The first phase of the Bangladesh ICT Skills Competition has begun with 500-plus students from 30 engineering universities competing in it.

All these students will have free online courses through a dedicated online platform managed by Huawei.

Also, the participants will get two weeks for online learning in the preliminary round, and an exam will take place on February 19 to evaluate their learning.

The exam will consist of MCQ and true-false questions. And top 20 qualifying universities will be selected for the semi-final round where they will be provided with Huawei Certified ICT Associate (HCIA) R&S Training for two weeks.

Next, the top 10 teams will be nominated for the country final, which will take place on March 18 in the form of E-Lab Practice.

Yang Guobing, president of Enterprise Business Group of Huawei Technologies Bangladesh, said, "We need to empower the students with a collaborative effort whenever we can. So, we are pleased to initiate multiple competitions, strengthening the youth's knowledge in the technology sector."

Also read: Kenya hails Huawei's role in boosting youth ICT skills

Huawei signed a memorandum of understanding with Bangladesh Computer Council and Bangladesh Hi-Tech Park Authority to launch numerous ICT competitions for university students three months ago.

The global provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices integrates solutions across four key domains – telecom networks, IT, smart devices, and cloud services.

The company invests heavily in basic research, concentrating on technological breakthroughs that drive the world forward. It has more than 194,000 employees and operates in more than 170 countries.

Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) officials recently visited the smartphone manufacturing plant of the global smartphone maker Vivo Bangladesh.

Brigadier General Shahidul Alam, director general of Spectrum Division of BTRC, lead the regulator team and expressed satisfaction over the use of the latest global technology in the smartphone manufacturing plant.

David, product director of vivo Bangladesh, accompanied the BTRC officials as they visited different sections of the manufacturing plant.

Also read: vivo drives innovation prioritising local users

At the end of the visit, highlighting the safety measures and environmental aspects of the factory, Shahidul Alam said, "The security system of the vivo smartphone manufacturing plant is very decent. They are also keeping eyes on environmental issues."

Expressing satisfaction over the uses of the latest technology, he also said, "Vivo uses state-of-the-art technology in its plant. They can also set up a research and development centre here."

Also read: Vivo marks 3 years of smartphone innovation in Bangladesh

Md Mehfuz Bin Khaled, deputy director of Spectrum Division of BTRC, Md Akramul Haque, assistant director, Shahadat Hossain, assistant director, Sohana Parvin, deputy assistant director of Spectrum Division, were also present during the factory visit.

Vivo set up its smartphone manufacturing plant in Narayanganj in 2019. Most of the employees of this factory are Bangladeshis.

Also read: Vivo, Zeiss team up for mobile imaging

"Almost 20 lakh units of smartphones are assembled and produced in this plant every year," the company said.

Global smartphone brand realme has been announced as the fastest-growing major brand in the world in 2020.

Research company Counterpoint said this in its latest smartphone report on Q4, as realme grew 65% year-on-year and shipped 42 million smartphones last year.

How realme became the fastest-growing smartphone brand?

realme has been employing innovative methods in both the consumer and product segments to aggressively grow its market share.

Also read: realme plans to leap into a prosperous 2021

In an economic environment where nearly all major industry leaders were facing a loss, realme was one of the only two major smartphone brands to register growth throughout 2020.

The company started the year selling only to 35 markets and ended it with approximately 100% growth, totalling 61 active markets by the end of 2020.

During this time, realme expanded its user base by 250%, from 25 million to over 50 million.

Also read: First realme flagship sales and service centre launched in Bangladesh

"At realme, we live our philosophy, which is to dare to leap into the forefront of innovation, design and product value, which is something young people can identify with," said realme CEO Sky Li.

realme surpassed the 50 million sales milestone in merely nine quarters since its inception, making it the fastest-growing smartphone brand in the world.

The brand's users and employees frequently trade tips about the latest technological trends, sell online through a heavy emphasis on e-commerce.

Read Also: 50 million in two Years: What has made realme so successful so fast?

"This has created authenticity from the top to the bottom, and this brand value is seen by the consumer first-hand," said Li.

"Our changing environment has allowed realme to live out its values in plain view of its consumers. Once countries start to limit movement, we upgraded our after-sales services such as warranty extensions, live online support and shorter waiting and delivery times to maintain the high quality of service to our users that we have become known for."

realme has consistently led the market in decentralising and exposing 5G-enable equipment to many groups through leap-forward performed products of great value, such as the global launch of the realme 7 5G, which costs less than $300.

