have a particular area of interest in the presentation, click on the link to the relevant chapter from the options below.
0:00 Introduction by IAA Chair Matthew Enger
2:00 CEO Narelle Clark on Survey Results
4:47 Organisation Update by Matthew Enger
9:14 IAA Tech Update by Nick Pratley
22:00 IAA Portal Update by Nick Pratley
25:54 Public Policy and Advocacy by Sophia Joo
33:43 IAA Events Update by Narelle Clark
The IAA Members Forum is just one of the ways Members can engage with us. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to email admin@internet.asn.au.
In February we were excited to launch our newest exchange: TAS-IX, featuring not one, but two points of presence in Hobart.
- TasmaNet DC3 data centre in Cranbourne, Hobart.
- 7HOB, an nbn™ POI address.
We’d like to remind you that Members can enjoy FREE 10G ports until February 2025.
To celebrate this important expansion of our network, we hosted a launch party at T42 Hobart. Thanks to all who were able to attend. It was a fabulous evening.
If you haven’t already, be sure to order your ports via the IAA Member Portal now.
As promised, as of March 2024, we’ve brought down the cost of our inter-capital Virtual Leased Lines (iVLL). We upgraded our inter-capital network to protected, burstable 100G links. This means we can now support higher speed iVLLs at a better price.
Check out our 4-tier pricing structure that’s fairer and more cost effective for our Members, with the rate set by your total Mbps. New prices start from 40c per Mbps between key states.
Order your iVLL services now, via the IAA Member Portal.
If you have any questions, please email peering@internet.asn.au and we’ll be happy to assist.
Just in case you haven’t heard, we have supersized our port offering on NSW-IX. At a whopping 400Gbps, for just $3,500/month, NSW-IX’s new ports are sure to give you the hit you’re looking for. Get your network buzzing with the new 400GBase-LR4 technology, spanning up to 10km with Duplex SMF.
Ready to experience the difference? Contact us at peering@internet.asn.au or order your new ports through the IAA Member Portal now.
Work continues on the IAA Member Portal. Since our last update you may have noticed a revamp of the Events area which is streamlining the registration and communication’s process for the Events team and also, we hope, making it a more attractive and user-friendly experience for Members as you register for events.
In a further effort to improve user experience, we have reworked the identification of networks in Looking Glass to mirror the names provided in PeeringDB, for consistency and ease of identifying peers.
Network automation continues to be another focus, with some refinements as we continue to monitor this rollout and turn our attention to billing automation.
We’re committed to continuous improvement of the Portal and look forward to bringing you even better functionality.
Online Event
This year’s Convergent Series got off to a strong start. Our online panel discussion, It’s an emergency! featured an expert panel of emergency management specialists who shared their experiences of the expectations versus reality of a major disaster. They provided invaluable insights into how to build resilience into the system to ensure emergency comms stay open when they’re needed most.
Our CEO Narelle Clark moderated and we’d like to thank our panellists:
Simon Allard – Head of Technology Architecture, 2degrees
Chloe Harpley – Project Manager, ANU Tech Policy Centre Resilience Project
Nick Jones – Founder of Omnitouch
Sophia Joo – IAA’s Policy Officer
In-person Event
We’ve also hosted two IAA Convergent In-person Socials, one in Melbourne in April and our Sydney event last night. Here are some pictures from the Melbourne event and if you follow us on social media you will be sure to catch some of the Sydney highlights soon. As always, IAA Convergent Social Events are a fantastic opportunity to catch up with our Members and friends to unwind after a hard day’s work.
We’re looking forward to visiting the other capitals to host more IAA Convergent Events soon, along with more great online content. Next up is Perth, Wednesday 15 May. We hope you can make it! Head to IAA Member Portal where you can view and register for all our IAA Events.
By RSVPing, you are agreeing to comply with IAA’s Code of Conduct – Events.
The IAASysters program is now in its fourth year and applications have just closed!
This year, IAASysters will take place 4-6 September in Sydney. Following our usual format of a one-day IAASysters workshop followed by two days attending AusNOG.
As we select the successful applicants, we’re also putting out the call for sponsors of this year’s (or next year’s!) program.
