Press Release

VodafoneThree, the National Crime Agency (NCA) and City of London Police have collaborated to identify and disrupt criminal SIM farm operations, leading to eight arrests, the seizure of cash and equipment, and the recovery of more than one million compromised card details ‘phished’ from the public by criminals.

A SIM farm is a collection of cellular SIM cards, sometimes scaling to hundreds or thousands, used by fraudsters to route massive volumes of automated calls and text messages to members of the public, aiming to deceive victims into giving up sensitive personal information – known commonly as ‘phishing’. This information can be used to commit fraudulent activities or be packaged into detailed ‘profiles’ of potential victims and sold to other criminals.

Around three million victims suffered financial loss through fraud, (the most commonly experienced crime in England and Wales) with more than four million incidents in the year ending March 2025. The economic and social cost of fraud in 2024 was estimated at £14.4 billion by the Home Office.

Using a new approach developed with law enforcement, having identified suspected SIM farm activity, VodafoneThree shared intelligence with the NCA and City of London Police’s Fraud Targeting Cell. The Dedicated Card and Payment Crime Unit (DCPCU), a banking industry-funded unit, used the intel to investigate individuals suspected of using SIM farm systems to target the public. This led to the disruption of organised criminal activity and the recovery of what law enforcement has described as potentially the largest haul of compromised payment details ever recovered.

The announcement comes as legislation banning the operation of SIM farms takes effect in the UK, strengthening powers to tackle fraud and organised crime – enabling earlier disruption, more arrests, and fewer victims.

Rachel Andrews, Head of Corporate Security at VodafoneThree, said:

“Fraud cannot be tackled through protection measures alone. We need to go further, using our intelligence and capabilities to identify and disrupt the infrastructure that allows organised criminals to operate at scale. This collaboration with the NCA shows what can be achieved when industry and law enforcement combine their strengths, disrupting criminal activity closer to its source and preventing harm before it reaches customers and the wider public.”

Nick Sharp, Deputy Director of Fraud in the National Economic Crime Centre at the National Crime Agency, said:

“These arrests highlight the impact of close collaboration between law enforcement and industry. Intelligence shared by VodafoneThree enabled us to disrupt suspected criminal activity and recover more than one million compromised card details.

“SIM farms are a key enabler of large-scale fraud, allowing criminals to create huge numbers of fake online accounts and target victims in huge quantities with minimal effort.”

“The introduction of new offences covering the possession and supply of SIM farms strengthens our ability to protect the public from fraud. The NCA will continue to work with partners across policing and industry to disrupt the criminals behind this offending.”

Lord Hanson, Minister for Fraud, said:

“It only takes one fraudulent text to deprive people of their hard-earned money and SIM farms give fraudsters the tools to target their victims at scale.”

“The law we introduced to ban their use is now in force. Those using these devices to defraud the public will not only continue to face the full force of the law but will also be hit with hefty fines.”

“Criminals are increasingly working on an industrial scale, so we are meeting them with the same force by partnering with mobile networks and law enforcement to disrupt their operations and hit the scammers where it hurts.”

Tackling fraud at the source

Crucially, SIM farms can hide in plain sight. Recent UK investigations have uncovered the technology operating from ordinary homes and properties in local communities.

As criminals increasingly exploit digital infrastructure, organised fraud is becoming more sophisticated and harder to detect. The ability to operate at greater scale and speed makes disrupting the infrastructure behind fraud more important than ever.

• Fraud “accounts for more than 40% of all reported crime in England and Wales” (Major step for fraud prevention with landmark ban on SIM farms – GOV.UK)
• Lord Hanson (Fraud Minister): “Two-thirds of British adults say they’ve received a suspicious message on their phone – equivalent to more than 35 million people – which is why cracking down on SIM farms is so vital to protecting the public.”

Combatting organised crime through collaboration

Telecommunications operators have a critical role to play in disrupting the infrastructure that enables organised fraud.

In line with Pillar 1 ‘DISRUPT’ of the UK Government’s Fraud Strategy, VodafoneThree is committed to tackling fraud at its source. Alongside its own safeguards, it works with industry, government and law enforcement to disrupt fraud and protect customers and the wider public.

A landmark moment in the fight against digital fraud

The criminalisation of SIM farms represents a significant change in the UK’s approach to tackling fraud.

