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Telecom
FCC Poised To Temporarily Cap Universal Service
by David Hatch
The FCC is poised to impose a temporary cap on the multibillion-dollar universal service fund, with a vote expected this month, government and industry sources said.
The threshold, recommended in May by a federal-state advisory board comprised of agency officials, a consumer advocate and state regulators, is designed to curb the program's growth while substantive changes are pursued. The federal fund subsidizes telecommunications and Internet connections in rural and underprivileged areas.
On Oct. 26, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin circulated three USF proposals among his colleagues. New rules would freeze funding at 2007 levels to "competitive" carriers, mostly wireless firms that receive support in markets where dominant, traditional telephone companies are subsidized.
Critics complain that support to the carriers has grown by a billion dollars in recent years, threatening the fund's viability. Wireless companies counter that they provide critical service to rural regions and should not be singled out for reductions.
Martin also recommended that the FCC consider eliminating a rule requiring that assistance to competitors be based on subsidies to dominant firms, even if competitors' costs are lower. In addition, he suggested that the agency consider "reverse auctions," which award universal service funds to carriers agreeing to the lowest subsidies.
Both ideas would be outlined in proposed rulemakings subject to public comment. Meanwhile, the federal-state board may issue additional recommendations for long-term changes that reflect Martin's priorities.
A cap does not sit well with powerful lawmakers in both parties representing largely rural states that are heavily reliant on the program. "This is an ostrich approach as far as I'm concerned," Ted Stevens of Alaska, the ranking Republican on the Senate Commerce Committee, said at a June hearing that featured near-unanimous criticism.
Since then, however, some prominent lawmakers -- including Iowa Republican Charles Grassley -- have backed a threshold.
Martin has used telecom mergers to force major carriers to accept interim caps in exchange for approval of their deals. Last month, the agency conditioned a private equity firm's acquisition of Alltel on such a restriction, with similar conditions expected for AT&T's purchase of the wireless provider Dobson Communications and T-Mobile's acquisition of Suncom Wireless.
"That takes a large chunk of the [competitive] money off the table," a lobbyist noted, adding that the strategy makes it easier to impose the restriction industry-wide.
One source predicted that a USF cap will be approved along party lines. Supporters are Martin, who's spearheading the plan, and Deborah Taylor Tate, a fellow Republican commissioner who heads the advisory board. Robert McDowell, the third Republican, favored the Alltel cap, but his stance on the larger proposal is considered uncertain.
"My gut tells me that he would go along for a ride on this," the source added.
Regarding the FCC's Democrats, Michael Copps is strongly opposed. Jonathan Adelstein supported the Alltel condition but clarified in an accompanying statement that his vote does not "prejudge" his view on a broader rule.
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Security
Travel Groups Want Visitor-Tracking Tool Upgraded
by Chris Strohm
A coalition of business travel organizations has boosted lobbying aimed at improving processes and technology for welcoming international visitors at U.S. airports, saying the Homeland Security Department is moving too slowly to meet congressional mandates.
In letters sent last week to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and key congressional appropriators, the National Business Travel Association urged the government to quicken the pace when it comes to modernizing airports.
A major bill enacted earlier this year to implement unfulfilled recommendations of the commission that investigated the 2001 terrorist attacks requires the department to create a "model ports of entry" program at 20 U.S. airports servicing most foreign business travelers and tourists.
To date, the department has only deployed the program at two airports: Houston International and Dulles International in the Washington region. The association, which includes corporate and government travel managers and travel service providers, joins a burgeoning movement aimed at improving the experience that foreigners have when traveling to the United States.
In its letter to Chertoff, the National Business Travel Association said Homeland Security is taking an incremental approach to the model ports program, which requires enhanced technology and processes for international visitors. The group urged the department "to move as aggressively as possible to implement this program expeditiously.
"Affording business travelers and tourists alike the opportunity to enter the United States through an arrival process that is efficient, welcoming, informative and secure is good for our economy and serves as [a] valuable public diplomacy tool."
