BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2017
The Times, They’re Not A-Changin’: The Continuing Case for an Open Internet http://bit.ly/2y3Ly03
COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY
The Terrifying Power of Internet Censors - op-ed
Americans Are Poorly Informed About Basic Constitutional Provisions [links to Annenberg Public Policy Center]
Poll: Most California Democrats want to restrict free speech from white nationalists [links to San Jose Mercury News]
ELECTIONS & MEDIA
Clinton: Media rewarded Trump for ‘bigoted’ attacks [links to Hill, The]
Assessing a Clinton argument that the media helped to elect Trump - WaPo analysis
Russia Used Facebook Events to Organize Anti-Immigrant Rallies on US Soil
Facebook needs to answer these questions about the Russian campaign to influence American voters - [links to Benton summary]
SECURITY/PRIVACY
The Right Response to Equifax - PK analysis
The three big questions Equifax hasn’t answered [links to Benton summary]
Equifax data breach focuses Washington's attention on security of sensitive personal information [links to Benton summary]
Zeynep Tufekci: Equifax’s Maddening Unaccountability [links to New York Times]
Lawmakers Want Limits on Wiretaps Despite Trump Administration Objections [links to New York Times]
Bluetooth attack can take over phones, computers over the air [links to Hill, The]
Energy Dept Doles out $33 Million to Help Grid Withstand Cyber and Physical Attacks [links to nextgov]
Law making it illegal to collect data, photo of open land hangs in balance [links to Ars Technica]
INTERNET/BROADBAND
Congress, don't let net neutrality debate fall victim to executive orders - The Hill op-ed [links to Benton summary]
Op-ed -- Bipartisanship needed re: net neutrality bill [links to Angus Leader]
EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS
Hurricane Irma Communications Status Report for Sept. 12 [links to Federal Communications Commission]
Statement of Commissioner Rosenworcel on Senate Passage of SANDY Act - press release [links to Benton summary]
In Defense of the TV Reporter Standing Outside During a Hurricane [links to Slate]
TELEVISION/CONTENT
Google Offers Olive Branch to Publishers by Relaxing Policy on Subscription Sites
Apple has upgraded its Apple TV box, but it’s not yet reinventing TV [links to Vox]
AT&T CEO: Bye-Bye DirecTV, Hello AT&T OTT Video [links to telecompetitor]
Netflix CFO David Wells Says Content Spending Will Pass $7 Billion a Year [links to Wrap, The]
Yelp accuses Google of violating FTC settlement [links to Hill, The]
Comcast raises sports and TV fees again, says it’s about “transparency” [links to Ars Technica]
Achieving the Promise of Digital TV [links to Broadcasting&Cable]
WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
CAF II Auction Rules: FCC Explains How Proposed Auction to Fund Rural Broadband Would Work [links to Benton summary]
Remarks Of FCC Chairman Ajit Pai At Mobile World Congress Americas - speech [links to Benton summary]
T-Mobile: No to ATSC 3.0 Cellphone Mandate [links to TVNewsCheck]
The US is now the world’s smartphone and wireless tech champ [links to Benton summary]
OWNERSHIP
Internet companies too big? FTC chair says more than market share counts [links to Benton summary]
JOURNALISM
Sputnik, the Russian news agency, is under investigation by the FBI [links to Benton summary]
Concerns over FBI investigation into Russian ‘news’ are overblown [links to Benton summary]
Study: 91 percent of recent network Trump coverage has been negative [links to Benton summary]
DIVERSITY
Boxed In 2016-17: Women On Screen and Behind the Scenes in Television - San Diego State University research [links to Benton summary]
Combating Sexism in Tech With Honesty: The Impact of Upload’s Silence [links to Medium]
Ellen Pao says it's time to 'shake out' people in tech who don't believe in inclusion [links to Benton summary]
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
From staff cuts to lagging technology, Congress has a capacity problem [links to Brookings]
POLICYMAKERS
Hope Hicks to be named White House communications director
Chairman Pai Names Dana Shaffer As Deputy Bureau Chief Of Wireless Telecommunications Bureau - press release [links to Benton summary]
COMPANY NEWS
Apple Unveils New iPhone X to Fend Off Growing Competition [links to Wall Street Journal]
How Apple is bringing us into the age of facial recognition whether we’re ready or not [links to Washington Post]
Are you ready to unlock your iPhone with your face? [links to Los Angeles Times]
Tim Cook: Apple products aren't just for the rich [links to Guardian, The]
STORIES FROM ABROAD
Murdoch Bid for Sky Control Hits New Bump as UK Official Hints at Inquiry
Rupert Murdoch's Fox joins court challenge to CBS' Australian TV buyout [links to Reuters]
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COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY
INTERNET CENSORS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Kate Klonick]
