April 2011

Industry urges better cooperation from government on cyber threats

The government should have a standard protocol for when to alert the private sector to cybersecurity threats and a standard process for sharing that information without revealing classified secrets, the leader of a financial services industry group told the House Homeland Security panel on cybersecurity.

While the infrastructure is in place for the government and industry to work together on cybersecurity, the private sector often is kept in the dark too long because federal officials are wary of revealing information about ongoing investigations, said Jane Carlin, chairwoman of the Financial Services Sector Coordinating Council. "What we're recommending is a documented protocol," she said, "a regularized and repeatable process for deciding when to disclose a threat to the financial community rather than making it up each time ... Let's inject some science here. How do we balance the importance of an ongoing investigation with the public policy effects of [firms'] ongoing exposure [to a security threat]?" FSSCC, which was created shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, acts as the financial community's clearinghouse for cyber threat information and as a liaison with government cybersecurity offices.

President Obama Dishes on Federal Technology

President Barack Obama unloaded about government agencies' "horrible" technology at a fundraiser in Chicago after the press pool left. What he didn't realize was that his candid remarks were being picked up by microphones and broadcast to reporters sitting in the White House. Maybe the President has become so disenchanted with federal technology he forgot that media companies are pretty adept at recording stuff. CBS' Mark Knoller quoted President Obama as saying, "I always thought I was gonna have like really cool phones and stuff." Instead, "We can't get our phones to work," President Obama said, adding, "Come on, guys. I'm the president of the United States! Where's the fancy buttons and stuff and the big screen comes up? It doesn't happen." The Washington Post noted that Obama's predecessor had similar complaints.

Barack Obama reelect’s first job: Reconnect

President Barack Obama’s reelection campaign is building a volunteer network with the audacious goal of contacting every single person who voted for him in 2008, as part of a reinvented voter outreach that will be as focused on smart phones in 2012 as it was on text messages last time.

Strategists plan to customize videos and other messages for the iPhones and other mobile devices of targeted groups of voters. They also envision “virtual networks” among supporters’ friends and families, so that millions of people will feel a personal connection to the campaign. Mobilizing millions of volunteers to reconnect with as many of Obama’s 69 million past supporters as is possible, along with raising money for a re-election fight that could cost as much as $1 billion, will be the major focus this year of the campaign now getting off the ground here. President Obama himself will not begin extended barnstorming until 2012.

E-mail Confidential

Ever get an e-mail from someone who works for Time Inc? He's the disclaimer you'd find at the bottom:

This message is the property of Time Inc. or its affiliates. It may be legally privileged and/or confidential and is intended only for the use of the addressee(s). No addressee should forward, print, copy, or otherwise reproduce this message in any manner that would allow it to be viewed by any individual not originally listed as a recipient. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any unauthorized disclosure, dissemination, distribution, copying or the taking of any action in reliance on the information herein is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please immediately notify the sender and delete this message.

Race to the Smart Grid

Tomorrow's electric power system will rely on the "smart grid"— infrastructure that is monitored and managed by means of continual, two-way communication between users and utilities.

Automated meter reading is probably the best-known application of the smart grid, but that's only the beginning. With the right infrastructure in place, electric utilities can communicate not only with meters but also with end-user appliances, such as hot-water heaters and their own generating and distribution equipment. In many rural areas, telcos will play an important role in making the smart grid a reality. Utilities and regulators are counting on the smart grid to enable energy conservation, shift demand from peak to nonpeak periods, integrate distributed energy sources (small-scale solar, wind and hydro generators) and energy storage facilities, accommodate the proliferation of electric cars, reduce waste and theft of power, and raise system uptime and reliability, among other goals. State regulators are still wrestling with the question of how to pay for smart-grid investments. For example, in June 2010, the Maryland Public Service Commission shocked the industry by denying Baltimore Gas & Electric's proposal to shift the cost of smart meters to customers. But in general, regulators support the initiative.

Seeking to narrow the definitions of 'broadband'

Broadband is a surprisingly hard-to-define Internet service that so many consumers covet for faster access, whatever their needs, and that borders on a national obsession as we fret about competing with technology leaders in Europe and Asia. What exactly is "good broadband"? That's the $50-a-month question -- or the $100, $150, or $200 question. And the answer remains as oddly fuzzy today as when the term emerged in the 1990s and pretty much meant "faster than the usual dial-up."

Even the National Broadband Plan, which sets goals for hooking up the whole nation to this essential telecommunications service, doesn't exactly define broadband. What do leading Internet service providers promise and actually deliver? And what level of broadband do you really need? Answers to those questions are harder to come by, which is one reason the Federal Communications Commission jumped into the fray this week, seeking public comment on how to help consumers understand the "need for speed" when they choose an Internet provider. In the next few weeks, the Federal Communications Commission is expected to publish results from a broadband service study of 10,000 U.S. households conducted for it by SamKnows.com and designed to find whether consumers are getting what they expect.

