International
Negotiators Reach Deal On Drafts For Information Summit
by William New
GENEVA -- Two years after starting to draft texts on spreading information and communications technologies (ICTs) to developing countries for global leaders to sign, negotiators on Tuesday struck an accord.
Completion of the language clears the way for heads of state and their stand-ins to sign the two texts during their three-day World Summit on the Information Society beginning here on Wednesday. The texts are a declaration of principles and a plan of action.
"We are very pleased both by the declaration and the plan of action," said U.S. delegation head David Gross of the State Department. "It recognizes that ICTs can play an important role in helping people both to [help] themselves economically and provides greater social benefits." It also makes governments more responsive to their people on freedom of expression, he said.
The final sticking point for the preparatory committee of negotiators involved a Senegalese proposal for a centralized voluntary fund for ICT development that donor countries saw as problematic and unnecessary. On Tuesday, negotiators agreed to recognize that some countries may choose to create a "digital solidarity fund," but it will not be mandated.
The compromise does not represent the creation of the fund by the summit, one informed source from a Western country said. "They do not need the permission of this summit," the source said. "Countries are free to do as they wish."
The second part of the funding compromise calls for a group to implement a study on the effectiveness, feasibility and creation of a voluntary fund such as the one proposed by Senegal by December 2004. That report would be put toward the second phase of the two-part summit, to be held in Tunis, Tunisia, in November 2005.
The European Union and Japan were said to be most vocal in the closed negotiations at the United Nations, speaking in opposition to the voluntary fund, one source said. The United States also did not support the proposal. In the end, the Senegalese recognized the need for a study and developed a compromise with Japan, the source said.
Senegal President Abdoulaye Wade said in a press conference afterward that a solidarity fund would be created and would focus on nonprofit groups and the private sector.
The other remaining issue that was resolved Tuesday addressed a section in the plan of action on work to be done between now and the Tunis summit. Tunis agreed to curtail the scope of the language, with the idea that more be left for the next two-year preparatory committee.
Officials dropped a mandate to implement and follow up on the plan of action at national, regional and international levels, as well as establish to partnerships and develop ways to evaluate progress such as through an "ICT development index."
The remainder of the week will be filled with speeches by heads of state and other officials, and by dozens of concurrent events.
Net Governance
Proposals Emerge For Summit's Internet Governance Group
by William New
GENEVA -- Countries participating in the U.N. World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) this week decided that the organization that manages the system of Internet addresses such as .com or .org may continue but left open the possibility of pursuing broader issues of Internet governance at the United Nations.
"There is no change in the status quo with regard to Internet governance," regardless of what that term was interpreted to mean, one Western diplomat said.
One day later, several groups rushed into that "possibility" with ideas on how to proceed. Negotiators completing Internet governance sections of the WSIS declaration and plan of action over the weekend called for agreement on a definition of Internet governance and related public policy issues to be decided, as well as an understanding of the role of governments, international organizations, nonprofit groups and the private sector.
They mandated preparation of a report and a long list of other activities, such as development of a framework for the secure storage and archival of documents and other electronic records.
Questions immediately began swirling as to how to form a group to conduct the study, which was only given the requirement that it be chosen in an "open and inclusive" fashion.
On Tuesday, a closed roundtable of dozens of respected experts from various constituencies convened to address Internet governance and other issues. Ayisi Makatiani, chair of the committee of the roundtable that addressed governance, said at a press conference that the committee agreed there should be a small group of about a dozen independent experts serving in an advisory role, as well as doing the study. They said it should be formed by June 2004.
Despite agreement by negotiators, debate continues as to whether the California-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) should continue to be seen as the international body overseeing the Internet.
Talal Abu-Ghazaleh, an Egyptian consultant who serves as an adviser to the U.N. Information and Communications Technologies Task Force, proposed to the private roundtable that the task force be designated as the only global Internet body. He proposed to bring ICANN into the group, which he said is the "only global multi-stakeholders entity enjoying international legitimacy."
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan in 2001 created that task force to involve all stakeholders in the realization of the "millennium goals" for development.
He suggested that the group create a governance commission chaired permanently by the United States, with membership from a range of international intergovernmental and business organizations, plus one representative from each continent.
The group would maintain the operational management of the Internet under private-sector control and would accelerate the implementation of domain names in foreign-language characters and stronger intellectual property rights protection.
