Pack a lunch.

Transtasman mobile roaming regulation could take two or three years.

That’s the message from Sydney-based market analyst Paul Budde, who has close connections to the Australian government.

The Australian and New Zealand governments have launched a joint investigation into the sky-high price of mobile phone roaming when visiting either country. Also under the microscope: the way roaming rates are presented to customers.

The New Zealand and Australian governments are teaming to look into data roaming “bill shock” - the syndrome where someone uses their mobile phone for email or web surfing overseas, then inadvertently racks up a bill running into thousands of dollars.

READ ALSO: Vodafone slashes global roaming rates - but still a nosebleed

Australia’s controversial DBCDE is to start monitoring blogs, including ISP filtering critic Whirlpool, for mentions of itself – but the government says it’s all innocent.

A tender put out by The Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE) asks media monitoring of print, plus websites, for mentions of its name, reports TechWired Australia.

The ACCC has filed suit against Telstra for refusing rivals’ access to its copper network, sending its shares to a fresh all-time low.

And just to make sure the company is really, really, really out of the running for the National Broadband Network, a senior Telstra employee mocks Communications & IT Minister Stephen Conroy on Twitter.

A suit by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), filed in a Melbourne Federal Court this afternoon, alleges that Telstra refused to let rivals access seven of its phone exchanges.

Following their 11.62% plunge yesterday, Telstra’s shares were down another 6.3% in midday trading on the ASX today.

Telstra shares look set to finish the session at a fresh two-year low, with around $A9 billion wiped from the company’s market cap since it was first shut out of National Broadband Network bidding 48 hours ago.