February 2012

Chinese workers earn a shared $8 for every iPad 2 they make: report

According to the Korea Daily, the Chinese factory workers that assemble the iPad 2 earn approximately $8, collectively, for every Apple tablet that rolls off the supply line. Eight bucks, as a point of reference, is less than two percent of the price of the cheapest iPad. It's also far less than the $34 per iPad 2 reportedly paid to factory workers in Korea. Assuming the report is correct, Chinese workers are getting shortchanged. And Apple is making out big: Apple rakes in a hefty $150 – 30 percent of the retail price – on every iPad 2 sold. So will Apple, which currently dominates the tablet market in the US, be affected by growing concern over the way its products are built? Hard to say. But Apple is certainly concerned enough to have begun hitting back at critics.

EP endorses plan to free up frequencies for high-speed mobile internet

Mobile internet is set to hit dizzying speeds after Members of the European Parliament approved a proposal to free up radio frequencies for their use.

Under the plan member states will be required to open up more frequencies for high-speed mobile internet by 2013 to satisfy growing demand for wireless data. The EP approved the first radio spectrum policy program (RSPP) which will help to co-ordinate the use of spectrum for new services and technologies, such as “fourth generation” (4G) wireless networks (e.g., LTE and Wimax) that can reach up to 100 Mbps download speeds. According to the program, member states will have to authorize the use of the 800 MHz band for wireless broadband by 1 January 2013

EU Court: Social Networks Can't Be Made To Filter Content

The owner of a social network cannot be made to install monitoring systems to prevent illegal downloads of copyrighted material, the European Court of Justice, the European Union's highest court, ruled. In a case referred to the ECJ by a Belgian court, the court ruled that if a national court required a hosting service provider to install a filtering system, it "would not be respecting the requirement that a fair balance be struck" between intellectual property rights on one hand and the freedom to conduct business and data protection on the other. The ECJ's ruling was in line with a November 2011 decision which said Internet providers can't be made to filter content.

Investigators suspect ‘serious criminality’ at News Corp

Investigators looking into alleged corrupt practices at News Corp’s UK newspapers suspect that cash payments worth more than £100,000 were made to police officers and other public officials.

News Corp’s management and standards committee, set up after the News of the World phone hacking scandal convulsed the News International newspaper division last July, has been under fire from reporters for passing information to police that has led to the arrests of nine journalists at The Sun. A person with knowledge of the investigation dismissed claims that journalists were being penalized for innocuous lunches with sources. “This is not about sources or expenses,” he said: “This is an investigation into serious suspected criminality over a sustained period.” He added: “It involves regular cash payments totaling tens of thousands of pounds a year for several years to public officials, some of whom were effectively on a retainer to provide information. In totality, it involves a six-figure sum.”

Lawmakers Finalizing Details of Spectrum Language

House and Senate negotiators were finalizing the details of spectrum legislation that is now expected to be part of a payroll tax cut package. "We're just about there," House Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) told reporters.

Chairman Upton -- along with Communications and Technology Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) -- are members of the House-Senate payroll tax conference committee and are working on the spectrum provisions. House Commerce ranking member Henry Waxman (D-CA), who also sits on the conference committee, said negotiators were finalizing details but wouldn't say what still needed to be worked out. The negotiators want to use the spectrum legislation to help pay for the payroll tax cut package. The spectrum legislation would authorize incentive auctions, from which the Federal Communications Commission to could give broadcasters and other spectrum holders a share of the revenues from the spectrum they relinquish. Auctions could raise billions for the Treasury depending on how the legislation is structured. The Congressional Budget Office projected that spectrum legislation approved late last year by Walden's subcommittee and included in the House's version of the payroll tax package would generate $16.7 billion for the Treasury. "It's all about the money," said Communications and Technology Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo (D-CA).