ICANN President Paul Twomey told reporters on Tuesday that ICANN has a mandate to reform itself and would establish regional offices in all five ICANN geographic areas by June. Twomey said he has received about five offers to host offices in the remaining regions of Africa and Latin America during the conference this week.
Cyber Security
Federal Entities' Average For Computer Security Is 'D'
by Ted Leventhal
Federal departments and agencies earned an average grade of "D" in computer security, according to the fourth annual report card on the issue released on Tuesday.
The House Government Reform Technology Subcommittee graded the entities and concluded that many government networks still have substantial weaknesses and vulnerabilities. Subcommittee Chairman Adam Putnam, R-Fla., said at a press conference that the government's poor progress is unacceptable and added that the subcommittee will move aggressively next year to get agencies to raise their grades.
Suggesting that sometimes "the worst enemy is the enemy within," Putnam said public- and private-sector leaders have not taken cyber security seriously enough. "The culture of our top level CEOs in the private sector and top executives in government must be changed," he said.
Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, also decried the poor grades in a statement and called for immediate action. "It is unacceptable that eight of 24 major federal agencies have failed to undertake necessary measures to safeguard their computers," she said.
The grades were assigned based on reports to Congress and the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) mandated by a law enacted last year. The report card shows some improvement but highlights glaring failures.
Many agencies received a higher grade, with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the National Science Foundation receiving "A's." But overall, 14 agencies scored less than "C," and eight failed.
In addition, only five agencies completed reliable inventories of their critical information technology assets, and the inspectors general from three agencies did not submit independent reports as required by law, which Putnam called "disappointing" and "disturbing."
Putnam said there is no excuse for poor computer security from either the federal government or industry and characterized federal cyber-security progress as "too slow for my satisfaction."
The subcommittee plans to meet with individual agency chief information officers to develop action plans for raising grades. OMB plans to release its own report March 1, with a subcommittee hearing to be held thereafter.
Putnam also chastised industry for failing to properly educate home users in proper security practices, which he said is crucial to the overall security of the Internet.
"While some burden is on the shoulders of the user, I feel strongly that a significant burden falls on the shoulders of hardware, software, operating-system manufacturers" and Internet service providers, he said. "These entities, until recently, have paid insufficient attention to educating consumers" and instead have spent billions of dollars on advertising.
Patching software flaws is "simply too difficult" for the average consumer, he said. Automated software updates are preferable, but secure software with fewer bugs would be better, he added.
"[The National Institute of Standards and Technology] estimates that software bugs and errors cost the U.S. economy $59.5 billion per year," Putnam said. "We can and must do better," with the federal government leveraging its purchasing power to get better products.
Budget
Proposed Cut In Manufacturing Program Infuriates Democrats
by Teri Rucker
Congressional Democrats are furious that the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) would lose two-thirds of its funding under the spending bill that the House passed on Monday and are warning that the budget cut could mean the end of the program.
"When the time came for action, instead of just talk, a Republican Congress and administration killed the very program designed to support small and medium-sized manufacturers they claim to support," said Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo.
The bill, which would cover fiscal 2004 funding for numerous departments and agencies, would allocate $39.6 million for MEP, down from nearly $107 million in fiscal 2003. The White House proposed $12 million and a phase-out of the program in fiscal 2004.
The final number reflects the amount approved by House appropriators; Senate appropriators had voted to fully fund MEP at $107 million. The National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) oversees the program and the funding is allocated to it.
The budgetary decision is ironic and frustrating, said Andy Davis, the spokesman for Sen. Ernest (Fritz) Hollings, D-S.C., who has long fought for MEP funding. "It is ironic at a time when they are rhetorically arguing that we need to do everything we can to help small and medium-sized businesses, they zero out this program," Davis said, noting that the decision is confusing given that the Senate voted to fully fund MEP and keep budget increases down.
"The onus is on the House leadership and the White House," he said.
A House source noted that House Democrats fought to keep the funding and cannot understand why the White House would support killing a program that is credited with creating or retaining 32,000 jobs, increasing sales by $750 million and sparking $743 million in modernization, such as plant and equipment upgrades and workforce training, during fiscal 2002.
Udall noted that the funding cuts would mean 11,275 fewer businesses would receive support, resulting in sales losses, $446 million more in costs and $649 million less investment.