Here's five tips to help you understand broadband speed needs: 1) Some uses are data hogs. 2) Speed isn't the only concern -- another key factor is called latency, which measures how quickly the broadband network responds to an input. 3) What you're promised by your Internet service provider may not be what you get. 4) Your ISP may not be to blame. 5) Sharing service slows your speed.

CBO Scores Bill on Reclaiming Unused Broadband Stimulus Funds

H.R. 1343 would require the National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA) and the Rural Utilities Service (RUS) to promptly terminate certain grant awards if the agency determines that award recipients are engaged in wasteful or fraudulent activities or have not met performance expectations. The bill also would require each agency, upon receiving notification of material noncompliance with award terms or improper usage of award funds, to determine whether the award should be terminated and to notify the Congress of any terminated awards. Both agencies are required under current law to promptly terminate grants for wasteful or fraudulent spending or for failure to meet specific performance milestones. In addition, the Pay-It-Back-Act (Public Law 111-203) requires agencies to promptly return to the Treasury any funds awarded under ARRA that are terminated. Thus, restating those requirements, as provided in H.R. 1343, would not affect federal spending or revenues.

Based on information from the agencies, CBO estimates that implementing the new reporting requirements in H.R. 1343 would have no significant effect on spending subject to appropriation. Enacting H.R. 1343 would not affect direct spending or revenues; therefore, pay-as-you-go procedures do not apply.

The Cloud Threat to the Software Business

In the business market, cloud computing — computer resources and services delivered remotely — will progress at a rate largely shaped by two constituencies: the customers and the major software companies. The big software suppliers, including IBM, Microsoft and Oracle, have all hopped on the cloud bandwagon, but with a twist. They talk of the cloud transforming the distribution of software, but not much about its potential to upend the economics of the traditional corporate software business. These companies have huge software businesses, relying on large annual sales contracts, licensing and subscription fees, and maintenance charges. The insurgents in the cloud market, led by Amazon, see private clouds as mainly a means of account control for software’s old guard, holding onto customers and high profit margins. “Private clouds are essentially the same thing that large, established companies have offered for years as managed services,” said Adam Selipsky, vice president of product management and developer relations for Amazon Web Services, its cloud unit. “It amounts to a rebranding.” Perhaps, but many customers do find moving toward the underlying cloud technology a big money-saver, even in a private cloud setting.

Kansas bill loosens regulations on AT&T wireline service

The largest wireline provider in Kansas, AT&T, could soon be able to avoid a cap on standalone wireline rates imposed by the state thanks to a bill that Gov. Sam Brownback says he will sign. While supporters say the bill will improve the business climate in Kansas, opponents worry that rural or poor residents who have only a single landline will have to pay more for that service, Bloomberg BusinessWeek reports. The bill states that a provider that has the majority of landlines in an area with a deregulated exchange can apply to have prices in the exchange area deregulated.

April 9-15: Spectrum -- The Air That We Breathe

Although we try not to play favorites, Headlines, like you, has sources and authors we love to turn to help make sense of the latest developments in communications and, especially, telecommunications policy. GigaOm's Stacey Higginbotham is one of those people for us. Our April 15 daily newsletter bore the title of one of Higginbotham's latest pieces -- "Everything You Need to Know About the Fight for TV Spectrum." This debate has been one of the hottest topics of late and this past week especially with the broadcast industry meeting in Las Vegas for its annual convention.

Higginbotham does a great job in her piece of identifying what the issue is, who the players are, and what's at stake. In addition, Higginbotham's colleague, Om Malik, sat down with Pradeep Sindhu, co-founder of Juniper Networks. Sindhu believes (and many agree) that the rise of mobility, or “anywhere computing,” is going to change the whole notion of information infrastructure. Most of us want “to consume information and information services anytime, anywhere, with no limitations, and preferably in the same way across all devices,” he points out. Sindhu argues that we shouldn't distinguish between a wired or a wireless network, for in the future the network traffic is going to be more unpredictable, with demand coming from any client device, from any app at anytime. As our readers well know (we hope), the National Broadband Plan and President Barack Obama are strongly committed to identifying and freeing up more spectrum to provide mobile broadband services. The move is meant to provide some more competition both within the wireless industry and between wireless and wireline Internet service providers -- and reduce the cost of providing broadband services in rural areas. A big part of the debate is figuring out where the needed spectrum will come from.

Benton

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