An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: A new report released by Ookla placed the U.S. at the very top of a list of 40 countries in terms of 5G availability. To determine this, Ookla tested to see what percent of users with 5G devices spent the majority of their time actually on 5G during Q3. Under that criteria, the U.S. ranked number one with 49.2% availability. But hold on, don't whip out your red, white, and blue foam finger just yet, it's not all good news. The actual download and upload speeds (in other words, the whole point) of 5G networks still vary significantly by country according to the report. Though the U.S. ranked first in availability, its actual download speeds were amongst the worst of early 5G adopter nations. Ookla placed median 5G download speeds at 93.73 Mbps in the US, far lower than the UK's 184.2 Mbps median and far lower still than South Korea, which led the pack at 492.48 Mbps. The U.S. placed around the same relative position for upload speeds as well. And while U.S. wireless customers can take some solace knowing they're on the top of the availability list, the list itself is unimpressive as a whole, especially in relation to the types of coverage necessary for 5G's most ambitious promises.

Boeing Chief Executive Dave Calhoun and Airbus Americas CEO Jeffrey Knittel have urged the Biden administration to delay planned deployment of new 5G wireless services, saying it could harm aviation safety. From a report: The executives in a joint letter seen by Reuters asked U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to support postponing AT&T and Verizon's Jan. 5 deployment of C-Band spectrum 5G wireless. "5G interference could adversely affect the ability of aircraft to safely operate," the letter said, adding it could have "an enormous negative impact on the aviation industry." The industry and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have raised concerns about potential interference of 5G with sensitive aircraft electronics like radio altimeters.

Necklaces and accessories claiming to "protect" people from 5G mobile networks have been found to be radioactive. The BBC reports: The Dutch authority for nuclear safety and radiation protection (ANVS) issued a warning about ten products it found gave off harmful ionizing radiation. It urged people not to use the products, which could cause harm with long-term wear. [...] The products identified included an "Energy Armor" sleeping mask, bracelet and necklace. A bracelet for children, branded Magnetix Wellness, was also found to be emitting radiation.

"Don't wear it any more, put it away safely and wait for the return instructions," the ANVS said in a statement. "The sellers in the Netherlands known to the ANVS have been told that the sale is prohibited and must be stopped immediately, and that they must inform their customers about this." The ANVS has published a full list of the products it identified as radioactive on its website. Further reading: Worried About 5G's Health Effects? Don't Be

Major U.S. air carriers warned on Wednesday that plans by AT&T and Verizon to use spectrum for 5G wireless services could be highly disruptive to air travel and cost air passengers $1.6 billion annually in delays. Reuters reports: Trade group Airlines for America (A4A) said if a new Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) directive for addressing potential interference from wireless transmissions had been in effect in 2019 "approximately 345,000 passenger flights, 32 million passengers, and 5,400 cargo flights would have been impacted in the form of delayed flights, diversions, or cancellations." At a hearing Wednesday, senators urged airlines to work to find a resolution. United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said the 5G wireless issue "is the biggest and most damaging potential issue facing us. We want nothing more than to work to a solution." Southwest Airlines Chief Executive Gary Kelly said the FAA directive "would significantly impact our operations once it is deployed on Jan. 5." The wireless carriers are set to begin using the spectrum in just three weeks. Last week, the FAA issued new airworthiness directives warning interference from 5G wireless spectrum could result in flight diversions.

The aviation industry and FAA have raised significant concerns about potential interference of 5G with sensitive aircraft electronics like radio altimeters. In November, AT&T and Verizon agreed to delay the commercial launch of C-band wireless service until Jan. 5 after the FAA raised concerns. They also adopted precautionary measures for six months to limit interference. The FAA directives order revising airplane and helicopter flight manuals to prohibit some operations requiring radio altimeter data when in the presence of 5G C-Band wireless broadband signals. Aviation industry groups said they were insufficient to address air safety concerns. FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, who did not immediately comment on the airlines' analysis, has said she believes the issues can be resolved and spectrum safely used.

Karl Bode, reporting for TechDirt: Back in 2008, Verizon proclaimed that we didn't need additional consumer privacy protections (or opt in requirements, or net neutrality rules) because consumers would keep the company honest. "The extensive oversight provided by literally hundreds of thousands of sophisticated online users would help ensure effective enforcement of good practices and protect consumers," Verizon said at the time.