C. Stewart Verdery, founder of Monument Policy Group and a chief lobbyist for the association, said the Customs and Border Protection division has not yet issued a schedule for implementing the program at other airports. "We need a more dedicated focus if we're ever going to expand it, and obviously it's going to take some money," Verdery said.
In a separate letter, the association asked top Democrats and Republicans on the Senate and House Appropriations committees to allocate $40 million to the model ports program. The Senate committee included $40 million, but House Appropriations did not include similar funding. The two chambers have not yet negotiated a final bill.
"We're optimistic that the money will stay in," Verdery said.
The Discover America Partnership, meanwhile, estimates that the United States has experienced a 17 percent decline in foreign visitors, costing the country $94 billion in lost spending, nearly 200,000 jobs and $16 billion in lost tax revenue.
It is backing other legislation that would create an independent, nonprofit corporation to promote travel to the United States. The fund would be financed by both public and private sources, including an additional $10 fee charged to international travelers from U.S.-friendly countries whose citizens do not need visas to visit the United States.
Verdery, who also lobbies for the partnership, said the legislation has bipartisan support from key Senate and House lawmakers. "It's really just a question of how we can get it marked up and through," he said.
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Civil Liberties
Critics Of Telecom Immunity Rally Against Senate Bill
by Andrew Noyes
Civil libertarians and high-tech watchdogs on Monday slammed Senate legislation that would grant retroactive legal immunity to telecommunications firms that reportedly have helped the federal government conduct anti-terrorism wiretaps without warrants.
The American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which hosted a teleconference with reporters, have court cases pending against major telephone and Internet providers, as well as the National Security Agency, in connection with the Bush administration's electronic spying and use of customer calling records.
Last month, the Senate Intelligence Committee approved a bill, S.2248, that could end that litigation, officials said during the afternoon briefing. The bill would let the attorney general block any court or public utility commission from reviewing whether state and federal laws were broken by spying activities after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The measure also would let the government gag the courts hearing the cases after forcing them to dismiss the lawsuits. Judges would not be allowed to say whether the dismissals were based on the firms' alleged nonparticipation or whether they spied on customers, ACLU officials said.
The measure would kill cases seeking monetary damages and those that want a ruling from the court stating that the behavior was illegal. It also would let the attorney general intervene in state investigations into whether their privacy laws were violated by wiretapping and the release of consumer records after 9/11.
Ann Brick, an attorney with the ACLU of Northern California, said now "is not the time to be talking about amnesty for the telephone companies." "The issue of whether or not damages will be imposed on them is a long way away," she said.
District courts, appeals courts -- and possibly even the U.S. Supreme Court -- are still expected to weigh in on the litigation if it is allowed to proceed, she said. The pending legislation would "short-circuit the judicial process," Brick argued.
Caroline Fredrickson, ACLU's top lobbyist, said it is "highly unusual" for Congress to intervene in ongoing litigation, and to legislatively dismiss the cases "would only invite some major constitutional challenges about the role of Congress in a pending lawsuit."
Upon his panel approving the bill, Senate Intelligence Chairman John (Jay) Rockefeller, D-W.Va., said "private companies who received legal assurances from the highest levels of government should not be dragged through the courts for their help with national security."
The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to debate the bill Thursday, and that panel's chairman, Patrick Leahy, has publicly expressed concern with the telecom immunity provision.
The Vermont Democrat said that before considering such a proposal, he and ranking Republican Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania "have always been clear with the administration that we would need the legal justifications, authorizations and other documents that show the basis for the actions of the government and the carriers."
In related news, the primary witness in EFF's lawsuit against AT&T will visit Washington this week to ask lawmakers to reject amnesty for the telecom firms. A media event with AT&T whistleblower Mark Klein is scheduled for Wednesday.
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Politics
Facebook Time: How Does It Matter To Candidates?
by Heather Greenfield
Comedian Stephen Colbert may be out of the Democratic presidential race, but he may be getting online supporters to go to the polls to choose a primary candidate. The comedian now has the largest political group on Facebook, with 1.3 million friends.