By making the operation of SIM farms a criminal offence, law enforcement agencies now have additional powers to target the infrastructure that underpins a wide range of fraud and cybercrime offences. The legislation reflects a growing focus on preventing criminal activity at source.

*according to the NCA

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Contributed Article

By Cesar Jimenez, CTO, Trans Americas Fiber

Latin America’s international bandwidth is growing faster than that of almost any other region, yet much of it still travels on cables designed for a very different internet. There is real value in making better use of the region’s existing subsea infrastructure. Upgrading established systems can unlock additional capacity and extend their useful life, and it will remain an important part of meeting future demand. At the same time, the region’s changing traffic patterns and growing connectivity needs raise a broader question: how can existing infrastructure and new investment work together to deliver the capacity, route diversity and commercial flexibility customers need?

Demand is not evenly distributed

The average utilisation across an existing portfolio can look comfortable, but demand does not spread itself evenly across a network. According to TeleGeography, used international bandwidth in Latin America grew by about 25% in 2025 to more than 400 Tbps, and some networks are already running hot. Brazil has grown at a 29% compound annual rate, Mexico at 32%, and Colombia at close to 40%. Spare capacity on one cable does not help a customer who needs it on another route, in another country, or with a different landing point. Nor does it help if it cannot be bought in the quantity or on the terms the customer needs. Available capacity is only useful where, when and how it can be used.

Investment is lagging demand

Latin America is attracting less cable investment than other regions. TeleGeography estimates USD 0.7 billion for cables entering service between 2023 and 2025 and USD 1.3 billion expected between 2026 and 2029, below Asia, Oceania and the transatlantic and transpacific routes. Content providers played no role in Latin American cables before 2017, but their presence has grown steadily, and carriers remain key to future projects. More than 90 Tbps of content-provider demand already travels the US to Latin America route, growing at about 50% a year. The cloud footprint tells the same story. Latin America has far fewer cloud availability zones than Asia, Europe or the United States, yet five more are planned. As that infrastructure arrives, so does the need for direct, high-capacity international connectivity.

The limits of upgrades

New terminal equipment can raise the capacity of existing fiber, and the industry should keep taking advantage of that. But an upgrade works within the limits of the cable already in the water: its fiber count, its reach and its age. Older systems were built with fewer fiber pairs, earlier generations of fiber with higher attenuation and smaller effective area, and repeaters and power-feed equipment designed for the transmission technology of their day. A system with no defined end of life is not a system with unlimited life, and an upgraded older cable is still an older cable.

TeleGeography’s list of ageing systems in the region runs to around twenty cables, with the oldest past 30 years in service. Meanwhile, the demands placed on the network have changed. Yesterday’s cables were designed for voice and internet traffic that was predictable, flow north to south, was led by carriers and was limited by capacity. Today’s traffic is shaped by cloud, AI, content delivery and regional data centres. It is dynamic, distributed and growing quickly.

Designed for today’s traffic

The TAM-1 cable, and other planned new subsea systems in the region, have been designed for that traffic. TAM-1 is one of fewer than five 24-fiber-pair subsea cable systems deployed globally, and the first in the Americas. With 24 fiber pairs on its South System and 12 on its North System and around 800 Tbps of design capacity with current-generation terminal equipment, it offers more than 200 times the capacity of any of the legacy Caribbean systems and its open cable design lets customers light capacity with the equipment of their choice as transmission technology evolves.

Resilience is about having more routes to choose from

Resilience is a priority for subsea networks across a region exposed to hurricanes, earthquakes and fishing activity. Strong operational track records and continued investment in existing systems both play an important role, but resilience also depends on the diversity of routes available when disruption occurs. Past hurricanes have demonstrated how connectivity can be affected when communities rely on a single route. TAM-1 addresses this through two diverse subsea routes, a North System and a South System, with switchable branching units that allow traffic to be re-routed between them. Stubbed branching units installed during construction also provide for future expansion, including the planned TAM-2 Pacific extension, without the need for disruptive marine work on the live system. Route diversity and future flexibility were priorities highlighted by customers from the outset, and both are built into the design.

TAM-1 North and South Systems. Source: Trans Americas Fiber

Access matters as much as capacity

For decades, the best subsea connectivity in the region has been available mainly to those who own infrastructure or depend on those who do. Smaller carriers and ISPs paid more for less and had little say over the capacity they relied on.