Six years later and Verizon found itself at the heart of a massive privacy scandal after it began covertly injecting unique user-tracking headers into wireless data packets. The technology allowed Verizon to track users all over the internet, and the company neither bothered to inform users it would happen, or gave users any way to opt out. It took security researchers two years before security researchers even realized what Verizon was doing. Verizon ultimately received a $1.35 million fine from the FCC (a tiny portion of what Verizon made off the program), but still uses the same tech (albeit with functioning opt-out) today.

A few years later and it's not clear Verizon has actually learned all that much. The company last week began expanding its data collection and monetization once again, this time via a new "Verizon Custom Experience" the company says will help it "personalize our communications with you, give you more relevant product and service recommendations, and develop plans, services and offers that are more appealing to you." In reality that means Verizon is expanding the collection of data on the websites you visit, the people you communicate with, and the apps you use.

Airliners, private planes and helicopters may have to limit landings in low-visibility conditions and follow other restrictions under a government directive to ensure safe operations once a new band of 5G mobile-phone service starts in January. From a report: The Federal Aviation Administration on Tuesday issued two orders laying out potential flight restrictions that could cause severe restrictions at major airports during bad weather.

"The FAA is working closely with the Federal Communications Commission and wireless companies, and has made progress toward safely implementing the 5G expansion," the FAA said in a statement. "We are confident with ongoing collaboration we will reach this shared goal." The agency said in a press release that it believes "the expansion of 5G and aviation will safely co-exist" and stopped short of specific restrictions. But the two airworthiness directives lay the groundwork for what could be severe limitations across the nation's aviation system if the regulator believes the signals -- from a part of the spectrum called the "C-Band" that the mobile carriers have procured to expand their service -- threaten safety.

Verizon might be collecting information about your browsing history, location, apps, and your contacts, all in the name of helping the company "understand your interests," first spotted by Input. The Verge reports: The program, which Verizon appears to automatically opt customers into, is called Verizon Custom Experience and its controls lay buried in the privacy settings on the My Verizon app. The program introduces two different options that appear in the app, Custom Experience and Custom Experience Plus, each of which varies in terms of invasiveness. Verizon provides additional information about both settings within the app, as well as on a FAQ page on its website. It appears that the Custom Experience option is a stripped-down version of Custom Experience Plus, and as Verizon states directly in the app, it helps Verizon "personalize" its "communication with you" and "give you more relevant product and service recommendations" by using "information about websites you visit and apps you use on your mobile device."

Meanwhile, Custom Experience Plus has the same stated purpose -- to help Verizon provide you with a more "personalized" experience. However, it not only uses information about the websites and apps you use on your mobile device, but it also says it uses your "device location," along with "phone numbers you call or that call you" to help Verizon "better understand your interests." This also includes your CPNI, which tracks the times and duration of your calls, and because Verizon is your wireless network provider, it can track your location even if you've turned off location services on your phone. As Verizon explains on its site, it might use your information to, say, present you with an offer that includes music content, or give you a music-related option in its Verizon Up reward program if it knows you like music. Verizon explicitly states that for the more invasive Customer Experience Plus tracking, you "must opt-in to participate and you can change your choice at any time." Signing up for those Up Rewards, or other promotions with consequences buried in the fine print may have opted customers in unknowingly. How to opt-out: "[...] open your My Verizon app, and then hit the gear icon in the top-right corner of the screen. Scroll down and select 'Manage privacy settings' beneath the 'Preferences' heading. On the next page, toggle off 'Custom Experience' and 'Custom Experience Plus.' To erase the information that Verizon has already collected about you through the program, tap 'Custom Experience Settings,' and hit 'Reset.'"

"Security researchers analyzed nine popular WiFi routers and found a total of 226 potential vulnerabilities in them," reports Bleeping Computer, "even when running the latest firmware." Slashdot reader joshuark shared their report: The tested routers are made by Asus, AVM, D-Link, Netgear, Edimax, TP-Link, Synology, and Linksys, and are used by millions of people... Researchers at IoT Inspector carried out the security tests in collaboration with CHIP magazine, focusing on models used mainly by small firms and home users. "For Chip's router evaluation, vendors provided them with current models, which were upgraded to the latest firmware version," Florian Lukavsky, CTO & Founder at IoT Inspector, told BleepingComputer via email. "The firmware versions were automatically analyzed by IoT Inspector and checked for more than 5,000 CVEs and other security issues...."