"I don't think there is a disagreement on whether the program is a good program," said Connie Partoyan, senior adviser to Phil Bond, director of the Commerce Department's Technology Administration. "When the president submitted his budget back in February, there were a lot of competing priorities with homeland security and national security issues," resulting in the lower funding request, she said.
However, Bond "has been working to see if there can be an effort to take another look at MEP as part of our overall manufacturing initiative," she said.
A spokeswoman for the program noted that nothing would change until the budget is approved, and once NIST knows the exact funding, officials would devise a plan to keep MEP running. "The program is not going to shut down," she said.
Lobbying
E-Voting Company Executives Set Goals For New Group
by Chloe Albanesius
The Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) on Tuesday detailed the organizational goals of its new e-voting group, the Election Technology Council (ETC).
Tracey Graham, president of Sequoia Voting Systems, said at a press conference that the group's concerns are developing "a code of ethics for election systems' companies, a series of recommendations in the area of standards and certification, and a review of best practices in the area of security."
Sequoia is one of six companies involved in the project. Other participants are Advanced Voting Systems, Diebold Election Systems, Election Systems & Software, Hart InterCivic and Unilect.
"The ETC is now a forum to which those in academia, government, interested groups and individuals can turn for constructive dialogue on issues like vote accuracy and security," ITAA President Harris Miller said.
The council has "an overarching responsibility to build voter confidence in the accuracy, responsibility and security of those systems," said David Hart, chairman of ETC and of Hart InterCivic.
Critics of e-voting machines have pointed to the lack of a paper trail from electronic systems that would make a recount impossible. Miller said those counties that request paper trails would be able to get them. The Florida Association of Counties is one of those that requested that their machines not have a paper trail, he added.
"It's a common myth that [e-voting machines] are not auditable," said Bill Welsh, former chairman and director of Election Systems & Software.
"The election industry is very heavily regulated," Hart said. Fraud on a massive scale would require competing companies to collaborate with another, an unlikely venture. It is, however, an "ongoing process to make sure products are certified," he said.
The ETC will meet in January and would like to run on a "rapid timetable" due to the upcoming presidential elections. They are stalled somewhat, however, until Congress gives final approval on an omnibus spending bill that would give the e-voting industry $1.5 billion, Miller said.
Spectrum
Officials Begin Tackling Reform Of Spectrum Management
by Teri Rucker
The White House charged government agencies with reforming spectrum-management policy, but that means government officials now must grapple with basic issues such as defining spectrum "efficiency," panelists said on Tuesday.
"Confusion seems to reign because of different definitions of efficiency," acting assistant secretary for Commerce Michael Gallagher said during the first of a series of government-sponsored forums on spectrum management. "We need to define it and then work from there."
Michael Calabrese, vice president of the New America Foundation, sees spectrum efficiency as "whatever facilitates communication." Greg Rosston, deputy director of the Stanford Institute of Economic Policy Research, generally views it as whatever "maximizes consumer benefit," although in the case of spectrum, he said it also includes public-interest benefits derived from government use of spectrum.
At the prodding of Gallagher, the eight panelists agreed that the term efficiency possesses technical, economic and social components that must be considered, although which element takes priority is debatable, they said.
"Technical efficiency alone is not necessarily" the goal, Rosston said, because it can be achieved at the unfortunate expense of the social components.
James Miller, director of spectrum policy at the Transportation Department, agreed, noting that some bands of spectrum, along with equipment used in those bands (like those used by the Federal Aviation Administration to ensure safe air travel), cannot be replicated or substituted without tragic consequences.
Policymakers "often confuse their keen interest in who gets the resource with the best distribution system," said Adele Morris, an economist at the Treasury Department.
Gallagher agreed, noting that based on the discussion, "you can manipulate these concepts and play them off one another to get to the outcome you want to achieve." He urged participants to submit written comments detailing specifics.
Panelists added that the other looming issue is deciding upon the proper incentives to encourage efficient spectrum use, particularly among government users.
The government's first job, Morris said, is to establish an assessment tool to determine its spectrum-resource needs and to measure whether agencies are using their spectrum allocation effectively.
She suggested considering a mechanism allowing agencies to lease unused portions of their spectrum temporarily, thereby ensuring the spectrum does not lie fallow and boosting the agency's budget.
