Communications-Related Headlines for August 22, 2003

TELECOM POLICY
Bells Won't Have to Share Broadband
FCC Releases New Phone, Broadband Rules
The FCC's Early Xmas Gift to the Lawyers
Consumers Will Continue to Fight for Competition

DIGITAL DIVIDE
Technology with Social Skills
Hope Floats: Asian Youths to Bridge Digital Divide

INTERNET SECURITY
Global Race Against the Clock to Beat Sobig Virus

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TELECOM POLICY

BELLS WON'T HAVE TO SHARE BROADBAND
Yesterday the FCC released its long-awaited set of rules that will govern
how Baby Bells and their rivals compete in the telecommunications market.
The order relieves the four regional Bells from having to give discounted
line-sharing services to competing Internet Service Providers that offer
residential DSL service. A decision by the FCC in February decision gave
state public utility commissions the authority to decide whether the Bells
must offer discounted rates for phone switching facilities used by
competitors. The order provides a set of guidelines for states to determine
whether there is significant competition in the voice market to loosen
regulations. CompTel, the Competitive Telecommunications Association, says
it is pleased with the FCC's decision to preserve switching discounts, but
concerned about the DSL decision. "The unjustified discontinuation of
line-sharing and premature deregulation of broadband access to customers
nationwide will only serve to strengthen the Bells' monopolistic grasp,"
said CompTel president H. Russell Frisby Jr.
SOURCE: Yahoo! News; AUTHOR: Grant Gross, IDG News Service
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/pcworld/20030822/tc_pcworld/11...

See also:

FCC RELEASES NEW PHONE, BROADBAND RULES
The FCC's long-awaited telecom rules, nearly 600 pages long, maintain the
requirement that regional Bells lease the use of their networks to
competitors at wholesale prices and provides great latitude to state
telephone regulators to establish pricing. While the new rules support
regulating the voice market to promote competition, the order also removes
similar safeguards for broadband Internet access, phasing out the network
discount over the next three years. The commission cites increased
competition in the broadband sector, particularly from the cable industry,
which controls about two-thirds of the domestic residential market. Long
distance providers such as WorldCom and AT&T praised portions of the deal
but were disappointed by the broadband deregulation, which will make it more
difficult for them to bundle services. "Consumers will pay for this lack of
FCC resolve in the form of higher rates, less choice and lower-quality
services," said Robert Quinn, AT&T vice president for federal regulatory
affairs. FCC Chairman Michael Powell, who dissented on the order, criticized
the majority and called the order "a molten morass of regulatory activity
that may very well wilt any lingering investment in the sector."
SOURCE: The Washington Post; AUTHOR: Christopher Stern
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28763-2003Aug21.html

THE FCC'S EARLY XMAS GIFT TO THE LAWYERS
Media reports across the country suggest that the FCC's new telecom rules
will face years of court challenges. "Every word will be challenged,"
telecom lawyer Dana Frix told the New York Times. The LA Times quoted AT&T's
Robert Quinn as saying that "[s]ome segment of the industry will appeal
every aspect of" the order. The Dow Jones Newswires said that the order
"signals less the end of a process than the beginning of litigation that has
been promised from virtually every corner of the industry" and predicted
that suits would be filed by both the regional Bells and their competitors
in the high-speed Internet market. Advocacy groups appear equally split on
the issue; while the LA Times reported that consumer groups cheered the
decision, the Consumer Federation of America "fears that broadband could
increasingly be dominated by the Bells and cable TV companies, and has
promised to fight that portion of the rules."
SOURCE: The Washington Post; AUTHOR: Cynthia L. Webb
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30786-2003Aug22.html

CONSUMERS WILL CONTINUE TO FIGHT FOR COMPETITION
"After six months of regulatory ruminating by the FCC the really hard work
must now begin," said Dr. Mark Cooper of the Consumer Federation of America
regarding yesterday's telecom order. Cooper pledged to continue fighting to
make sure that "state regulators have the flexibility they need to promote
competition." CFA intends to fight to reverse the broadband portions of the
order, however. "Why shouldn't consumers of 21st century communications get
the same benefits from competition that millions of wireline consumers
already enjoy?" he asks.
SOURCE: Consumer Federation of America; AUTHOR: Mark Cooper
Please contact Dr. Cooper at mcooper( at )consumerfed.org for more information.

DIGITAL DIVIDE

TECHNOLOGY WITH SOCIAL SKILLS
A number of development organizations are finding smart ways to use
technology to solve the world's most pressing socioeconomic problems. The
key for many of these initiatives is to focus on technologies appropriate
for the capabilities of NGOs working in capital-poor but labor-rich
developing countries. "It's not high technology or low technology but the
right technology that we're interested in," says Cowan Coventry of the
Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG), which works to bring
locally available, affordable technologies to the developing world. In
Sudan, ITDG makes cell phones available so that traders can phone in the
selling prices of commodities to radio networks; then farmers can find the
best price for their products. In the Philippines, watchdog groups are using
a simple software program called Martus to compile, analyze and securely
transmit data on human rights abuses. Project Impact has developed cheaper
manufacturing processes for intra-ocular lenses and high-end hearing aids
and sells these devices for a fraction of the traditional cost. "Poverty
maps," which use global positioning satellite technology to highlight areas
of poverty, have been used in Brazil to redistribute tax revenues and in
South Africa to create a strategy to contain a cholera outbreak.
SOURCE: Tech News World; AUTHOR: Jane Black
http://www.technewsworld.com/perl/story/31398.html

HOPE FLOATS: ASIAN YOUTHS TO BRIDGE DIGITAL DIVIDE
Fifteen projects have been selected to share a $1 million grant from the
Samsung DigitAll Hope program. The projects range from distance-learning
programs for the blind in Vietnam to helping young farmers in Malaysia
improve crops yields through information technology. In India, the Hope
grant will go towards funding 10 cybercafes in rural areas. This particular
project is part of a larger effort by Development Alternatives to spur the
setup of 48,000 cyber cafes in India over the next six years. Singapore's
Ngee Ann Polytechnic runs a program under its Business Information
Technology course to help young offenders from the prison's reformative
training center learn computer skills. Students develop a seven-week IT
curriculum for the offenders, ages 19-22, who attend classes at the
polytechnic once a week. Professor Leo Tan, who sits on the regional judging
panel for the awards, said hope floats when youths learn the need to help
others. "If I have the expertise, it's my duty, my responsibility, to bring
others along with me," he added.
SOURCE: The Straits Times; AUTHOR: Ho Ka Wei
http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/techscience/story/0,4386,205457,00.html

INTERNET SECURITY

GLOBAL RACE AGAINST THE CLOCK TO BEAT SOBIG VIRUS
Computer security experts raced frantically today to prevent a barrage of
data from being unleashed on the Web by the Sobig.F virus. A global hunt was
under way from the United States to South Korea to find and switch off 20
home computers with high-speed broadband connections targeted by hundreds of
thousands of infected computers at 3 pm EDT Friday. Security experts
discovered only late yesterday that the bug has an embedded instruction for
the infected PCs to make contact with the 20 computers, which store an
unknown program. The search has been somewhat successful thus far, as
technicians have located and shut down half of the machines. Analysts
estimate that the Sobig virus has infected over a million computers
worldwide, generating a massive flow of infectious junk emails and bogging
down computer networks.
SOURCE: Yahoo! News; AUTHOR: Bernhard Warner, Reuters
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20030822/tc_nm/tech_in...
et_virus_dc

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