While not all flaws carried the same risk, the team found some common problems that affected most of the tested models:

- Outdated Linux kernel in the firmware
- Outdated multimedia and VPN functions
- Over-reliance on older versions of BusyBox
- Use of weak default passwords like "admin"
- Presence of hardcoded credentials in plain text form....

All of the affected manufacturers responded to the researchers' findings and released firmware patches.
The researchers demonstrated one exploit they found on one of the routers that extracted the AES key used for the firmware encryption, letting malicious firmware image updates pass verification checks on the device — and thus potentially planting malware on the router.

jd (Slashdot reader #1,658) shares another perspective on the same study from Security Week: Not all of the identified weaknesses are considered real security flaws, and for some bugs it is unclear whether exploitation is even possible. However, many of the identified vulnerabilities (ranging from 2 in AVM devices to nearly a dozen in other routers) were classified as high- and medium-severity.

Long-time Slashdot reader mtaht writes: Comcast fully deployed bufferbloat fixes across their entire network over the past year, demonstrating 90% improvements in working latency and jitter — which is described in this article by by Comcast Vice President of Technology Policy & Standards. (The article's Cumulative Distribution Function chart is to die for...) But: did anybody notice? Did any other ISPs adopt AQM tech? How many of y'all out there are running smart queue management (sch_cake in linux) nowadays?
But wait — it gets even more interesting...

The Comcast official anticipates even less latency with the newest Wi-Fi 6E standard. (And for home users, the article links to a page recommending "a router whose manufacturer understands the principles of bufferbloat, and has updated the firmware to use one of the Smart Queue Management algorithms such as cake, fq_codel, PIE.")

But then the Comcast VP looks to the future, and where all of this is leading: Currently under discussion at the IETF in the Transport Area Working Group is a proposal for Low Latency, Low Loss Scalable Throughput. This potential approach to achieve very low latency may result in working latencies of roughly one millisecond (though perhaps 1-5 milliseconds initially). As the IETF sorts out the best technical path forward through experimentation and consensus-building (including debate of alternatives), in a few years we may see the beginning of a shift to sub-5 millisecond working latency. This seems likely to not only improve the quality of experience of existing applications but also create a network foundation on which entirely new classes of applications will be built.

While we can certainly think of usable augmented and virtual reality (AR and VR), these are applications we know about today. But what happens when the time to access resources on the Internet is the same, or close to the time to access local compute or storage resources? What if the core assumption that developers make about networks — that there is an unpredictable and variable delay — goes away? This is a central assumption embedded into the design of more or less all existing applications. So, if that assumption changes, then we can potentially rethink the design of many applications and all sorts of new applications will become possible. That is a big deal and exciting to think about the possibilities!

In a few years, when most people have 1 Gbps, 10 Gbps, or eventually 100 Gbps connections in their home, it is perhaps easy to imagine that connection speed is not the only key factor in your performance. We're perhaps entering an era where consistently low working latency will become the next big thing that differentiates various Internet access services and application services/platforms. Beyond that, factors likely exceptionally high uptime, proactive/adaptive security, dynamic privacy protection, and other new things will likely also play a role. But keep an eye on working latency — there's a lot of exciting things happening!

AT&T and Verizon said they will slightly reduce the power of their 5G transmissions in C-band spectrum for six months. The companies said they will do so to allow federal aviation officials more time to study how such transmission might affect radio altimeters in aircraft. From a report: "We are committed to the rapid deployment of 5G and the safety of aviation," the two companies told the FCC in a new letter. "While we continue to believe the FCC's current rules provide for both, we will, without waiver of our legal rights associated with our substantial investments in these licenses, adopt these precautionary measures to allow for additional time for continued analysis." Importantly, according to the Wall Street Journal, executives in the wireless industry don't expect the power reduction to "seriously impair" the operators' 5G operations in the spectrum band. Further, the operators continued to argue that their 5G transmissions in C-band spectrum do not pose a risk to air travel in the US, despite a report from some airlines showing a potential risk of interference to aircraft operations.

Huawei, whose smartphone business has been devastated by U.S. sanctions, is planning to license its handset designs to third parties as a way to gain access to critical components, Bloomberg is reporting, citing people with knowledge of the matter. From the report: The Shenzhen-based tech giant is considering licensing its designs to a unit of state-owned China Postal and Telecommunications Appliances Co, or PTAC, which will then seek to buy parts barred under the Trump-era blacklisting, said one of the people, asking not to be identified discussing internal matters. The unit, known as Xnova, is already selling Huawei-branded Nova phones on its e-commerce site and the partnership will see it offer self-branded devices based on the larger company's designs.

