March 2013

FCC Reinstates Experimental TV Rules

On February 15, the chief of the video division of the Federal Communications Commission's Media Bureau granted an experimental license to test, among other things, “technological capabilities that could lead to ... a future broadcast standard.” This suggests that the reinstated broadcast rules can and will be used to permit testing of a next-generation broadcast standard — a replacement for the current ATSC standard — that would keep broadcast TV competitive as the digital world evolves.

Apple Can’t Duck Giving Documents in Privacy Lawsuit

Apple must show in detail how it’s complying with court orders to turn over evidence in a privacy lawsuit, a judge ruled, saying he can no longer rely on what the company tells him in the case. U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul S. Grewal in San Jose (CA) issued the order after the plaintiffs’ lawyers claimed Apple withheld documents it had previously been ordered to produce. Apple is accused in the lawsuit of collecting data on the locations of customers through iPhones, even after the device’s geo-location feature was turned off. Judge Grewal, saying he had already “refereed” the dispute, said it was “unacceptable” that Apple waited more than three months to verify whether it complied with his November order to turn over documents.

New FTC Chair Ramirez Outlines Privacy Stance

In her first public policy remarks since becoming chairman of the Federal Trade Commission on March 4, Edith Ramirez said she plans to continue the agency's work in shaping privacy policy to protect consumers, and wouldn’t back off on enforcement.

"We haven't been shy about taking on the tech giants," Chairman Ramirez said, referring to the agency’s 20-year consent decrees with both Google and Facebook. "That has been just tremendous. And that’s all, in my mind, vital and will continue." Enforcing children's privacy will be a top priority, she said, especially with updates to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act going into effect July 1. "We want to make sure we’re fulfilling the mandate Congress set out for us. I personally feel quite proud of the work we did," Chairman Ramirez said, adding that the FTC is working to finalize FAQs about the rule in order to guide companies "as soon as we can." Addressing the "Do Not Track" issue, Ramirez kept to the script the agency wrote under former chairman Jon Leibowitz. Expressing her support of Do Not Track as a "longstanding commitment," Chairman Ramirez also suggested that any solution would require all the interested parties crafting a solution together, a position that should give some relief to the advertising industry's self-regulatory initiatives. "I'm optimistic there will be a solution, but all interested parties must come together for a solution that is consensus-based," Chairman Ramirez said. "I’m happy there are so many tools available to consumers."

FTC Staff Report Examines Growing Use of Mobile Payments

As part of its efforts to ensure that consumers are protected in the growing mobile marketplace, the Federal Trade Commission issued a staff report today highlighting key issues facing consumers and companies as they adopt mobile payment services. The report, titled “Paper, Plastic… or Mobile? An FTC Workshop on Mobile Payments,” is based on a workshop held by the Commission in 2012 to examine these issues.

The report notes three major areas of potential concern for consumers:

First, the report encourages companies to develop clear policies on how consumers can resolve disputes arising from a fraudulent mobile payment or an unauthorized charge.
Second, the report encourages industry-wide adoption of strong measures to ensure security throughout the mobile payment process.
Third, the report highlights the need for companies in the mobile payment sphere to practice “privacy by design,” incorporating strong privacy practices, consumer choice, and transparency into their products from the outset.
The report also notes the privacy issues arising from the consolidation of consumers’ personal information in the mobile payment process. In a traditional credit card transaction, a merchant will have sensitive financial information about consumers, but will generally not also have their contact information and a record of their location. Mobile payment providers also potentially have access to a much larger cache of personal information stored on the consumer’s mobile device.

Public Knowledge and Patent Reform

Earlier this week, Public Knowledge announced that we have hired Charles Duan to head up our new Patent Reform Project. Charles is a computer scientist and former patent litigator who is currently working with my colleagues at the University of Colorado Law School analyzing next-generation Internet technologies and their impact on privacy, intellectual property and communications law. He’ll be starting full time this summer and we’re excited to get started. It should come as no surprise that Public Knowledge is starting this new project. Our mission is to ensure an open communications system that promotes creativity, innovation and freedom of expression. Unfortunately, the current patent system is having the opposite effect.

AT&T is Not Invincible

The ill-considered bill in Georgia that would have prevented local communities from investing in their own broadband networks was defeated last night, and this is great news.