[Commentary] Generally speaking, there are two kinds of corporate players on the internet: companies that build infrastructure through which content flows, and companies that seek to curate content and create a community. Internet service providers like Verizon and Comcast, domain name servers, web hosts and security services providers like Cloudflare are all the former — or the “pipe.” They typically don’t look at the content their clients and customers are putting up, they just give them the means to do it and let it flow. Because of the precise nature of Cloudflare’s business, and the scarcity of competitors, its role censoring internet speech is not just new, it’s terrifying. What makes Cloudflare an essential part of the internet is its ability to block malicious traffic from barraging clients’ websites with requests that take them offline. Cloudflare is one of the few companies in the world that provide this kind of reliable protection. If you don’t want your website to get taken down by extortionists, jokers, political opposition or hackers, you have to hire Cloudflare or one of its very few competitors. Social media platforms like Facebook are the latter. They encourage their users to create, share and engage with content — so they look at content all the time and decide whether they want to allow hateful material like that of neo-Nazis to stay up. While there have long been worries about internet service providers favoring access to some content over others, there has been less concern about companies further along the pipeline holding an internet on/off switch. In large part, this is because at other points in the pipeline, users have choice. Private companies can make their own rules, and consumers can choose among them. If GoDaddy won’t register your domain, you can go to Bluehost or thousands of other companies. But the fewer choices you have for the infrastructure you need to stay online, the more serious the consequences when companies refuse service.
[Kate Klonick is a lawyer and doctoral candidate at Yale Law School who studies law and technology.]
benton.org/headlines/terrifying-power-internet-censors | New York Times
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ELECTIONS & MEDIA
ASSESSING CLINTON ARGUMENT THAT MEDIA HELPED TO ELECT TRUMP
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Philip Bump]
Many of Hillary Clinton's supporters identify one culprit more than others in the 2016 outcome: the media. Clinton herself points a finger in that direction in her new book, “What Happened,” according to an excerpt published at the Hill. “Many in the political media don’t want to hear about how these things happened and how these things tipped the election in the final days,” Clinton writes. “They say their beef is that I’m not taking responsibility for my mistakes — but I have and I do again throughout this book. Their real problem is they can’t bear to face their own role in helping elect Trump, from providing him free airtime to giving my emails three times more coverage than all the issues affecting people’s lives combined.” The first point there is fair. By the end of the campaign, Donald Trump had been the beneficiary of the equivalent of some $5 billion in free advertising, according to the media tracking firm mediaQuant. Some of that was a function of the live coverage of Trump’s rallies, which often ran without interruption on cable news, particularly in the early days of the campaign. But much of that free coverage was also a function of online coverage, often driven by his tweets. In May 2016, as the Street notes, Trump generated nearly $200 million in free media attention — largely thanks to his weird tweet about taco bowls. It’s also worth noting that Clinton, too, was the beneficiary of free coverage. MediaQuant estimates that she was the beneficiary of $3.24 billion in free media coverage — or, as it’s known in political campaigns, earned media. Politicians work to get this free coverage. It’s part of the process. And Trump earned more than Clinton.
benton.org/headlines/assessing-clinton-argument-media-helped-elect-trump | Washington Post
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RUSSIA USED FB EVENTS TO ORGANIZE ANTI-IMMIGRANT RALLIES ON US SOIL
[SOURCE: Daily Beast, AUTHOR: Ben Collins, Kevin Poulsen, Spencer Ackerman]
Russian operatives hiding behind false identities used Facebook’s event management tool to remotely organize and promote political protests in the US, including an August 2016 anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim rally in Idaho. A Facebook spokesperson confirmed that the social-media giant “shut down several promoted events as part of the takedown we described last week.” The company declined to elaborate, except to confirm that the events were promoted with paid ads. (This is the first time the social media giant has publicly acknowledged the existence of such events.) The Facebook events—one of which echoed Islamophobic conspiracy theories pushed by pro-Trump media outlets—are the first indication that the Kremlin’s attempts to shape America’s political discourse moved beyond fake news and led unwitting Americans into specific real-life action.