Chinese telecom equipment maker TD Tech Ltd. will also sell some phones featuring Huawei's designs under its own brand, another person said. The partnerships are subject to change as negotiations are still ongoing. The move may be Huawei's best chance at salvaging its smartphone business after U.S. sanctions cut off its access to key chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, Google's Android apps and Qualcomm's 5G wireless modems. Since Huawei first came under fire from the Trump administration, its shrinking consumer business has seen sales fall for four straight quarters.

HPE has confirmed that a "limited subset" of customer data was taken in a data breach involving its subsidiary Aruba Networks, a maker of networking equipment. From a report: The enterprise technology giant said in a statement that an unauthorized person used a private key to gain access to customer data stored in its Aruba Central cloud. HPE did not say how the hacker obtained the private key, but said the key allowed access to cloud servers in multiple regions where customer data was stored. HPE bought Aruba Networks in 2015 for $3 billion in cash. Aruba provides networking gear, like wireless access points, and network security for companies. Through its dashboard, Aruba Central, companies can centrally monitor and manage their Wi-Fi networks. It's the Wi-Fi data collected in Aruba Central that HPE said was compromised. HPE said two datasets were exposed: one for network analytics containing information about devices accessing a customer's Wi-Fi network, and a second dataset containing location data about devices on the network.

Because of a "surprising and sudden request" from America's Federal Aviation Administration that's "based on unverified potential radio interference, a highly anticipated increase in 5G speeds and availability just got put on hold," writes the president/chief analyst of market research/consulting firm TECHnalysis.

But in an opinion piece for USA Today, he asks if the concern is actually warranted? [A]s soon as you start to dig into the details, the concerns quickly seem less practical and more political. Most notably, the plan to launch 5G services on C-Band frequencies has been in the works for several years and really took on momentum after the three big U.S. carriers spent over $80 billion earlier this year to get access to these frequencies. In addition, a report that the FAA cited as part of their complaint has been out for well over a year, so why the last-minute concerns?

U.S. government agencies are, unfortunately, known to hold grudges against one another, sometimes without real clarity as to what's actually involved, as appears to be the case here... Some 40 countries around the world are already using most of the C-Band frequencies for 5G (part of the reason the U.S. has fallen behind on the 5G front), and none have reported any interference with radio altimeters on planes in their countries, the wireless trade association CTIA argues on its website 5GandAviation.com. In addition, new filtering technologies being built into a somewhat obscure part of smartphones called the RF (radio frequency) front end, such as Qualcomm's recently introduced ultraBAW filters, can reduce interference issues on next generation smartphones.

All told, there are numerous reasons why the FAA's concerns around 5G deployment look to be more of a red herring than a legitimate technical concern. While it is true that some older radio altimeters with poor filtering might have to be updated and/or replaced to completely prevent interference, it's not clear that the theoretical interference would even cause an issue.
The article complains that the delayed expansion of bandwidth "could also delay important (and significant) economic impacts," since every previous change in cellular service levels "has triggered billions of dollars of new business and thousands of new jobs by creating new opportunities that faster wireless networks bring with them and 5G is expected do the same...

"While airplane safety shouldn't be compromised in any way, an overabundance of unnecessary caution on this issue could have a much bigger negative impact on the U.S.'s technology advancements and economy than many realize."

After the U.S. Copyright Office's once-every-three-years review of allowed exemptions, "We have some good news to share...." reads a new announcement this week from the Free Software Foundation: The FSF was one of several activist organizations pushing for exemptions to the anticircumvention rules under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) that make breaking Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) illegal, even for ethical and legitimate purposes. We helped bring public awareness to a process that is too often only a conversation between lawyers and bureaucrats.

As of late last week, there are now multiple new exemptions that will help ease some of the acute abuse DRM inflicts on users.

However, the main lesson to be learned here is that we should and must keep pushing. Individual, specific exemptions are not enough. The entire anticircumvention law needs to be repealed. We want to thank the 230 individuals who co-signed their names to our comments supporting exemptions across the board. We should take this as a sign that even though it can be difficult, anti-DRM activism yields practical results.

