Digital TV body adds HbbTV to UK standard

The UK's digital TV specifications guardian, the Digital TV Group, has formally incorporated HbbTV into its 'D-Book' digital telly standard.

As is the way with such organisations, the latest version of the D-Book - the seventh edition - has not yet been published, merely "approved for publication" by the dusty bureaucrats.

Hardware makers and content providers who are DTG members will have had access to the spec since its release in "draft" form in March 2011.

D-Book 7's Part B covers connected TV technologies, and it's this that contains HbbTV - aka Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV. The new version of the standard will allow telly and set-top box makers to support HbbTV in their products.

Freesat, for example, has already mandated HbbTV for second-generation satellite tuners, due to appear early in 2012.