Read Also: realme ranked among top 4 mobile brands during Q3 in Bangladesh

Well-known gadget media GSM Arena has rated realme as the number one mid-range all-rounder mobile phone for 2020.

Bangladesh held onto its progress in the ICT sector in the Global Connectivity Index (GCI) 2020 event amid the pandemic.

The country made headway in the field of broadband, internet of things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) compared to last year. So, three more points were added to Bangladesh’s portfolio.

Huawei released the GCI report recently based on the progress of 79 economies in deploying digital infrastructure and capabilities.

According to the GCI 2020 report, Bangladesh advanced eight points in the Global Connectivity Index since 2015.

In GCI 2019 report, the country confirmed its place on the “top movers” with remarkable growth in the digital economy in the last several years.

The GCI 2020 report used 40 indicators under four pillars, namely supply, demand, experience, and potential from 2015 to 2020.

It divided the countries into three groups – frontrunners, adopters and starters.  And Bangladesh belonged to the starter group.

The report showed that starters made significant progress in broadband coverage. Their average mobile broadband penetration went up by more than 2.5 times, 4G subscriptions increased and mobile broadband became 25% more affordable.

These achievements enabled starters to offer better comprehensive digital services and embrace new opportunities in economic development.  Also, their e-commerce expenditure almost doubled since 2014.

A key finding of the GCI 2020 is that the digital transformation of industries will help countries increase productivity, spur economic recovery, and develop future competitiveness.

GCI suggested that economies that could increase productivity and go digital with intelligent connectivity generally enjoy higher gross value added per worker or per hour worked.

It also says full recovery from the pandemic requires two things to happen.

Firstly, it requires recovery from lockdowns and border shutdowns, so that school, work, and global trade can resume via communication and collaboration tools.

Secondly, it requires a return to the same level of economic activity before the pandemic hit.

Nearly two-in-ten or 18 percent of the people in Southeast Asia (SEA) admitted to sharing news before verifying if they were true, according to a survey conducted by Kaspersky, recently.

A statement by Kaspersky today said that the survey revealed that such is highest among Gen Z (28 per cent), followed by Gen X (21 per cent), and Baby Boomers (19 per cent), while Millennials logged the lowest in this aspect at 16 percent.

The survey, which was done in November 2020 involving 1,240 respondents with 831 from SEA, also found out that only five-in-ten respondents across all generations said they read the full article before sharing it on their own account.

Also Read:  'Cyber Security Help Desk' to provide help for hacked FB account

On top of that, the research unmasked that majority (76 per cent of respondents) of users in SEA received their news updates from online platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram.

“The percentage is higher for Gen Z at 83 per cent, followed by Millennials at 81 per cent, Baby Boomers at 70 per cent, and Gen X at 62 per cent. This, however, does not mean absolute trust in information published on these platforms,” it said.

According to the survey, awareness about misinformation online is, however, showing signs of growth in the region with six-in-ten respondents across all generations saying that they do check the sources of information or news being circulated on social media before clicking “Share”.

Also Read: Facebook making messaging more secure

It also found out the Baby Boomers also lead the pack in confronting friends or family members who share fake news, based on their judgments, at 41 per cent, followed by the Millennials (27 per cent) and Gen X (23 per cent). Gen Z appears to be more polite at 19 per cent, it said.

As ‘blocking’ is another way of users in SEA to protect themselves from misinformation, it showed that more than a quarter of the respondents admitted blocking contacts who share articles they deem as inaccurate, with Gen Z at 46 per cent, Baby Boomers (33 per cent), Millennials (32 per cent), and Gen X (30 per cent).

The study was conducted by research agency YouGov in Australia, India, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Vietnam, with the respondents ranged from 18 to 65 years of age, all of whom are working professionals who are active on social media (spending at least an hour a day on social media).

Also Read: US banning use of WeChat, TikTok for national security

Therefore, Kaspersky experts suggested some tips to help users protect themselves against cunning social engineering attacks on social media such as check the source, break the loop, think about the digital footprint and secure devices.

Baby Boomers are the persons born between 1946 and 1964, Gen X (1965-1980), Millennials (1981-1996) and Gen Z (1997-2007).