The statewide ban on texting while driving wasn’t enough for one New Jersey town, according to The Huffington Post. After 74 crashes involving pedestrians in 2011, three of which were fatal, Fort Lee, New Jersey passed a new law earlier this year that fines walkers $85 who do not stop prior to texting. “It’s a big distraction,” Fort Lee Police Chief Thomas Ripoli said. “Pedestrians aren’t watching where they are going and they are not aware.” Since the law has been in place, Fort Lee police have issued more than 117 tickets. New York State Senator Carl Kruger has attempted to bring a similar ban to New York, which would also prohibit talking on the phone or using iPods while walking or running, however Kruger has been unsuccessful thus far.

UPDATE: According to MSNBC, there is no ban on texting while walking in Fort Lee, although there is a $54 jaywalking ticket, of which more than 117 tickets have been issued.

Read [Huffington Post] Read [MSNBC]

Courts in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Delaware have granted Verizon Communications injunctions against striking union workers who are picketing outside of its corporate offices and retail locations. Specifically, the injunctions are against members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. Last week, Verizon filed lawsuits against the Communications Workers of America in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Massachusetts and accused the union workers of sabotage and harassment. 45,000 Verizon Communications employees, about 25% of the company’s workforce, went on strike on August 7th after the company failed to reach an agreement with labor unions over health benefit premiums. Managers are currently filling in for the strikers until a deal is reached, although at this point it appears negotiations could take a while.

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An Arkansas man has been indicted for carrying out a cyberattack on AT&T servers that resulted in the theft of personal data from more than 100,000 iPad users. Andrew Auernheimer has been charged by a New Jersey grand jury with one count of conspiracy to gain unauthorized access to computers and one count of identity theft, Reuters reports. Auernheimer’s codefendant Daniel Spitler entered a guilty plea after being charged with the same crimes late last month. Court documents recount several conversations Auernheimer allegedly had surrounding the AT&T breach, and the evidence appears to be damning. “If we get 1 reporters address with this somehow we instantly have a story,” he wrote to Spitler on June 6, 2010, according to the indictment. “HI I STOLE YOUR EMAIL FROM AT&&T WANT TO KNOW HOW?” Auernheimer later continued, “The more email addresses we get … the more of a freakout we can cause.” Both Auernheimer and Spitler are said to be associated with “Goatse Security,” a hacker group reportedly focused on disrupting online content and services.

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Cablevision’s Optimum Wi-Fi service, free for subscribers, has been extremely popular in the New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut tri-state area, giving customers access to fast Wi-Fi from tens of thousands of locations. Today, Cablevision is announcing that the company has bumped up speeds at all Wi-Fi locations to 15Mbps down and 4Mbps up — the same speeds home subscribers get with entry-level Optimum Online service. Over 500,000 people use Optimum’s free Wi-Fi service, and this move makes Optimum’s Wi-Fi faster than any 3G or 4G network, barring Verizon Wireless’ 4G LTE network, which we’ve seen trump those numbers from time to time. Additionally, Cablevision previously partnered with Time Warner and Comcast to allow customers of all three providers to roam onto all three provider’s Wi-Fi networks, so this change affects Time Warner and Comcast subscribers as well which is great. The full press release is after the break, and the new download and upload speeds are already available across the tri-state area.

CABLEVISION HITS THE GAS PEDAL ON OPTIMUM WIFI – NOW DELIVERING UP TO 15 MBPS DOWNSTREAM AND 4 MBPS UPSTREAM OVER NATION’S LARGEST AND MOST ADVANCED WIFI NETWORK

Downstream Speed Of Optimum WiFi Now Matches Company’s Flagship Residential Service, And Far Exceeds 3G and 4G Cellular Networks

BETHPAGE, NY, June 14, 2011 – Cablevision Systems Corp. (NYSE: CVC) today announced that it had significantly increased the speed of its Optimum WiFi network, which spans tens of thousands of outdoor access points and thousands of indoor locations across the New York metropolitan area. Optimum WiFi, available to the company’s Optimum Online high-speed Internet customers at no additional charge, now delivers up to 15 megabits-per-second (Mbps) downstream and up to 4 Mbps upstream, matching the downstream speed of its flagship wired high-speed Internet service, and far exceeding the network’s previous speeds of up to 3 Mbps downstream and 1.5 Mbps upstream. Optimum WiFi is dramatically faster than cellular data over 3G and 4G networks, and more than three times as fast as the nation’s average residential wired broadband service.

“This is a huge enhancement for our customers and a significant step forward for mobile online access. With this increase, Optimum WiFi not only blows away 3G and 4G cellular data speeds, it’s three times faster than the average wired residential broadband service across the country,” said Kevin Curran, Cablevision’s senior vice president of wireless product management. “With awareness and usage continuing to increase, we think this is the perfect time to hit the gas pedal on Optimum WiFi and deliver unbeatable speed on the nation’s largest and most advanced WiFi network, by geographic coverage.”