A widget on that site called Rock the Vote helps young people register to vote, and in just over a week, it registered nearly 5,000 eligible voters. The widget is important as both candidates and those promoting them chart the value of social-networking sites like Facebook.
The entertainer announced his candidacy Oct. 16 but said he would just run in his home state of South Carolina. South Carolina Democratic Executive Council members on Thursday voted 13-3 to reject Colbert's bid. Some were concerned that he was using his candidacy to publicize his comedy routine. The Caucus reported Monday that Colbert has dropped his presidential bid.
The Colbert group, administered by Raj Vachhani, set a Facebook record, gaining 1 million members in just eight days. As Vachhani cheered the progress, online strategists voiced varying advice on Facebook groups and whether they matter.
Julie Barko Germany, deputy director of George Washington University's Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet, said she has "no empirical evidence" to suggest Facebook friends translate to votes. "But that doesn't mean that social-networking outreach is worthless," Germany said. "It's just a matter of developing an online outreach strategy that uses community tools to accomplish real political goals, like voting."
Kari Chisholm, a Democratic consultant for Mandate Media, said "it's not about votes. Facebook is a social network, so it's really best used as an organizing tool."
"If a campaign has 500,000 friends nationwide, that's going to be, on average, over 1,000 friends per congressional district," Chisholm said. "That's a lot of capacity, even if only 10 percent of them actually show up at events, volunteer or donate."
What about a half-million enemies? Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton holds the dubious honor of having the second-largest political group on Facebook -- dubious because the group unites Republicans, Democrats and independents who oppose her.
Stop Hillary crossed the 500,000-member mark in late October and has a goal to get 1 million members by this month.
Pro-Clinton Facebook groups, meanwhile, have more than 8,000 members.
Democrat Barack Obama is the major candidate with the biggest support group on Facebook; it has more than 389,000 members. But he also faces a few anti-Obama groups with about 200,000 members each, and a One Million Strong Against Hillary and Obama group has 3,100 members.
Joe Trippi, a senior adviser for Democratic candidate John Edwards, said he would not advise a campaign to take any action over negative Facebook groups because they cannot and should not be controlled. He said that with 300 million Americans, candidates do not necessarily have to worry about 1 million people opposing them anyway.
Altogether, he sees both the transparency and participation in social-networking groups as a good thing. "What this is [doing] is turning democracy over to the people," he said.
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Intellectual Property
Dual Changes In China Complicate Tech Policy Efforts
by Andrew Noyes
China is going through what amounts to an industrial and electronic revolution "all at once," which creates "some strain on policies to deal with that," a Philips Electronics executive told an Intellectual Property Owners Association conference Monday.
The country, whose economic underpinning has shifted in the past two decades from agriculture to manufacturing, is "almost an alternate universe" when compared to how the United States and Europe have evolved in the technology-driven era, said Jack Slobod, the firm's senior director for intellectual property licensing.
Gregory Shea, managing director of the U.S. Information Technology Office, a Beijing-based trade group that has represented American IT interests in China since 1995, expanded on that theme, noting the Chinese government's clear emphasis on self-reliance.
A 15-year "indigenous innovation" agenda, unveiled in January 2006 by the Chinese State Council, the country's chief administrative authority, uses various policy tools to promote, favor and reward home-grown IT advancements, he said.
One near-term goal is to increase research and development spending to 2.5 percent of China's gross domestic product by 2010, a doubling of the current rate, Shea said. But unlike in the United States, that development is being led chiefly by government, not industry.
China's inward-focused tech agenda can be illustrated by its work in the standards-setting arena, WilmerHale attorney Gil Ohana said. One example is a 2003 proposal to create a national policy for authentication and encryption of data that uses the Wi-Fi wireless technology.
The effort began at the same time that the engineering standards body known as IEEE was embarking on a parallel international initiative, which resulted in what is now known as the 802.11i wireless standard, he said.