However, Rosston warned that incentives for government spectrum users are different than in the commercial sector. For example, if the Defense Department uses its spectrum more efficiently, it could lose spectrum it would like to reserve for potential future use, he said. He added that if an agency leases the spectrum, it faces congressional budget cuts equal to the lease fees, which diminishes the incentive to lease.
"You can already see that it is harder than you might think to get the incentives right," Morris said, agreeing that it is necessary to find the right balance between efficiency incentives, the appropriations process and the desire for agencies to retain as much spectrum as they can.
Intellectual Property
Observers Expect Dudas To Get Top Job At Patent Office
by Drew Clark
The announcement by Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) Director James Rogan that he is leaving the Bush administration in January should pave the way for his deputy, Jon Dudas, to assume the top job, individuals close to the patent office said on Tuesday.
Rogan has served for two years as the Commerce Department's undersecretary for intellectual property. He has spearheaded a legislative initiative aimed at bolstering the quality of the patent-review process by improving the agency's operations and by using higher application fees to increase the number of examiners.
Dudas currently is the deputy undersecretary for intellectual property and deputy director of PTO. Under law, he becomes the acting director when Rogan resigns Jan. 9. Rogan is leaving to complete work on his autobiography, "Rough Edges," which is scheduled to be published next summer by HarperCollins.
Others close to the office expect Dudas to receive the president's nomination as director, and many said Dudas already is running the agency. On Monday, he gave the keynote address at the agency's "PTO Day" and has represented the office on various recent occasions.
At the Dec. 2 dedication of the new PTO headquarters in Alexandria, Va., Dudas served as master of ceremonies and thanked the audience for attending the ceremony, signaling the opening of the first of five buildings the agency ultimately will occupy. Commerce official Sam Bodman referred to Dudas and Rogan as "managing the U.S. PTO."
"Jim Rogan is the director who has put PTO reform on the Washington agenda, and that is a major accomplishment," said Herb Wamsley, executive director of Intellectual Property Owners Association (IPO).
Rogan's new fee proposal is dubbed the "21st-century strategic plan" and was revised after initial objections by patent owners. The plan is embodied in a bill, H.R. 1561, and as approved by the House Judiciary Committee, that bill would take PTO out of the annual appropriations process.
"[Rogan] developed that [plan] and promoted that within the government, on Capitol Hill, in the private sector, and it is very widely supported," Wamsley said. "The 21st Century Strategic Plan is PTO reform, and he is the person who did that."
Dudas, who has served as Rogan's deputy since January 2002, was the counsel for legal policy and senior floor assistant to House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. He previously served as deputy general counsel for the House Judiciary Committee and as counsel on then Courts and Intellectual Property Subcommittee.
He also practiced law in Chicago at Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg, and earned a law degree from the University of Chicago. Dudas was traveling and unavailable for comment.
"To me, the interesting question is how much [Dudas] is tied to the plan," said another attorney close to PTO. "Or how much does he have to divert from the plan because of the overwhelming funding realities?"
Business
Recording Industry Changes As Copyright Fights Continue
by Joan Van Tassel for Technology Daily
LOS ANGELES -- If there is an overriding theme for the iHollywood Forum's business conference here this week, it is that the music industry waits for no lawyers.
Even as the Recording Industry Association of America issues subpoenas alleging copyright infringement, courts rule in those cases and legislatures debate new laws, companies on the consumer front line definitely are not continuing business as usual. Executives are fighting back on the business front, not just the legal front, after being pummeled by piracy.
"We have to reinvent ourselves," David Ring, a vice president at Universal Music Group's eLabs, said here on Monday, "but a lot of people don't understand how incredibly difficult it is" to do that while the industry has lost a third of its business and been forced to lay off workers. "It takes manpower and money -- and a lot of them."
In spite of the difficulties, the labels are moving their catalogs online as quickly as possible. Ring pointed to his own company's efforts to allow legal downloads, totaling more than 100,000 non-classical tracks in the last nine months.
The success of Apple's iTunes service has been a catalyst, leading the way for the industry as a whole to develop online marketing. ITunes Marketing Director Peter Lowe was keynote speaker at the conference and provided some insight into Apple's thinking in starting the service.
He noted Apple's long involvement with digital music, particularly creation software. As consumers moved from purchasing compact discs and copying them onto their own compilation discs to using the Napster file-sharing service and then other similar services, Lowe said Apple realized that people want portable entertainment.