Section 1201 is one of the most nefarious sections of the DMCA. The provisions contained in 1201 impose legal penalties against anyone trying to circumvent the DRM on their software and devices or, in other words, anyone who tries to control that software or device themselves instead of leaving it up to its corporate overlords.... It takes the hard work of hundreds to secure the anticircumvention use exemptions we already have, and even more work to eke out a few more. Yet thanks to the support of citizens, activists, and researchers around the world, the U.S. Copyright Office has approved a few more, while at the same time demonstrating the DMCA's serious flaws.

In coverage of the new round of anticircumvention exemptions we've seen so far, something that stands out is the U.S. Copyright Office's approval for blind users to break the digital restrictions preventing any ebooks from being processed through a screen reader. At least at first glance, it looks like a big win for all of us concerned with user freedom, but a closer look shows something more sinister, as the U.S. Copyright Office refused to make this exemption permanent. The message this sends to all user freedom activists, but especially the visually impaired among us, is: "we're giving you this now because it would seem inhumane otherwise, but we hope that you'll forget to fight for it later so we can allow corporations to keep on restricting you...."

[P]articipating organizations have been able to make progress on other important exemptions, whether that's the right to install free software on wireless routers or the right to repair dedicated devices like game consoles. It's the coalescing of groups like these that is "chipping away" at Section 1201. At the same time, it's telling that we're forced to fight tooth and nail for the meager exemptions we're granted, even with such a broad base of support. The corporations who have a vested interest in the DMCA and Congress itself are content with the status quo, but we shouldn't be content with patches on a broken system. Incremental progress against Section 1201 is of course a good thing, but we shouldn't lose sight of our goal as user freedom activists: a complete repeal of Section 1201, and all other laws that codify or mandate DRM.

The Defective by Design campaign takes a radical stance when it comes to DRM and the laws that support it. We believe that they should not exist at all, under any circumstance, and we need your help to support this mission....

Apple's long-rumored AR-VR headset may be arriving next year. According to a new report from notable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the iPhone-maker is aiming to put Wi-Fi 6 and 6E support into the device, which could arrive at some point towards the end of 2022. From a report: In a note to investors, spotted by MacRumors, Kuo writes that Meta (formerly Facebook), Sony and Apple will all have new virtual reality or augmented reality headsets of some kind next year, which will support the latest Wi-Fi standards. He expects that Meta's product will launch in the second half of the year, Apple's in the fourth quarter of 2022 and Sony's sometime in the second quarter. Last week during its Facebook Connect event Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg teased a new, higher-end headset dubbed Project Cambria that the company says will arrive next year. Sony, meanwhile, has been teasing a successor to its PlayStation VR headset that is designed for the PlayStation 5. It too is aiming to launch its VR product in 2022. Kuo writes that using Wi-Fi 6 or Wi-Fi 6E will be a "basic requirement for head-mounted displays to improve the wireless experience," adding that "Wi-Fi 6 is significantly better than Wi-Fi 5 in transmission speed and power consumption."

Something is slowing internet subscriber growth at Comcast and Charter, reports Bloomberg, "raising concerns about an end to what has been a huge growth business."

But why? Explanations ranging from a slowdown in consumer spending to competition from phone giants. Slashdot reader JoeyRox shared this report from Bloomberg: Charter on Friday reported 25% fewer new broadband subscribers than analysts estimated and said the overall number of new customers would fall back to 2018 levels. Comcast, which had earlier cut its subscriber forecast, reported 300,000 new internet customers Thursday, less than half the number added a year ago. Analysts were expecting some slowdown in demand coming off 2020, a year when broadband sign-ups spiked as the pandemic shifted people to working and schooling from home. Still, with Charter echoing Comcast's gloomy picture from Thursday, suddenly there's a chill on the cable broadband front, which became the most prized segment of the business as consumers cut traditional TV service.

Charter's shortfall raises "questions about whether this is the beginning of the end of the cable broadband story," said Geetha Ranganathan, an industry analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence...

Both Charter and Comcast blamed a slower new home market for some of the slack in demand, leaving the companies to try and squeeze more business out of their saturated markets. Other factors could include a dropoff in lower-paying customers as government assisted broadband funds dry up... New competition from phone companies certainly doesn't help. AT&T Inc. is expanding its network and added 289,000 new fiber internet customers last quarter. Meanwhile, T-Mobile US Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. are very excited about new wireless home broadband offers that aim directly at cable and outlying areas where cable could potentially expand.

