Microsoft is closing its physical stores and will provide sales, training and support remotely, it said Friday. The company will “reimagine” spaces that serve customers, including Microsoft Experience Centers in New York; London; Redmond, Washington; and Sydney. Store closings will result in a pretax charge of $450 million, to be recorded in Q2. “Our sales have grown online as our product portfolio has evolved to largely digital offerings," said Microsoft Corporate Vice President David Porter. The company has been serving customers remotely over the past few months during the pandemic, he said. New online services include 1:1 video chat support, online tutorial videos and virtual workshops.

With more employees working from home now, and possibly beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, home network security is a growing concern, experts told a webinar with cybersecurity company Bitdefender. Nearly 80% of U.S. consumers surveyed by Parks Associates are concerned about a data security break or privacy issues, said analyst Brad Russell. The increasing time households are spending on their Wi-Fi networks heightened home network exposure to phishing attacks, Russell noted. WFH puts the home network “in a completely different spotlight,” said Alex Balan, Bitdefender chief security researcher. Bitdefender is tracking 350 IoT-oriented botnets in its labs that are compromising such smart home devices as routers, power outlets, smart cameras, printers, smart TVs and connected coffee makers. Eventually, all devices in the home will be connected and the number of attacks on home networks will “dramatically expand,” said Balan. Vulnerabilities are present in 90% of the devices Bitdefender analyzes, he said, and are “very difficult to defend against.” Consumers can’t buy anti-virus software “for a smart light bulb or a Roomba,” he said. “You don’t know how to tackle security for your smart devices.” The average broadband household has 22 devices, up from 12-15 two years ago, said Razvan Todor, Bitdefender director-connected home security, and that will keep growing. “We’ve just now become painfully aware that we need to protect them,” ideally from a single point, said Todor. ISPs can help with cybersecurity, while clearing up their networks with fewer distributed denial-of-service attacks, experts said.

The FCC Media Bureau extended a waiver of sponsorship identification rules for donated COVID-19-related public service announcements through Aug. 31, said a public notice Friday. Since the PSAs are created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and don’t include the names of the entities that donated advertising time to air them, they would otherwise violate sponsorship ID rules. Despite some states lifting stay-at-home orders, “many restrictions, including 'social distancing' measures, remain in effect with uncertain timetables for their removal,” MB said.

Revenue in CalAmp’s LoJack business was $6.6 million in Q1 ended May 31, down from $11.2 million in Q4, said Chief Financial Officer Kurt Binder on a Thursday investor call. It’s the first time CalAmp broke out that stolen-vehicle recovery business it bought four years ago, he said. Executives charted a future for that business. The stock closed 8.9% higher Friday at $8.37. It's moving to "aggressively transition it to a subscription-based business model” from a one-time stand-alone device sale, said Binder. He blamed the revenue decline on the “slowdown in device installations” due to the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown. Installations “got better” as fiscal Q1 progressed, and “more of the markets around the country opened up,” said interim CEO Jeff Gardner. “But it was a struggle.” Reopenings take place “at a different pace,” “depending on the region or the state,” he said. LoJack is “challenged from a performance perspective,” said Gardner. “It's one of my top objectives to begin transitioning this business to a recurring revenue model that offers significant value to our dealer partners and their customers, similar to a model that we provide to all of our international businesses.” The business suffers because its “legacy” product runs on a proprietary RF frequency out of step with the automotive industry, said Gardner: “The world's really moving to telematics,” and LoJack is playing catchup.

Global IT spending on cloud-based infrastructure grew 2.2% in Q1, while investments in “non-cloud environments plunged 16.3%, reported IDC Thursday. “The broadening impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was the major factor driving infrastructure spending,” it said. “Widespread lockdowns across the world and staged reopening of economies triggered increased demand for cloud-based consumer and business services.” IDC forecasts the Q1 pace “will continue through rest of the year as cloud adoption continues to get an additional boost."

The Wireless Bureau released an electronic process for FCC licensees to apply for expedited Section 106 historic review or emergency authorization of wireless facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation rules “include provisions to allow certain critical infrastructure projects to proceed under expedited Section 106 review during emergencies such as the COVID-19 crisis,” said a notice in Friday’s Daily Digest. “The Commission may issue emergency authorizations for infrastructure projects critical for responding to emergency situations."

Auction 903 and rural broadband experiment funding recipients have a limited waiver until the end of 2021 from letter of credit rules, the Wireline Bureau said Friday. Skybeam and the Connect America Fund Phase II Coalition petitioned for waivers to conform with recent Rural Digital Opportunity Fund rules (see 2003110034). Staff said waiver is justified given how the pandemic has increased demand for broadband while impeding business.

More than a quarter of the more than 1 million people searching online for new homes at the peak of COVID-19 in April and May were looking at locales in other U.S. regions, said Redfin. There was a “huge increase” in people in large metropolitan areas “looking online at homes in small towns,” it said Thursday: The pandemic and resulting work-from-home trends are “accelerating migration patterns.” New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles had the biggest “net outflow” of users in April and May, the digital real estate brokerage said.

The FCC stopped taking COVID-19 telehealth applications, it announced Thursday (see 2006250069). "Based on the applications received to date, demand for funding exceeds available" money. Some $200 million was allotted. The FCC doesn't "want to impose burdens on health care providers who may prepare new applications that cannot be funded under the current appropriation." The program has approved 444 requests in 46 states plus Washington, D.C., for $157.64 million, the agency announced. The latest awards were disclosed this week. A Wireline Bureau public notice has details on the cessation of accepting new requests for money. The bureau began taking applications for the congressionally mandated program April 13 after the commission approved program rules earlier that month (see 2004010042). The bureau was directed to review applications and award funding commitments on a rolling basis until funding exhausts or the pandemic ends. The bureau prioritized funding applications targeting areas hardest hit by the coronavirus and where the support will have the most impact on healthcare needs, as Congress directed. The American Telemedicine Association has asked Congress to expand the program in the next COVID-19 legislative package, a spokesperson emailed Thursday. Commissioner Brendan Carr has been a proponent at the agency for telehealth funds. “Less than two years ago, we set out to establish a new FCC telehealth program to support the trend towards connected care," Carr said in a statement to us. "I am pleased that this leg work enabled the FCC to stand up the emergency telehealth initiative in record time. And I am pleased with the interest that health care providers have shown in participating. I look forward to the FCC’s continued work on these efforts, including the upcoming Connected Care Pilot.” The FCC didn't answer our questions.

Rev launched live captions for Zoom virtual meeting users, said the speech-to-text company Thursday: Zoom quickly became the leading video conferencing platform during the pandemic (see 2006120054), previously lacking “a solution for on-screen captions.”