He summarized consumers' wants as: instant gratification; a vast selection of music; the unlimited right to copy CDs and use portable players and computers; and free access to songs.
The company also observed the negative aspects of what it considered illegal file-sharing services, Lowe added. "Encoding and downloads are unreliable. There are no previews or album cover art. Finally, file sharing is stealing."
The lack of legal alternatives for consumers prompted Apple to create iTunes in an effort to remove the negative aspects of illegal services while making most of the features that customers desire. ITunes subscribers can burn an unlimited number of CDs and move music to any number of portable players. They can play music on up to three computers. And while the service is not free, 99 cents per song is widely perceived as a reasonable charge.
The company made deals with the five major recording labels before launch. Since then, it has added more than 200 independent labels, fulfilling the consumers' desire to have a vast selection of more than 400,000 songs. ITunes sold 20 million songs in its first seven months of operation and hopes to reach 100 million in its first year.
Budget
Fiscal 2004 Appropriations Work Delayed Until January
by Peter Cohn, CongressDaily
The first session of the 108th Congress will end Tuesday with seven of 13 annual must-pass appropriations bills unfinished despite Republican control of both chambers and the White House.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., on Tuesday moved to limit debate on an $820 billion omnibus package for fiscal 2004 that combines the seven remaining spending bills. A vote would occur at 2:30 p.m. when the Senate returns Jan. 20, and Frist said final passage could occur within 24 hours after that.
Frist failed to gain unanimous consent to pass the bill Tuesday after objections from Minority Leader Thomas Daschle, D-S.D., and Appropriations Committee ranking Democrat Robert Byrd of West Virginia.
The House passed the omnibus bill on Monday by a vote of 242-176 before adjourning until Jan. 20, when a joint session will convene for President Bush's State of the Union speech.
Frist decided not to call senators back to town from their vacations -- despite direct lobbying by Bush -- due to a commitment not to have roll-call votes until January. But Frist acknowledged he faced possible defeat on the Senate floor, putting fiscal 2004 spending in limbo for the remainder of the fiscal year.
"My job is to maximize opportunity to pass this omnibus bill," he told reporters. "This month there is sufficient uncertainty" about the bill that the chances for passage were "less than optimal," he said, adding that floor debate could take eight or nine days.
Daschle and Byrd criticized GOP leaders for not completing appropriations work on time. "At the beginning of the year, we were told that the White House and Senate Republican leadership would make sure the Appropriations process ran more smoothly than ever before," Daschle said. "In fact, the process broke down to an extent never seen before, opening the door to the worst kind of legislative abuses and special-interest giveaways."
Daschle unsuccessfully moved to debate and vote on a resolution removing from the bill last-minute deals struck by the majority Republicans and the White House on provisions dealing with media ownership and other issues.
Frist objected to that and another Daschle motion to separate from the omnibus the foreign-aid spending bill, citing concerns about a lack of funding to combat HIV/AIDS. Frist said there are sufficient funds within the current continuing resolution, which funds the government under fiscal 2003 levels through Jan. 31. Frist also objected to a motion for temporary unemployment aid.
Frist defended his record as majority leader in moving the appropriations process along. Combined with the 11-bill fiscal 2003 omnibus package enacted early this year are the six fiscal 2004 spending bills already approved and the pending seven-bill omnibus for fiscal 2004.
"I passed 25 appropriations bills," Frist said in a slight exaggeration -- only 23 have been approved in the Senate under his watch. But Frist noted that when the Democrats were in control last year, they were unable to move most of the fiscal 2003 bills through the Senate.
Today's Feature:
People Column
James Rogan announced that he is leaving his post as director of the Patent and Trademark Office effective Jan. 9. Jon Dudas, PTO's deputy director, will succeed him. Meanwhile, Adobe Systems is opening a government relations office in Washington, moving its newly hired senior director for public policy Michael Engelhardt back East.
Every Tuesday, read the People Column by Senior Writer Ted Leventhal.