We’re delighted to welcome back APNIC, Aussie Broadband and Vocus as Gold Sponsors this year! We’re equally excited to have Identity Digital on board as Silver Sponsors.
The ongoing commitment to empowering women in the Internet industry by key stakeholders is truly appreciated. Together we’re making strides towards a more inclusive and diverse tech landscape.
It’s not too late to put up your hand to sponsor this year’s event. If you would like to sponsor this year’s event, you can learn more via the IAA website:
In February we journeyed to Bangkok for Asia Pacific’s largest international Internet Conference. IAA is proud to attend and support this significant event, as a Diversity and Inclusivity in Tech Sponsor. Our time there proved to be invaluable for gaining insight into the progress and challenges in our industry across the entire region.
Apricot hosted a wide array of talks and presentations from highly technical to highly topical. Our CEO, Narelle Clark, hosted a fascinating panel discussion on Promotion and Outreach. Kittinan Sriprasert (Nan) of BK-IX, Rhett Jones from GetaFIX and Frank Orlowski from DE-CIX shared their diverse perspectives on how to grow an IXP and engage with existing and potential members.
While their exchanges are operating at different scales, the key take-outs emphasised the tried and true methods of building high quality infrastructure, operating at scale (the larger your ecosystem, the better), locating where your customer base resides and being sure to engage with and listen to members.
Narelle also took part in an interesting discussion focusing on diversity in our industry and while it sparked a lively debate, there was a consensus that equal opportunity is a worthwhile pursuit.
A recurring theme of the conference was the thorny issue of industry regulations. It was notable that governments the world over are struggling to implement new rules that keep pace with the evolution of communications and the Internet. It seemed there is a wide diversity of approaches, but none seem to be adequately addressing the challenges. It reiterated the importance of our industry advocacy role as we continue to work with key stakeholders and decision-makers to help shape fair and functional legislative frameworks for our Members and the industry.
Hard on the heels of Apricot, it was off to Brisbane for the Internet Engineering Task Force meeting 119. We joined 1,000+ leading technologists who attended in-person and online. The focus was on ways to manage the Internet in such a way as to make the Internet work better for all.
This year IAA supported IETF 119 as a Co-Host Consortium sponsor. It was a great opportunity to share ideas and discuss new protocol standards and proposals for best practice.
It was also wonderful to meet up with IAA Members as we co-hosted the APNIC Tech Social Event at APNIC HQ and the IETF networking event at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre.
April saw the return of NZNOG, this time in Nelson where the Internet community summoned rain for the week. NZIX’s booth was setup with all the swag for our members, umbrellas that can survive wind, cage nut tools to save your fingers, tech bags for all your console cables and of course purple lollies!
We thank all the Members and Non-members alike who came up and had a chat with the NZIX Team!
IAA’s own Aaron Chidiac presented the NZIX Tech Update 2024, covering topics of growth over the years and upcoming projects, such as, a portal upgrade and NZIX running their own compute stack. Our CEO, Narelle Clark, gave a presentation on the IAASysters program, which by all accounts, is inspiring some to think more about how they too can support diversity in tech and maybe recruit some Systers of their own.
With the Financial Hardship Standard coming into effect 29 March, over the last couple of months, we have been busy working to assist Members to comply with the new Financial Hardship Standard. You can read more about the new Standard, and the material we have prepared for Members in this article.
We also had our first meeting with our IAA Public Policy Advisory Panel (PPAP) on 14 March. Fruitful discussion was had on the Telecommunications Customer Protections Code that is still currently underway, as well as unpacking the new requirements under the Financial Hardship Standard together. We are always looking for more Members to join the PPAP. If you are interested in contributing to our advocacy efforts, or want a way to be more in the loop with changing telecommunications policy, contact us to become a PPAP panelist or attend a PPAP meeting as a guest!
Our team was also present at the IETF, attending the parallel IETF-ISOC Policy Makers meeting to discuss Internet Governance issues, as well as other external meetings to discuss matters of interception, the Triple Zero failover working group, and changes to the Security of Critical Infrastructure legislation that will affect the telco sector.