Spectrum Policy Rush Hour as Deadline Nears

As legislators continued to work on a payroll tax extension package that includes spectrum incentive auctions, they were getting plenty of advice from industry players.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said he was hopeful the package would contain a version of the bill that allowed the FCC to maximize the benefits for spectrum reclamation for all, which means without the conditions backed by Republicans that would limit the FCC's allocation of more unlicensed spectrum and its ability to put any conditions on auction bidders. Elsewhere, unlicensed backers Reps. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) and Darrell Issa (D-CA) called on their colleagues to protect access to unlicensed spectrum, scheduling a Capitol Hill event for Feb. 16, the day before the effective deadline for coming up a payroll package to extend the tax cut and unemployment benefits. CTIA: The Wireless Association President Steve Largent sent a letter to House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid urging them to keep spectrum incentive auction legislation in the package. Given that the auctions are helping pay for the tax cut and benefits to the tune of as much as $20 billion, there is reason for hope the auctions will remain in this bill after having been excised from earlier versions of compromise spending legislation.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller: Public safety network to be included in payroll deal

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) said in a that he expects the public safety first responder network will be included in the congressional deal to extend the payroll tax holiday.

“We’ve made great progress and are very close to a historic milestone—creation of a new nationwide communications network for our first responders,” said Sen Rockefeller. “My expectation is that we will be able to include this legislative language in the compromise payroll deal that is close to being finalized. Although we continue to hash out some of the finer points of the legislation, the end result should be the same: a new communications network that will save lives and generate economic growth.”

Apple: App Access to Contact Data Will Require Explicit User Permission

After a week of silence, Apple has finally responded to reports that dozens of iOS applications have been accessing, transmitting and storing user contact data without explicit permission.

Apple has faced growing criticism that it has given iOS developers far too much access to address book information without requiring a user prompt. On Feb 15, the company agreed with that assessment, and said that soon, apps that use address book data will require explicit user permission to do so. “Apps that collect or transmit a user’s contact data without their prior permission are in violation of our guidelines*,” Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr said. “We’re working to make this even better for our customers, and as we have done with location services, any app wishing to access contact data will require explicit user approval in a future software release.” So Apple has done the right thing, arguably something it should have done long ago: Assure users that no app can read their contact data without their permission.

Google as Benevolent Dictator Yanks Smartphone Apps With Kill Switch: Tech

Google, Apple and Microsoft have with little fanfare embraced technology that lets technicians instantly and remotely purge unauthorized content from users’ machines.

So-called kill switches are standard on Android handsets and iPhones, the smartphone leaders. The capability will soon become more widespread with the release of Microsoft’s Windows 8 software for tablets and computers. While their stated use is for the removal of harmful content, there’s no standard definition of what that means, and companies aren’t required to disclose when and how the tools are employed. The technology could be harnessed by a hacker to unleash a virus, a company to pry into a user’s private information or a government body to repress free speech, said Eric Goldman, director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University’s law school.

FCC Extends Network Outage Reporting Requirement to Interconnected VoIP Service to Help Ensure a More Resilient and Reliable 9-1-1 System

The Federal Communications Commission took action to make the nation’s 9-1-1 systems more reliable and resilient by requiring interconnected Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service providers to report significant network outages that meet specific criteria and thresholds.

The new rules will help ensure that the country’s critical communications infrastructure remains available in times of crisis. The FCC will use outage reports to track and analyze information on interconnected VoIP outages affecting 9-1-1 service and determine if action is needed to prevent future outages. Interconnected VoIP service providers will be obligated to report significant service outages to the FCC. The FCC’s Report and Order defines outage reporting for interconnected VoIP service, establishes reporting criteria and thresholds, and discusses how the reporting process should work, what information should be reported, and confidential treatment of the outage reports. The FCC deferred action on a number of questions, including the possibility of setting thresholds for reporting outages of broadband Internet service, and measurements for outages of both interconnected VoIP and broadband Internet services based on performance degradation, as opposed to complete service outage.

Benton

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