Under China's model, makers of wireless devices from any country would have had to buy chips from one of 11 Chinese manufacturers in order to comply. That proposition sent shockwaves through the American tech sector, which urged U.S. trade officials to challenge the proposal.
Despite China's efforts, the plan did not get the support it needed from its own computing and networking businesses, which were expanding rapidly overseas. The International Organization for Standardization and the International Electrotechnical Commission eventually ratified IEEE's standard and rejected China's.
In recent years, representatives from Chinese companies have gotten involved in multinational technology policy organizations, Intel attorney Earl Neid noted. "They see the benefits of working with the West," he said.
Still, he characterized the country's standards-setting objectives as "a work in progress." "The Chinese are worried about foreigners taking advantage of their system," he said, and some "still desire from time to time to create a duplicative or incompatible standard" with the Western world.
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Health
Group Outlines Keys To A State E-Health System
by Aliya Sternstein
Creating a roadmap for networks to exchange electronic health records and coordinating privacy policies are key to developing a state e-health system, according to the interim findings of an ongoing study presented Monday by the American Health Information Management Association.
AHIMA delivered its observations during a conference on the role of state public-private partnerships in building a sustainable health information exchange. The group conducted telephone interviews with executives, directors, managers and advisers of 15 state-level exchange networks, and reviewed documents on the status of health care in each of those states.
The study was part of an AHIMA project that began in 2006, under a contract with the Health and Human Services Department. The project's larger aim is to guide the ongoing development of state information exchanges toward a nationwide network. A preliminary report was released in September, and a final report is due in March.
After describing the importance of technical roadmaps, the respondents stressed the need for the application of consistent data use, access and control policies across statewide networks, said Donald Mon, AHIMA's vice president of practice leadership.
Based on interviews, researchers determined several areas of access management that such policies should address, including identity-proofing, authentication and the choice not to participate in the network. There are currently "cracks in the pavement" in "building a solid foundation for privacy and security," Mon added.
For example, the issue of so-called consent directives, where a patient signs a document that contains a broad spectrum of disclosures that would be beneficial for a doctor's visit, would raise the question of the standard for obtaining consent.
Laura Adams, the CEO of Rhode Island Quality Institute, a collaborative forum that represents all aspects of health care and consumer interest, brought the discussion down to a practical level. She made a case for centralizing e-health records exchanges at the state level, as Rhode Island is striving to do. The state health department entered into a public-private partnership through her institute to build a network several years ago.
She said that with a central body, hospitals, insurers, physicians, consumers, nurses, academia and elected officials can agree on state legislation to protect consumer information and the provider participants in the health information exchange.
So far, Rhode Island's exchange stakeholders and committees have vetted draft safeguard legislation. The proposal should be introduced shortly if endorsed by the institute's board on Wednesday.
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Defense
What A Difference Digital Communications Make
by Greg Grant, GovExec.com
Access to a digital communications network played a key role in saving a helicopter crew and preventing the loss of American soldiers' live near Tal Afar, Iraq, in 2004, according to a new study by RAND.
The report draws a contrast between what happened in that battle and the better-know "Black Hawk Down" battle in Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993, 18 Americans were killed and dozens wounded, leading to the eventual withdrawal of U.S. forces from the country. The study said the difference is that forces in 2004 had networked digital communications networks and access to high-capacity satellite communications and navigation.
In the Mogadishu battle, ground units in Humvees that were sent to rescue a helicopter shot down by a rocket-propelled grenade did not have receivers for the global positioning system and had to rely on paper maps for navigation. Rescuers on the ground became lost in a maze of streets and alleys, and helicopter gunships were uncertain of the exact location of friendly troops.
Communication was limited to voice-only analog radios, the report said. Two problems resulted: 1) Troops used various frequencies, so different groups sent to the crash site could not talk to each other; and 2) the few frequencies used by multiple groups quickly were jammed.