As always, please get in touch to share any thoughts on any of the open and/or previous submissions as we really appreciate your feedback.
Completed Submissions:
Australian Cyber Security Strategy: Legislative Reforms | Department of Home Affairs
Upcoming Submissions:
The new Telecommunications (Financial Hardship) Industry Standard 2024 (Standard) came into effect on 29 March 2024. Applicable CSPs now face new obligations under the Standard to better protect customers experiencing financial hardship.
Some of the changes introduced under the Standard include:
- Expanded definition of ‘financial hardship’;
- Replacement of the ‘financial hardship policy’ with the ‘payment assistance policy’ with more prescriptive requirements as to the policy content;
- New obligation to take proactive action to identify financial hardship customers;
- Changes to the options for assistance that must be offered;
- Stricter training requirements for personnel that directly interact with customers; and
- Expansion of record keeping arrangements.
IAA has prepared this guidance material to help members understand their new obligations under the Standard, in detail. Members are also able to access free legal templates relating to the Standard via the IAA Member Portal.
As telecommunications becomes increasingly vital to everyday life, we understand the importance of having robust financial hardship protections for customers, especially given the rising cost of living experienced nationally. However, Members have shared concerns about the prompt manner in which the Standard was introduced. Indeed, in our submission to the draft Standard, IAA requested a longer grace period before the Standard came into effect, which was unfortunately not heeded.
Read our submission for further concerns about the Standard, and the need for a fit for purpose financial hardship legislation that will better serve both consumers and industry.
If you have any questions about the new Standard, or any of the materials, please contact us at policy@internet.asn.au.
Having formed in 2022, IAA’s Public Policy Advisory Panel is now entering its third year. The Panel is an advisory body of IAA Members that help inform IAA’s public policy and advocacy work related to the telecommunications sector.
We rely on the feedback and insights of the Panel to respond to the various consultations held by Government and regulatory on matters that affect our industry. The Panel have been immensely helpful for our advocacy work in the past and have a genuine impact in shaping government policy.
With many of our current Panels’ terms finishing at the end of this year, we encourage IAA Members to apply to join the Panel to contribute to our advocacy efforts. We meet quarterly to discuss live and upcoming policy matters affecting the Internet industry, and it is a fantastic way for Members to keep updated on changing telecommunications regulation!
We had our first meeting for 2024 in March where we discussed a number of pressing issues, including recently introduced Financial Hardship Standard, ongoing review of the TCP Code, as well as likely changes to the telecommunications security framework, all of which no doubt affect many IAA Members.
We welcome and strongly encourage applications and/or nominations to join the Panel. To join, you (or your employer) must be an IAA Member. You can find out more about the Panel on the IAA website.
If you are interested or know someone who would be a great addition to the Panel, please reach out at policy@internet.asn.au.
On 30 April, the Government released the both the Final Report into the Optus Outage Review (Report), as well as the Government Response. The Report recognised that no telecommunications network is wholly immune from network outages, but also emphasised that the systems in place are inadequate to deal with major disruptions to service, and indeed, that the events of 8 November 2023 signify the need for more robust and reliable systems.
As a result, the Report has made 18 recommendations, with the Government accepting all recommendations. Furthermore, in its response, the Government noted its expectation for many of the recommendations to be implemented in the next 12 months. A summary of the 18 recommendations, and the Terms of Reference for the Review can be found below.
This means the telco sector can expect new legislative instruments including a mixture of industry codes, and standards or determinations, as well as the expansion of the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman’s role to become the Triple Zero custodian, responsible for the oversight of the end-to-end Triple Zero system.
Although many of the recommendations relate to carriers, some will also result in changes to existing instruments such as the Complaints Handling Standard, or the codification of industry codes into standards, therefore potentially affecting carriage service providers.
It’s important that all legislative reform is fit-for-purpose and keeps in mind principles of proportionality and effectiveness in addressing the actual issue at hand. Especially given the short timeframe provided for by the Government to implement such large-scale reforms to Australia’s Triple Zero and broader telecommunications regulation and systems, industry definitely has its work cut out for them.