Modern systems are tending towards neutrality and open access. Any carrier, hyperscaler, ISP, government or enterprise can buy capacity directly, with no minimum commitment and no fixed structure. Shared spectrum, managed optical services and dark fiber let customers start at the scale they need and grow from there. Ten anchor tenants, including AT&T, Millicom, AXTEL and Grupo ICE, committed to TAM-1 before construction was complete. Grupo ICE’s partnership alone is expected to increase Costa Rica’s total international capacity more than twentyfold.

Both, and more

This is not a choice between upgrading what exists and building what is needed. The region needs both, and it needs competition between them. But it should not be asked to settle for yesterday’s design when demand is growing about 25 to 30% a year and the traffic mix is changing. Capacity on paper only matters if customers can reach it, trust it and afford it. We are acting to give the region scale, diversity and open access in one platform.

How is the submarine cable industry changing in 2026? Join the discussion at Submarine Networks EMEA

César Jiménez, Chief Technology Officer, Trans Americas Fiber

Recent news from tech giant Huawei underlines the growing interest in many regions in the use of communications to enhance transport systems – specifically railways.

According to local press reports, representatives of Huawei and experts from China’s Southwest Jiaotong University recently visited the Chukursay and Nazarbek railway stations in Tashkent to discuss further cooperation on digitising Uzbekistan’s railway sector.

The discussions focused on exchanging experience, strengthening cooperation in digital technologies and advancing previously reached agreements concerning the introduction of train traffic management systems on Uzbekistan’s main railway lines.

The visit took place as part of the implementation of the Digital Uzbekistan 2030 strategy, which includes efforts to introduce modern digital technologies across the country’s infrastructure and transport systems.

During the visits, the delegation examined station operations, the current level of digitalisation and the condition of the situation centre.

Participants also reviewed existing business processes related to train traffic management and considered potential technical solutions for modernising the relevant systems.

This isn’t the only recent Huawei-supported rail communications initiative. Just over a week ago Huawei and the Southern African Railways Association (SARA) launched the African Intelligent Rail Initiative (AIRI), a regional collaboration to accelerate the digital transformation of Southern Africa’s railway networks.

The initiative was announced at the 15th SARA Rail Conference & Exhibition, held in Johannesburg from 20 to 22 October, where Huawei also introduced its Intelligent RAIL 2.0 solutions to the Southern African market and participated in discussions on railway modernisation, operational efficiency and regional connectivity.

Coordinated by SARA, the AIRI will promote technical cooperation, knowledge-sharing and the adoption of intelligent technologies across regional railway networks. It will bring together railway operators, technology providers, engineering companies and research institutions to address common industry challenges.

Planned activities include developing an African Intelligent Rail White Paper and technical reference framework, a platform for sharing successful digitalisation projects, an annual best-practice recognition programme, and a joint working group.

The initiative comes as Southern African countries seek to improve the performance of regional freight and passenger networks, strengthen cross-border transport corridors and support trade under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

Huawei also introduced Intelligent RAIL 2.0 to the Southern African market. Developed jointly with industry partners, the portfolio comprises 20 scenario-based solutions covering railway construction, passenger and freight transport, and infrastructure and equipment maintenance.

The solutions combine digital connectivity, intelligent technologies and industry applications to help railway operators improve operational visibility, identify maintenance needs earlier, strengthen safety management, and coordinate freight and passenger 

Both initiatives are at an early stage, but both clearly illustrate a growing interest in a number of regions in the potential efficiencies, cost-savings and safety benefits that digitisation could bring to rail transport.

A few items from the last few days to catch up with: … [visit site to read more]

News

The company is accused of purchasing ads with the purpose of geolocating and surveilling users

A report from Reuters claims that Israeli ad tech firm Discover-Tech has been targeting Starlink users for surveillance, according to six anonymous sources familiar with the matter.

The sources claim that the company pursued a large scale ad purchasing campaign aimed at surreptitiously gaining access to targeted users’ location and tracking their internet activity.

The report builds upon a previous report published on 15 October by TrendAI, a subsidiary of Japanese security firm Trend Micro, which first revealed suspicious ad purchasing activity by a company referred to by a codename, “Shadow-Earth-79”.