The long delays caused by poor communications and units getting lost gave enemy forces more time to gather strength.
The digitally networked troops at Tal Afar, on the other hand, were able to organize the rescue much faster, react to fast-changing battlefield events more quickly and find their way through congested city streets while under heavy enemy fire.
The report said the Army units were equipped with Stryker wheeled vehicles and Blue Force Tracker, a system that used GPS to track the location of every American vehicle. The locations were overlaid on a map and displayed on a computer screen as blue icons. The tracker also allows instant text-messaging between networked units, and the Stryker unit had high-bandwidth satellite voice communications.
The Tal Afar battle began when a Kiowa Warrior helicopter providing surveillance for ground troops was shot down by a rocket-propelled grenade fired by an insurgent. The Stryker unit commander could see the helicopter icon on his tracker. He immediately dispatched rescuers.
A video surveillance feed from an aerial drone showed a large group of insurgents moving toward the crash site, so the Stryker unit commander dispatched reinforcements. They never got lost and arrived at the site within 30 minutes to establish a defensive perimeter.
RAND's analysts concluded that digital communications technology contributed directly to the successful outcome at Tal Afar, particularly in speed of battle command, capacity to synchronize the movement of multiple units, and ability to talk to aircraft overhead.
The report noted that the tracker used in Iraq remains a "blue force" digital network, in that it provides the exact locations of friendly troops but not that of enemy or "red forces." In Iraq, establishing those locations remains largely dependent on human intelligence.
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Today's Feature:
Issue of the Week
Vint Cerf, the silver-haired man known to many as the father of the Internet left his longtime post as chairman of the Internet Corporation for Names and Numbers on Friday. But he is positive that ICANN, which administers the Web-addressing system, will continue to thrive in his absence.
Every Monday, read the Issue of the Week by the Technology Daily staff.
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E-briefs
Crime: A West Virginia man was sentenced to 30 years in prison for charges relating to child pornography, the Justice Department said Friday. David Hicks was found guilty Jan. 23 on two counts of producing child porn, two counts of possessing it and one count of receiving the porn over the Internet. Hicks frequently took inappropriate nude and partially nude photographs of his daughter's friends, who were younger than 10, while they were visiting his home, according to evidence presented at the trial. He kept those images on his hard drive, which also contained thousands of sexually explicit images and movies of other prepubescent children that he obtained through a peer-to-peer file-sharing program. In other news, Reuters reports that a New Jersey man was sentenced Friday to two years in jail in a New York federal court for aiding in the distribution of unsolicited e-mails to more than 1.2 million AOL subscribers.
Telecom: Confirming its long-rumored foray into the mobile market, Google said Monday it is developing a free cellular telephone software package so the Internet search leader can more easily peddle advertisements and services to people who are not in front of computers. While the announcement ended months of speculation about the company's mobile ambitions, AP reports that the first phones equipped with Google's "software stack" won't be available until the second half of 2008. And Google won't be making the phones, nor does it plan to stamp its prized brand on the devices. Instead, it will work with four phone manufacturers -- HTC, LG Electronics, Motorola and Samsung Electronics -- which have agreed to use Google's programs in their handsets. Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn on Monday said the new project "is a step in the right direction to benefit consumers" and shows "the value that most of the wireless world places on opening up cell phones and wireless services."
Business: Richard Parsons will depart as CEO of Time Warner at the end of the year, five years after taking the helm of the world's largest media conglomerate and rebuilding its stature following a merger with AOL. AP reports that Time Warner said Monday that Parsons will be replaced Jan. 1 by Jeff Bewkes, a former head of HBO who is currently the company's chief operating officer. Parsons will stay on as chairman. The CEO changeover had been widely expected. Parsons, one of the most prominent black executives in corporate America, has spent much of his tenure repairing the damage from Time Warner's agreement in 2000 to be acquired by AOL. The grand synergies promised by the deal never materialized, and the company later faced, and settled, shareholder lawsuits and federal investigations stemming from shady accounting practices at AOL.
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