Changes in TV viewing may also be a factor. For decades, cable companies sold TV and internet in discounted bundles. With rise of streaming video "the cable promos aren't as appealing for broadband only," Lopez said. Even as Comcast and Charter deploy new faster network technology to attract more lucrative customers, cable's share of the market is starting to shrink, according to Tammy Parker, a senior analyst with GlobalData.

Apple this month unveiled an array of new gadgets: more powerful MacBook laptop computers, AirPod wireless headphones with longer battery life and HomePod Mini speakers in three more colors. But a different and unheralded Apple release is garnering so much interest that it has become the company's most back-ordered new product: a $19, 6.3-by-6.3-inch cloth to wipe smudges and fingerprints off screens. From a report: The cloth, imprinted with the Apple logo in the corner, is made with "soft, nonabrasive material" to clean the screens of iPhones, iPads and MacBooks "safely and effectively," according to the product page. The listing adds that the Polishing Cloth -- capital P, capital C -- is "compatible" with 88 different Apple products. For most U.S. shoppers, shipment is delayed until Jan. 11, at the earliest. Charging $19 for a piece of cloth about the size of two stacked dollar bills is bold even by Apple's standards, a company whose legions of loyal customers are conditioned to stomach steep prices. An Apple-branded set of four wheels to "improve mobility" for the Mac Pro, the company's most expensive desktop computer, is priced at $699, for instance.

Russia's boldest moves to censor the internet began in the most mundane of ways -- with a series of bureaucratic emails and forms. From a report: The messages, sent by Russia's powerful internet regulator, demanded technical details -- like traffic numbers, equipment specifications and connection speeds -- from companies that provide internet and telecommunications services across the country. Then the black boxes arrived. The telecom companies had no choice but to step aside as government-approved technicians installed the equipment alongside their own computer systems and servers. Sometimes caged behind lock and key, the new gear linked back to a command center in Moscow, giving authorities startling new powers to block, filter and slow down websites that they did not want the Russian public to see.

The process, underway since 2019, represents the start of perhaps the world's most ambitious digital censorship effort outside of China. Under President Vladimir V. Putin, who once called the internet a "C.I.A. project" and views the web as a threat to his power, the Russian government is attempting to bring the countryâ(TM)s once open and freewheeling internet to heel. The gear has been tucked inside the equipment rooms of Russia's largest telecom and internet service providers, including Rostelecom, MTS, MegaFon and Vympelcom, a senior Russian lawmaker revealed this year. It affects the vast majority of the country's more than 120 million wireless and home internet users, according to researchers and activists. The world got its first glimpse of Russia's new tools in action when Twitter was slowed to a crawl in the country this spring. It was the first time the filtering system had been put to work, researchers and activists said. Other sites have since been blocked, including several linked to the jailed opposition leader Alexei A. Navalny.

Just when some wireless carriers were trying to move away from phone giveways, T-Mobile upped the ante on Thursday with a deal offering new customers as much as $1,000 if they switch. From a report: The second-largest U.S. wireless carrier said that starting Friday consumers who bring a bill from their current provider to a T-Mobile store can get a prepaid debit card for any remaining amount owed on their phone, up to $1,000. Rivals AT&T and Verizon reported stronger-than-expected subscriber gains this week after using phone giveaways to help prime the pump in the third quarter.

Quick Google Stadia recap: Things have not been great. From a report: Google's AAA cloud gaming service launched in 2019 to middling reviews and since then has severely undershot Google's sales and usage estimates by hundreds of thousands of users. The company shut down its first-party studio, "Stadia Games & Entertainment (SG&E)," before it could ever develop a game, and it did so one week after lead executive Phil Harrison gave the division a positive progress report. Several key executives have left the struggling division, like Assassin's Creed co-creator and SG&E leader Jade Raymond, Stadia's VP and head of product, John Justice, and Engineering Lead Justin Uberti.

When Google killed the game division at the beginning of the year, an accompanying blog post hinted that big changes were coming to Google's strategy: "In 2021, we're expanding our efforts to help game developers and publishers take advantage of our platform technology and deliver games directly to their players." Rather than continuing to push Stadia as a consumer-facing, branded service, Google seems to want to pivot the service to what would essentially be "Google Cloud Gaming Platform." This would be a back-end, white-label service that could power other companies' products, just like a million other Google Cloud products, like database hosting and push messaging. Google said it believes a back-end service "is the best path to building Stadia into a long-term, sustainable business." This all brings us to this Batman game presented by AT&T Wireless.