Shadow-Earth-79, since revealed to be Discover-Tech, was shown to be the number one bidder for ad-space via Starlink in over 100 countries, including Syria, Libya, Yemen, and South Sudan – countries with “almost no demand” for Western advertisements.

In total, Discover Tech accounted for 12.9% of winning advertisements in Starlink traffic, almost five-times higher than the average of 2.6%.

Online advertisers typically compete for ad space on websites and apps through a complex auction process. During this process, data about the end receivers of those ads can be shared with bidders. This data, when recorded over time and combined with other available information, can allow for individual identification, geolocation, and targeting with surveillance software.

TrendAI’s report said that the company’s bidding patterns showed an “obvious skew” towards Starlink users, likely related to “targeting and tracking infrastructure rather than a commercial advertising operation.”

The same day that TrendAI’s report was released, Discover-Tech was also accused of wider surveillance efforts by cybersecurity watchdog Citizen Lab and ad tech specialist Confiant.  This included using Candiru spyware alongside its ads to compromise user devices, including 5 Windows devices at the Qatari broadcaster Al Jazeera between 2024 and 2025.

“Very likely hundreds of millions of people would have been touched by Discover-Tech,” explained Confiant cofounder Jerome Dangu.

Alphabet (Google), IAB Europe, and Comcast’s Beeswax have all cut the company off from their ad platforms in the past month.

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The GSMA has urged the Gabonese government to reduce taxes on smartphones and mobile services to make internet access more affordable and bring more people online.

Only four in 10 people in Gabon use mobile internet, despite 4G networks covering 95% of the population. GSMA head of Africa Angela Wamola said the country had “built strong foundations”, but the next priority should be making connectivity more accessible.

The industry body estimates that coordinated tax reforms covering mobile operators, smartphones, network investment and digital services could connect an additional 190,000 people to the internet by 2031.

The reforms could also generate a net gain of around XAF63 billion (US$107 million) for public finances by 2031, according to the GSMA. It forecasts that the number of unique mobile subscribers would rise from 1.06 million in 2026 to 1.48 million in 2031, compared with 1.3 million without the proposed changes. Gabon has a population of around 2.65 million.

Smartphone affordability is a major barrier to wider adoption. Around 40% of households in Gabon own a mobile phone, but only half of these devices are smartphones. Smartphones are subject to 18% VAT, compared with 10% for laptops and personal computers.

The GSMA is calling for the government to introduce a clear definition of entry-level smartphones eligible for a reduced VAT rate, alongside more flexible financing options.

It pointed to South Africa as an example of how tax changes can improve affordability. The government removed a 9% luxury excise duty on smartphones priced below ZAR2,500, helping drive sales of around 1.1 million entry-level devices in the first 11 months.

The GSMA also called on smartphone manufacturers, component suppliers, financing companies and mobile operators to help reduce costs and expand the availability of affordable devices.

It said Gabon had already established foundations for using mobile technology to collect taxes and deliver public services, including healthcare and education.

“Affordable smartphones, practical digital skills and access to everyday public services from a phone can help more people get online. Alongside continued network investment, these changes can improve lives while strengthening the economy,” said Wamola.

Those of us in the telecoms sector have long been familiar with data centres as somewhat ungainly elements of network infrastructure – a little banal, but essential if you want higher compute speeds.

However, the rapid rise to prominence of AI in the past few years has in turn skyrocketed public consciousness of data centres – and they are not popular. Governments and tech companies alike have sold them as critical infrastructure, rubber-stamping construction permits regardless of local opposition, but the affected populace is not happy with the cost-benefit analysis.

There has been significant outcry over the constant noise (and, according to some, odour) produced by these facilities, as well as the amount of water and electricity they consume – particularly since that ‘critical’ designation indicates that they’ll be prioritised over local residents in the event of a shortage.

Your friendly neighbourhood data centre

These aspects were enough to make date centres an unpopular presence in residential neighbourhoods, but there’s also the lack of tangible benefit to communities in terms of employment. While new data centre announcements often hint at local job creation, in practice operations are largely automated and the insinuated employment opportunities typically fail to materialise – which itself can be read as a microcosm of the widespread fear that AI has been built with the ultimate goal of replacing a human workforce.