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E-briefs
Trade: A U.S. trade official on Tuesday ruled out the idea of the Bush administration moving on its own to launch a trade case against China based on allegations that it manipulates its exchange rate to gain an advantage. Deputy Assistant U.S. Trade Representative Charles Freeman told a Senate subcommittee that the administration had no plans to launch such a case on its own. Governmental Affairs Government Management Subcommittee Chairman George Voinovich, R-Ohio, urged administration officials to launch a case against China for its failure to meet trade commitments on protecting intellectual property. He praised the administration for changes at the Commerce Department to combat unfair trade practices, in particular the call to create a new assistant secretary for manufacturing. The nominee for that post will be announced when Congress approves omnibus appropriations legislation that includes language authorizing the position, Assistant Commerce Secretary James Jochum said.
Intellectual Property: The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has hired Bradley Buckles, the director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), to head its anti-piracy unit. Buckles will work with investigators throughout the country to combat illegal downloads of music. "Brad's appointment should signal to everyone that we continue to take piracy, here and throughout the world, very seriously," said Mitch Bainwol, chairman and CEO of the RIAA. Buckles has been at the ATF since 1974, where he first served as chief counsel and then deputy director before being named director in 1999.
Defense: The House on Monday passed a Senate-amended version of legislation that would reauthorize defense production programs. The previous act expired in early October, leaving the government without the ability to bypass military procurement procedures for emergency purposes. In addition to providing that emergency purchasing power, the bill contains language that would extend the existing procurement right to the production of any aspect of critical infrastructure, including cyber-based systems and telecommunications networks. And it would authorize $200 million in funds to produce more "radiation-hardened" electronics in an attempt to address the problem of electronics failures due to exposure to natural or man-made radiation.
Telecom: One obstacle to recovery in the telecommunications industry is the competitive threat from Internet telephony, according to a Boston-based research firm. Two-thirds of small and medium-sized businesses are willing to consider Web-based telephone service to save money, the Yankee Group concluded in a survey release on Monday at a small-business forum in Waltham, Mass. Another leading argument for Internet telephony, the study showed, is the ability to serve customers better by integrating phones with computer-based processes such as call tracking, automatic updates for phone books and the quick additions of new lines. But the survey found companies seeking more information, said Helen Chan, a senior analyst for the group. "The features have to be as rich as in the current system," she said. "The interest is there, but they need to know more and what it will cost or if it will increase productivity at a cost that's affordable."
Trade: Non-production costs imposed on U.S. manufacturers are pricing them out of international competition, according to a study released Tuesday by the National Association of Manufacturers and the Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI. The report says that certain external expenses -- such as corporate taxes, employee benefits, litigation costs, regulatory compliance costs and rising energy rates -- increase unit labor costs by more than 22 percent for manufacturers, or nearly $5 per hour, relative to the United States' nine closest competitors. Jeremy Leonard, an MAPI economist who authored the study, said these non-production costs "essentially offset a lot of the productivity gains in the U.S. manufacturing sector in the past decade." U.S. manufacturing productivity has increased 54 percent since 1990, according to the study, but external expenses have overtaken that increase. The report calls on Congress to reduce corporate taxes, shift more healthcare costs to consumers, and protect manufacturers from "frivolous" consumer lawsuits.
E-Government: The Health and Human Services Department (HHS) on Tuesday unveiled Grants.gov, a new Web site designed to be a central point of contact for federal grant programs. The site has information on more than 800 grant programs from all 36 agencies totaling more than $360 billion in awards. Visitors can submit applications for grants while online. HHS was designated the host agency for the site because it awards more than half of all federal grants. "By putting relevant information in one place, we're helping to level the playing field for organizations less familiar with federal grant programs so they, too, can identify and apply for federal grants," HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson said in a statement.
E-Commerce: The Justice and Commerce departments on Tuesday issued a joint statement expressing their support for the passage of anti-spam legislation. The bill would be a "useful step" in slowing the reach of unsolicited commercial e-mail and would establish "a framework of technological, administrative, civil and criminal tools" to combat spam. "The [Bush] administration recognizes that problems with spam cannot be solved by federal legislation alone; the development and adoption of new technologies will also be necessary," the departments added in a statement. Brightmail, which makes anti-spam technology, also issued its support for the measure on Tuesday but called for a combination of "legislation, technology, education and best practices" to truly stop spam. President Bush is expected to sign the measure. The Direct Marketing Association also praised the passage of the legislation but said they remained concerned about the inclusion of provisions creating a "do not spam" registry and labeling requirements. And the Americans for Technology Leadership also commended the passage but noted that it will take more than the bill to stop spam.
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