benton.org/headlines/russia-used-facebook-events-organize-anti-immigrant-rallies-us-soil | Daily Beast
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SECURITY/PRIVACY
THE RIGHT RESPONSE TO EQUIFAX
[SOURCE: Public Knowledge, AUTHOR: Megan Stifel]
How can we reduce the consequences for consumers and companies when the next breach happens? We can pass national data breach legislation. A national standard would not have prevented the Equifax breach, but it would clarify for consumers and companies the types of information subject to protection and the penalties for failing to do so. While respecting the valuable role of the states, we clearly need a basic federal standard to ensure that all Americans can expect adequate data protection allowing companies to better deploy security and training so that the next breach is less damaging for consumers. Sen Mark Warner (D-VA) has not only renewed the call for national data breach legislation, but also asked the important question “is it time to rethink data protection policies dealing with these large, centralized sets of highly sensitive data on millions of Americans?” The answer to Senator Warner’s question is yes.
benton.org/headlines/right-response-equifax | Public Knowledge
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CONTENT
GOOGLE AND PUBLISHERS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Jack Nicas, Lukas Alpert]
Google is planning to end its “first click free” policy that enables users of its search engine to bypass paywalls on news websites, a move that could help publishers boost subscriptions, News Corp Chief Executive Robert Thomson said. Google for years has encouraged publishers to be part of the program, which allows search users to access a limited amount of content on subscription-based news sites free of charge. Some publishers say the policy has hurt subscription growth and say their sites are penalized in Google’s search rankings if they don’t participate in the program. The Wall Street Journal, which is owned by News Corp, opted out of the program in 2017 and saw its traffic from Google search fall 38% and from Google News fall 89% compared with a year earlier because its stories were demoted in search results, a spokesman said. Now, Google is ready to end the first-click-free program and allow publishers to choose how users access their sites from its search results. People familiar with the situation said Google will still enable subscription-oriented publishers to give search users a free sample of their stories if they choose to, but they won’t be penalized if they don’t.
benton.org/headlines/google-offers-olive-branch-publishers-relaxing-policy-subscription-sites | Wall Street Journal
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POLICYMAKERS
HICKS TO BE NAMED WH COMMUMICATIONS DIRECTOR
[SOURCE: Politico, AUTHOR: Louis Nelson, Andrew Restuccia]
Hope Hicks, a longtime member of President Donald Trump’s communications team, will assume the role of White House communications director on a permanent basis, a senior administration official confirmed Sept 12. Hicks had taken on the role of communications director on an interim basis since Aug, when she filled the job following the short-lived tenure of Anthony Scaramucci. The 28-year-old Hicks was among the first members of Trump’s presidential campaign, joining it after working for the Trump Organization. She is the third White House communications director of Trump’s presidency, following Scaramucci, who held the job for less than two weeks, and Mike Dubke, who resigned last May.
benton.org/headlines/hope-hicks-be-named-white-house-communications-director | Politico
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STORIES FROM ABROAD
MURDOCH BID FOR SKY CONTROL HITS NEW BUMP AS UK OFFICIAL HINTS AT INQUIRY
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Chad Bray]
Britain’s culture minister said that she was inclined to ask the country’s competition regulator to carry out a detailed review of a bid by Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox to take full control of the British satellite television giant Sky. In an address to Parliament, the minister, Karen Bradley, said she was “minded” to refer the $15 billion deal to the Competition and Markets Authority for a more intensive inquiry into concerns about whether Fox would uphold broadcast standards in Britain and whether owning all of Sky would give it too much control of the British media. Sky and Fox have 10 days to respond before Bradley makes a final decision. Bradley’s announcement move was expected: She had indicated previously that concerns about how much control the Murdoch family would have over the country’s media merited a further review. What was unexpected was the potential for additional scrutiny of whether Fox would uphold broadcasting standards in Britain.
benton.org/headlines/murdoch-bid-sky-control-hits-new-bump-uk-official-hints-inquiry | New York Times
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