Public backlash against data centres is in full swing then, and the extent to which the facilities have become politically toxic may come as a shock to industry-watchers who considered data centres essential, but largely innocuous. Over the summer of 2026 – which notably saw record-breaking heatwaves and extreme weather events as a result of climate change, which data centres stand accused of fuelling – Malaysia and Thailand both abruptly pumped the brakes on their plans for encouraging data centre investment amidst growing public opposition. The governments of both southeast Asian nations have stated their intention to rethink data centre regulations following concerns over the impact on domestic communities.

Changing terms

While two nations placing an effective pause on data centre planning may not indicate that the tide is turning, the fact that both have taken action at all is indicative of the scale of the backlash – but it doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re having second thoughts on constructing data centres so much as working out the best approach to doing so. Matt Walker of MTN Consulting notes that governments are not deciding against further data centre investment – but they do see the public opposition growing in the US, and they want to get ahead of that curve.

“They are changing the terms”, says Walker. “Thai officials said the country is ‘not closed for business.’ In Malaysia, what has stopped is approval without conditions. Both countries realise that there is strong demand from outsiders for permission to build, so they have leverage.”

This strong demand was a deciding factor behind Malaysia’s sudden onset of cold feet – in July this year, a statement from treasury secretary general Johan Mahmood Merican suggested that Malaysia’s government had essentially attracted too much investment from overseas companies into the local data centre industry by offering overly favourable terms, saying “we perhaps overdid the red carpet for data centres to the extent that now we are almost getting too much of a demand.”

Walker agrees that in terms of price and process, governments – particularly in Southeast Asia – have been making investment ‘too attractive’ for data centre providers. This can involve tax incentives or more controversial carrots such as waiving environmental requirements or offering cheap power. He argues that the older model of competing for foreign capital has given way to riding the wave of demand amidst the AI gold rush, but notes that rising awareness of the downsides of the AI boom is becoming harder to ignore – particularly in terms of the lack of job creation.

“Perceptions may be catching up with reality”, says Walker. “Data centre construction generates some jobs, but data centre operation is almost entirely automated.” To highlight this contrast, he cites the March 2024 application economic table of a facility built in Nevada by Vantage Data Centers, which over a ten-year period listed 4,242 jobs supported by construction, versus just 73 for operation. “With increased automation and physical AI, the staffing needs for ongoing operation may be even lower.”

High energy and water demands

The underwhelming impact that data centres will have on the local job market is an understandable cause for governmental hesitancy – but interestingly, it is not the sole factor, Walker notes that governments are starting to balk at the power and water consumption of data centres – even in the unlikeliest of markets. “

He notes that on 3rd August 2026, Texas Governor Greg Abbott paused new data centre interconnections and announced an audit of whether projects supply their own power, bring and reuse their own water, and rely on tax incentives – and that this attitude is beginning to be echoed globally. “There is a real concern with price impact on other ratepayers and overall grid stability, it’s not just theoretical.”

Walker adds that while extreme weather events are not the stated reason in the Thai, Malaysian, Texas or New York announcements regarding data centre moratoriums that have been in the news this year, this does not mean that climate change is not a motivating anxiety – it’s just that water and power scarcity are the main concerns, particularly in markets affected by drought and unreliable power grids. South Africa has suffered from a load-shedding crisis for years, with widespread outages as recently as 2025. Walker notes that the South African government anticipates that in one instance -reportedly Cape Town – planned data centres will account for up to a third of the city’s current peak power demand.  

The short-term political attention boost of a major construction project is increasingly being overshadowed by public debate about the downsides of AI, argues Walker – not least of which is genuine fear of the technology and its ultra-wealthy backers. This may prove difficult to assuage, but that should not deter governments from trying to find a balance.  

“I believe governments should try to internalise externalities”, says Walker. “The world is facing a climate change crisis – not in the future, but today, and the main cause is burning carbon and not charging for it correctly. If we want to turn society over to the AI overlords, they should at least pay their fair share. They are causing a massive spike in power demand that has trickle down effects on other sectors. They are often owned by companies that use clever accountants and lawyers to help them avoid paying taxes and avoiding regulation. Their owners hire lobbyists that persuade governments to craft rules to help them get richer. All of this has gotten extreme in the last three years, and there is a rising backlash.”

Viettel’s technology R&D arm, Viettel High Tech, said that it has successfully migrated more than 100 million Viettel subscribers and 5,000 tariff plans to its in-house cloud-native charging system, vOCS 4.0.