The bill was pushed by AT&T and Windstream, who argued that it would be unfair for public entities to "compete" with them. There are many problems with this line of thinking -- for one, telecom companies like AT&T and Windstream themselves are heavily subsidized by the government (they get access to public rights of way, airwaves, and Universal Service funds). The defeat of this bill shows that the state-level agenda pushed by AT&T, which manages to be both deregulatory (for AT&T) and regulatory (in passing laws preventing others from entering the market) at the same time, can be defeated when policymakers can see its consequences. With local broadband networks the consequences are clear: fewer, worse networks, and rural areas left unconnected. But when it comes to dismantling the phone network and the legal protections that surround it, AT&T has had a lot more success.

FCC chairman vows continued spectrum expansion

The Federal Communications Commission remains focused on rapidly expanding spectrum for licensed and unlicensed use, and encouraging both research and products that will let it be used more efficiently, according to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski.

Four years ago, he said, the U.S. was lagging in key wireless broadband indicators compared to Asia and Europe. Today, the nation has "leapfrogged other countries." "Mobile innovation is U.S.-driven," he said. "The percentage of global mobile devices that have an American OS has gone from under 20% to over 80%. Apps are American-driven. And in [mobile] infrastructure, America has more LTE customers than the rest of the world combined." In the last two years alone, private investment in mobile networks has totaled about $65 billion. The country still faces spectrum challenges, Chairman Genachowski said, and policy makers need to be working on "freeing up more spectrum and having forward-looking spectrum policies. A smartphone puts a demand on spectrum that's 25 times more than that of a feature phone." "The mobile infrastructure doesn't work without spectrum," he said. "No one anticipated the growth and demand we're seeing now. It's putting tremendous stress on the system. And we have to figure out ways to address that." Chairman Genachowski said there have been two major spectrum innovations in the last 30 years: the introduction of auctions to allocate spectrum and the introduction of unlicensed bands, which helped fuel the growth of Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, other RF technologies and the ecosystems of products and software that have sprung up around them. "It seems inconceivable to me that these would be the last two innovations in spectrum policy," he said. Possible new ones include what he called "next generation unlicensed spectrum," with higher ranges and lower frequencies, and "a lot more sharing of government spectrum for private use."

It’s Not a Storm Until the Weather Channel Names It

In the world of media behemoths, the most voracious may well be the Weather Channel, a subsidiary of NBCUniversal Media.

The network, which grabbed the Weather.com domain back in the earliest days of the Internet, now draws some 163 million monthly unique visitors to its sites. Its digital app has been downloaded 106 million times. Consulting firm Frank N. Magid Associates says the company, across its various platforms, has an 89 percent share of the weather audience—a particularly obsessive set. The Weather Channel is even powerful enough to face down the U.S. government. This winter, the network began naming winter storms—the way the National Hurricane Center names hurricanes and has been doing in concert with governments around the world for more than half a century. The Weather Channel’s names however—this week’s storm is Saturn; it was preceded by Athena, Brutus, and Caesar, not to mention Nemo, Gandolf, and Khan—have led some to accuse the station of gimmickry. An official at the National Weather Service declined to criticize the company, but noted that “we don’t recognize those names.” But competitor AccuWeather, the Yahoo to the Weather Channel’s Google, has had plenty to say. “In unilaterally deciding to name winter storms, The Weather Channel has confused media spin with science and public safety and is doing a disservice to the field of meteorology and public service.”

ONC Releases Data on Hospital EHR Adoption, Meaningful Use

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT recently released a data brief on electronic health record adoption among U.S. acute care hospitals and another data brief on the percentage of U.S. acute care hospitals that have met meaningful use requirements.

According to the first data brief, about 44.4% of U.S. acute care hospitals had a basic EHR system in 2012, compared with 12.2% in 2009. The states with the highest rates of hospital EHR adoption were: South Dakota, at 70.6%; Rhode Island, at 68.8%; and Colorado, at 68.3%. Hospitals in New Hampshire, New Mexico and Kansas had the lowest EHR adoption rates. The brief also found that about 85% of U.S. acute care hospitals had an EHR system capable of meeting some or all meaningful use objectives in 2012, compared with 72% in 2011

US doctors don't believe patients need full access to health records

Although electronic health records (EHR) systems may contain your health information, most physicians believe you should only be able to add information to them, not get access to all of their contents.

A survey released this week at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference in New Orleans, was conducted by Harris Interactive for health care consultancy Accenture. It involved 3,700 doctors in eight countries. It found that 82 percent of U.S. physicians want patients to update their electronic health records with information about themselves, but only 31 percent believe patients should have full access to that record; 65 percent believe patients should have only limited access. Four percent said patients should have no access at all. The findings were consistent among doctors surveyed in eight countries: Australia, Canada, England, France, Germany, Singapore, Spain, and the United States. The research was conducted between November and December 2012.

Benton

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