Summary of the recommendations:
TOR 1: Functioning of Triple Zero
- mandatory requirements to clearly establish requirements for network operators in regard to delivery of Triple Zero calls, including the obligation to wilt towers in the event of a core network outage;
- establishing a ‘Triple Zero custodian’ with the oversight for the end-to-end Triple Zero ecosystem;
- new testing requirements for carriers to ensure continuous access to Triple Zero;
- warning to customers who bring their own device that such devices may not have been tested to account for emergency scenarios;
- requirement for carriers to share real time network information detailing outages, including to the new custodian;
- consolidation and expansion of existing legislative instruments to cover all matters related to the Triple Zero ecosystem; and
- review of the Emergency Call Person (currently Telstra) arrangements.
TOR 2: Role of Government in managing and responding to a national service outage:
- improvement of the Protocol for Notification of Major Service Disruptions with detailed requirements for Government communication.
TOR 3: Customer Communications Requirements
- requirement for carriers to communicate specific information to customers during and about network outages (either by ACMA standard or determination); and
- Government to develop educative material to help the pubic prepare for and recover from network outages.
TOR 4: Complaints and Compensation
- amendment of Complaints Handling Standard and Record Keeping Rules to account for network outages and crisis events; and
- implementation of an industry wide standardised approach to resolutions for consumers affected by a large-scale outage.
TOR 5:
- consideration of temporary roaming for outages, not just during natural disasters;
- establishment of mutual assistance arrangements between telecommunications service providers to manage and resolve outages;
- establishment of arrangements to remotely access and activate network management tools;
- Government to review arrangements for maintaining their operations during outages including telecommunications redundancy for critical government services; and
- Review of all legislation and regulation relating to Triple Zero.
Read IAA’s submission to the Optus Outage Review.
Read the Final Report.
Read the Government Response
In March, the IAA team took a trip to Margaret River in Perth for our annual staff retreat. This retreat was not solely about working on the association’s strategy for the next year, but also about building on existing camaraderie and developing meaningful connections between staff.
From engaging in various team-building activities to enlightening conversations at dinner, every moment allowed us to harness our strengths and develop new bonds to serve Members better.
During the retreat, we had the opportunity to reflect individually and as a group on IAA’s services and professional development. The most memorable experience was the “Helping Hands” team-building activity. We built prosthetic hands to be donated to amputee landmine victims, which allowed us to work together and navigate challenges with respect, resilience, and responsibility.
As we returned to our duties, having enjoyed the charm of Margaret River, its exquisite wine and chocolate, we carried new experiences. Our priceless connections were strengthened, new ideas were aired, and our enthusiasm was reinvigorated for IAA’s collective goal of offering our Members excellent services and creating an efficient Internet exchange platform for all.
Corporate Members:
ORANGE BUSINESS SERVICES AUSTRALIA PTY LTD
Orange help businesses with their digital transformation by integrating their technologies – AI, IoT, Data, Cloud, Connectivity, Cybersecurity. Orange Business elected to join our IXs for Internet connectivity for its POPs in Australia. We welcome them to our network.
FIBOSS PTY LTD
Fiboss specialise in crafting Broadband and Energy networks that redefine efficiency and reliability across various sectors. As they move to provide Layer 2 services they require peering for transit efficiencies. We wish them happy peering!
ZONE NETWORKS PTY LTD
Offering networking and hosting services, Zone Networks allow customisation and flexibility to meet the specific business needs of their clients. They joined IAA with the intention of finding a suitable IX service. We are confident that they have found the right network.
P & L ENTERPRISES PTY LTD
As they start up an RSP in southern Tasmania to support our existing clients and local community, we are pleased to work with P&L Enterprises, as they continue to empower their clients to succeed in their digital transformation journey.
Professional Members:
Nihitha Sampath Sudarsan
Max Christiansen
Mikaela Purnell
Adrian Bourke
Mark Newton
Kai Tung Ng
Lachlan Nichols
Shane Marsh
David Ollis
Phyo Phyo Hein
Nathan O’Brien
Patrick Ko
Clinton White
Stephen Rumph