Viettel High Tech said the cutover took three months, and was carried out on Viettel’s live national network with no service disruption.

The company said it mitigated the risks of the project with real-time data synchronization, parallel running and a phased cutover, with instant rollback at every stage.

Viettel High Tech said it developed every core layer of vOCS 4.0, from a telecom-grade cloud-native platform and NFV-MANO orchestration to real-time charging, subscriber and balance management.

Before the upgrade to vOCS 4.0, Viettel had been using the 3.0 version of the vOCS platform since 2017, when it replaced a foreign vendor’s platform for 90 million Viettel subscribers.

“Passing rigorous tests of real-time self-diagnosis and self-recovery is what allows an operator to keep its promise of 24/7 service to customers, » said Viettel Networks CEO Luu Manh Ha in a statement on Tuesday. « Above all, owning the charging system means an operator is not dependent on foreign vendors – it safeguards digital sovereignty and preserves business flexibility.”

Viettel High Tech said it is now offering vOCS 4.0 to operators worldwide. Key selling points include its ability to handle over 300,000 transactions per second at latency below 5 milliseconds across 2G–5G and fixed services on one platform, as well as the agility to deploy new tariff plans in hours instead of days.

Viettel High Tech also said vOCS 4.0 is more cost-effective, reducing hardware investment by up to 50% by sharing infrastructure with the network. It’s also more resilient, as it’s supported by two active data centres, with automatic recovery in under two minutes.

“We believe vOCS 4.0 is ready to help operators worldwide capture the value of 5G and digital services,” said Viettel High Tech CEO Nguyen Minh Quang.

This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Bill Major, CEO of FiberLight

The AI race is usually framed around who has the best models, the most advanced chips, or the deepest pockets to build data centers. Those things matter. But for those of us building the infrastructure behind AI, there’s another piece of the equation we can’t afford to overlook: the network connecting it all. … [visit site to read more]

Guinea has appointed Mamy Diaby as CEO of state-owned telecoms operator Areeba, as the government restructures the struggling business after a sharp decline in subscribers and revenue.

Diaby will lead the operator alongside deputy CEO Mohamed Diallo, following appointments announced in a presidential decree on October 26, according to Ecofin Agency. The new leadership takes over as Areeba seeks to remain operational and protect jobs after an assessment by consultancy EY found it was close to insolvency.

The restructuring includes clearing accumulated losses, rebuilding equity and reducing liabilities. In July 2025, shareholders approved a plan to absorb losses through a reduction in share capital, followed by a capital increase through the conversion of government debt into equity.

Authorities are also negotiating potential debt write-offs with public-sector creditors, including Guinea’s tax authority and telecoms regulator. Proposed arrangements could allow creditors to recover some or all of the amounts forgiven if Areeba’s financial position improves.

Areeba also needs substantial investment to expand 4G coverage, increase network capacity and improve service quality.

Areeba loses ground to Orange

Areeba’s market position has deteriorated since the government acquired MTN’s stake in December 2024. At the time, it held 22.6% of Guinea’s 13.6 million mobile subscriptions, compared with 74.8% for Orange and 2.6% for Cellcom.

By June 2026, Areeba’s share had fallen to 13.4% of 13.2 million subscriptions, while Orange’s had increased to 85.4%. Areeba’s subscriber base dropped from around 3.07 million to 1.77 million over the period, a decline of approximately 1.3 million, or 42%.

Orange’s lead is even greater in voice traffic, where it accounts for 99% of the market, according to regulatory figures cited by Ecofin Agency.

Areeba has also lost ground in mobile internet. Its share of subscriptions fell from 20.4% at the end of 2024 to 8.5% in June 2026, while Orange’s rose from 77.5% to 90.9%.

The same trend is evident in mobile money, where Areeba’s share declined from 11% to 6% over the period, as Orange’s increased from 89% to 94%.

The financial results reflect the widening gap between the operators. Areeba’s revenue fell 51.4% year on year to GNF101 billion (US$11.5 million) in the second quarter of 2026. Orange’s revenue rose 23.4% to GNF2.57 trillion over the same period.

The new management team faces the challenge of stabilising Areeba’s finances while investing in its network and regaining customers in a market increasingly dominated by Orange.