BT Business highlighted the impact of a drone system used by the British Transport Police (BTP) intended to cut disruption caused by trespassers and other issues on the country’s rail network, a deployment set to be expanded over the next two years.

The police division is using BT’s drone SIM system and connectivity from its EE unit in a project the operator stated is able to cut response times for various problems taking place across the UK’s rail network.

It asserted the deployment is the first national routine use of beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) drones by a police force in the UK.

The first routine operations using the drones took place earlier this year, with the BTP now operating seven so-called drone-in-a-box locations across the rail network. It plans to expand to 14 over the next two years.  

BT explained with 20,000 miles of railway track to cover, BTP faced challenges in responding quickly to trespass, welfare and operational disruption issues which often occur in remote areas.

It noted officers previously had to travel significant distances to assess situations, “delaying critical operational decisions”.

The drone system is intended to support real-time intelligence, faster decision making and safer responses.

Head of BTP’s drones programme Simon Bachelor said the technology is “transforming the way we respond to incidents across the rail network”.

“Real-time aerial intelligence enables our teams to assess situations faster, deploy resources more effectively and improve safety for both officers and the public.”

BT added “as drones become an increasingly important tool for transport, law enforcement and public safety organisations”, it is working with a range of entities “to turn emerging technology into real-world operational benefits, improving safety, efficiency and resilience”.

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Authorities in Norway opened investigations into Telenor Group over its former operation in Myanmar, charging the company on suspicion of violating sanctions and separately on claims of complicity in a crime against humanity.

In a joint statement, Norwegian law enforcement organisations PST and Kripos announced the opening of separate probes and outlined the associated charges.

PST is assessing potential violation of sanctions legislation related to Telenor’s divestment of its unit in Myanmar, which completed in 2022.

It accuses the company of including sanctioned surveillance equipment in the sale without permission of authorities.  

Kripos is looking into complicity with crimes against humanity, which relates to accusations the operator’s unit in Myanmar “repeatedly handed over historical traffic data on customers of the military regime” between the time of a coup in February 2021 and the sale of the business.

The authority stated this was at a time when “the regime was responsible for extensive abuses against parts of the civilian population”.  

In a stock market statement, Telenor revealed it is closely cooperating with investigators and pledged to “do everything in its power to assist in clarifying the case to the fullest extent possible”.

The operator noted no individuals had been charged or were under investigation.

Telenor added the probe “represents a further step in the extensive and ongoing dialogue” it “has maintained with the Norwegian prosecuting authorities over a long period, during which a substantial volume of documentation and information has been provided”.

As part of their investigations, the PST and Kripos are set to conduct a search of the company’s headquarters in Oslo today (15 September) and plan to cooperate on their probes.

Telenor reportedly previously argued it was required to hand over data to Myanmar’s miliary government, stating it was faced with “no good options”.

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Nokia trumpeted an agreement with the provider of a major internet exchange point (IXP) in Spain to deploy its product to defend against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

The provider running the IXP, ESpanix, is set to offer Nokia Deepfield Defender as an optional add-on for the 200 national and international networks exchanging traffic through its system.

Nokia noted the ESpanix Node is a “central crossroads of the Spanish internet” and stated halting attack traffic would mean businesses, public services and consumers in the country are protected.

The vendor noted DDoS attacks continued to grow in size, frequency and sophistication, “with massive botnets of compromised IoT devices and weaponised residential proxies driving hyper-volumetric and application-layer attacks against networks, services and end users”.

ESpanix CTO Javier Achirica added this type of cyberattack is a “primary threat to our connected networks”, adding using the Nokia product would “substantially reduce the impact of DDoS events” by isolating and removing unwanted traffic while allowing legitimate communications.

“Crucially, this protection is delivered entirely within our network and within Spain, across the six data centres in Madrid and Barcelona where we connect with our members,” he added. “This ensures that local traffic remains local, eliminating any need for detours through third-party scrubbing infrastructure and thereby guaranteeing strict data sovereignty”.

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