“This new higher speed Optimum WiFi is like 4G on steroids,” commented Berge Ayvazian, Senior Analyst at Heavy Reading. “It offers a better mobile Internet experience to consumers

and mobile professionals virtually anywhere in Cablevision’s market who have become increasingly dependent on and enabled by wireless broadband to access their media content, multi-player gaming and business applications in the cloud.”

More than 500,000 Optimum Online high-speed Internet customers have already accessed the Internet when away from their home or small business connections over Optimum WiFi. The Optimum WiFi network spans tens of thousands of access points focused on high-traffic outdoor locations like downtown areas, commuter rail platforms and parking lots and parks. Additionally, in partnership with Optimum Business, Cablevision has activated WiFi access points inside more than 7,000 businesses that subscribe to the company’s high-speed Internet and phone services as a free value-added enhancement benefiting both the businesses and their customers.

Top outdoor usage areas for Optimum WiFi continue to be downtown areas and commuter rail station parking lots and train platforms. Cablevision has submitted formal proposals to both the MTA and NJ Transit, in response to Requests for Proposals, to extend Optimum WiFi access to commuter trains across the New York Metropolitan Area as well. Top indoor locations wired in partnership with Optimum Business are restaurants and health clubs. Cablevision has also expanded the reach of its own WiFi network by interconnecting with WiFi deployments by other cable providers Comcast and Time Warner Cable, so customers of all three companies can roam freely across these three distinct WiFi networks and enjoy a superior mobile data experience.

More information on Optimum WiFi, including detailed coverage maps, is available at http://www.optimumwifi.com.

We do wonder what it is like to be 26 years old and have a net worth of $6.9 billion. Seems like a pretty awesome problem to have. Forbes is reporting that Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is now ranked thirty-fifth on the Forbes 400 list; a list that details the richest Americans. One notable tech persona that Mr. Zuckerberg leapfrogged is Apple CEO Steve Jobs. Mr. Jobs is currently ranked forty-second on the list with an estimated net-worth of $6.1 billion. The young, social-networking tycoon isn’t just hoarding his cash though. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Facebook CEO is expected to announce a $100 million donation to the Newark Public School System. Currently the Newark, NJ system is the lowest performing system in the country; only half of its 40,000 students graduate high school. Nice work Mr. Zuckerburg, we’ll hit the proverbial “like” button for your charitable works.

Read [Forbes, WSJ]

Big news coming out of the NY/NJ/CT tri-state cable companies, and it’s downright exciting. Cablevision, Time Warner, and Comcast have all teamed up to announce a roaming agreement that will allow their subscribers to freely roam on any of the companies Wi-Fi networks. Think about that for a second… as long as you are a Cablevision, Time Warner, or Comcast customer, you can get free Wi-Fi access at practically limitless locations (thousands) all across the NY metro area from all three providers, and connect to any of their networks from your computer, iPad, iPhone, BlackBerry — whatever. According to the press release, authentication for this to happen is already in place starting today, so if you were just sticking to your own cable provider’s magic hotspot, fell free to mosey on over to one of the partner networks. Just try not to make Verizon too jealous, ok?

In a bid to compete with Verizon’s FIOS service, Comcast has just announced that it will begin the roll out of their DOCSIS 3.0 network starting with residential homes and businesses in parts of New England, including the Boston Metropolitan region and Southern New Hampshire. Also included in the roll out are areas of Philadelphia, New Jersey, and the Twin Cities where the wide-band service was launched earlier this year. Hey New Englanders, stop crying about the Bosox and go check your modem logs as it has reportedly gone live in some locations! Comcast has also introduced two new speed tiers for their high-speed service and doubled the speeds for current customers at no extra charge. The speeds and pricing of Comcast’s residential plans are now as follows:

• Extreme 50 : offering up to 50 Mbps of downstream speed and up to 10 Mbps of upstream speed at $139.95/month. (new)
• Ultra : offering up to 22 Mbps of downstream speed and up to 5 Mbps of upstream speed at $62.95/month. (new)
• Performance Plus : offering download speeds to up to 16 Mbps and up to 2 Mbps of upload speed at $52.95/month. (existing plan that was upgraded)
• Performance : offering download speeds to up to 12 Mbps and up to 2 Mbps of upload speed at $42.95/month. (existing plan that was upgraded)

Businesses will be eligible for similar wide-band plans (Deluxe 50/10 Mbps for $189.95/month and 22/5 Mbps for $99.95/month) and complimentary speed increases on existing plans as well. Comcast expects to expand the service to 10 major markets and nearly 10 million homes and businesses over the next several months. With faster speeds now available, we wonder what will happen to Comcast’s 250GB bandwidth cap and new network throttling plan. The press release says “With Extreme 50, Comcast customers, for example, will be able to download a high-def movie (6 GB) in about 16 minutes”. Hmm, one HD movie a day for month will use up about 180GB of the 250GB allotment. What about the online games, web browsing, you tube video watching, etc that also uses up some of the precious 250GB? Looks like there may be a lot more customers pushing that 250GB limit. Special honors will go to the first BGR reader to get an overlimit warning from Comcast. We’re rooting for you!

[via DSL Reports]

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