March 2013

BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for FRIDAY, MARCH 8, 2013

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CYBERSECURITY
   Recap: Senate Cybersecurity Hearing
   DARPA to Turn Off Funding for Hackers Pursuing Cybersecurity Research [links to web]
   Deutsche Telekom unveils real-time map of global cyberattacks [links to web]

TELECOM/INTERNET
   FCC's Pai: Commission Should Approve IP Transition Pilot Program
   Five Fundamentals for the Phone Network, Part 2: Interconnection and Competition - analysis
   Ranking Members Waxman, Eshoo, and DeGette Call For Hearing on Lifeline Program Reforms
   Georgia bill limiting cities’ ability to create broadband networks fails
   Report Suggests a Digital Divide Among Latinos
   Link between area codes, locations may be severed
   How to bring high-speed Internet to America [links to web]
   New York grants another $25M for high-speed Internet [links to web]
   Comcast program helps close the "digital divide" [links to web]
   NYC Announces 'Reinvent Payphones' Design Challenge Winners [links to web]

WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
   Senate bill would legalize cellphone unlocking
   Unlock those cell phones - editorial
   Stars Aligning for Verizon and Vodafone - analysis
   How to bring high-speed Internet to America [links to web]
   FTC Cracks Down on Senders of Spam Text Messages Promoting "Free" Gift Cards - press release [links to web]
   Why telcos may finally be moving past app store envy - analysis [links to web]
   Google Cutting 10 Percent of Jobs at Its Motorola Unit [links to web]
   The Dirty Secret of Apps: Many Go Bust [links to web]
   Judge Temporarily Blocks Cab-Hailing by Smartphones [links to web]

TELEVISION
   Cablevision Takes Its Second Swing at Viacom in Bundling-Breaking Fight
   Why Is Your Cable Bill So High? - analysis
   Broadcasters Dragging Their Feet on Mobile Emergency Alert System [links to web]

CONTENT
   Imagining a Swap Meet for E-Books and Music

PRIVACY
   Technology Turns to Tracking People Offline [links to web]
   Could New Software Help Cops Track Social Media? [links to web]
   Texas proposes one of nation’s “most sweeping” mobile privacy laws [links to web]

COMPANY NEWS
   Facebook to launch redesigned News Feed immediately, include feeds [links to web]
   Facebook experiments with free Wi-Fi, for a price [links to web]

STORIES FROM ABROAD
   EU’s Reding Says US Tech Giants Can’t Sidestep Rules
   European Court: Live-Streaming TV Broadcasts Is Illegal [links to web]
   Why John Kerry Must Listen to China's Social Web - op-ed
   Deutsche Telekom unveils real-time map of global cyberattacks [links to web]
   Google’s revenge: Cheap Android smartphones could overwhelm China’s censors [links to web]
   UK court invalidates three Samsung 3G patents [links to web]

MORE ONLINE
   Top 10 Tech Cities in the US [links to web]
   Knight Prototype Fund helps innovators test future of media - press release [links to web]
   Doug Feaver Named The Washington Post’s First Reader Representative - press release [links to web]

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CYBERSECURITY

CYBERSECURITY HEARING
[SOURCE: US Senate Commerce Committee]
The Senate Commerce Committee and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee held a joint hearing on March 7 to examine the development and implementation of the Executive Order issued by President Barack Obama and explore the need for comprehensive legislation to strengthen our nation’s cybersecurity. Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller said Congress has “wasted a lot of time, by turning an urgent national security issue into a partisan political fight. Back in 2010, we passed a cyber bill out of the Commerce Committee unanimously, without a vote. By the fall of 2012, we couldn’t even get enough votes to close debate on the Senate floor, even though our country’s top national security leaders were urging us to act. The Obama Administration got tired of waiting for us. I can’t blame them. This is a problem that is growing worse every day.” “While I commend the President for issuing this very important Order,” said Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Carper (D-DE), “there was only so much he could do using the authorities granted to him under existing law. Those authorities are simply not enough to get the job done. Now is the time to begin the process of gathering input from the Administration and a broad array of stakeholders in order to ascertain what Congress needs to do to build on the Executive Order that the President has promulgated.”
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Patrick Gallagher of the National Institute of Standards and Technology testified. Sen Napolitano said a "suite" of legislation was needed that would 1) incorporate privacy and civil liberties; 2) create information sharing standards; 3) provide additional tools to fight cybercrime; 4) create a data breach reporting requirement; and 5) give DHS hiring authority equivalent to the National Security Agency.
Gallagher repeatedly emphasized that the voluntary cybersecurity framework created by the president's executive order was just that, and that he wanted industry to come up with that framework. Napolitano said that the government would use carrots rather than sticks for industry, including procurement and contract incentives for adopting standards. Gallagher said the goal is to set standards, and have industry decide how best to do that. Napolitano said that to the extent that this is a national security interest and the government is leaving it to industry, that is a first, and a "grand and bold experiment," rather than a top-down government process as is usually the case with national security. Gallagher suggested an added benefit of having the industry drive the framework is that the government sequester cuts would not have much effect on that process, as opposed to a government top-down process. Asked why there seemed to be a shift in the industry, Napolitano suggested it was because the president involved them in the creation of the executive order itself, and because the administration did not stop work when the Democrat-backed bill failed in the last Congress.
benton.org/node/147377 | US Senate Commerce Committee | Chairman Rockefeller | B&C | Reuters | The Hill
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TELECOM/INTERNET

IP TANSITION
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Federal Communications Commission has yet to vote on a proposal by AT&T to test the migration to an all-IP communications delivery platform, but FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai said he thinks the commission should approve it. "The FCC has sought and received comments on a proposal to create an All-IP Pilot Program," Commissioner Pai said in a speech to the Hudson Institute. "I've reviewed the record carefully. And having done so, I am proposing today that the FCC move forward with this program." He likened the test to the Wilmington (NC) test of the national digital television transition, or the FCC's rural health care pilot program. Commissioner Pai suggested the test was needed because the move to IP delivery was "as inevitable as death, taxes, or another reality show starring a Kardashian." He outlined how he thinks the test should be conducted. First, it should be voluntary. Second, it should be conducted in a variety of diverse places.
benton.org/node/147372 | Broadcasting&Cable | read the speech
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INTERCONNECTION AND COMPETITION
[SOURCE: Public Knowledge, AUTHOR: Jodie Griffin]
Public Knowledge proposed Five Fundamentals to guide the upgrade of our phone network to an IP-based infrastructure. The second fundamental identifies the continued need for interconnection and competition among phone service providers. Interconnection requirements make sure that different phone networks connect with each other, so users can place a call to anyone else with a phone number, no matter which phone company the person being called uses. Interconnection has become a critical tool for developing competition among carriers—after all, if a smaller carrier couldn’t guarantee that you’d be able to use its service to call your friends, family, and business contacts, you would always need to buy service from the biggest carrier in order to be able to place the calls you want. As a result, the largest companies would only get bigger and bigger, leading to fewer choices and higher prices for subscribers. In contrast to the phone network, we sometimes see disputes in the markets for internet or subscription video services that disrupt service for customers.
benton.org/node/147370 | Public Knowledge
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LIFELINE OVERSIGHT?
[SOURCE: House of Representatives Commerce Committee, AUTHOR: Press release]
House Commerce Committee Ranking Member Henry A. Waxman (D-CA), Subcommittee on Communications and Technology Ranking Member Anna G. Eshoo (D-CA), and Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Ranking Member Diana DeGette (D-CO) sent a letter to Chairmen Fred Upton (R-MI), Greg Walden (R-OR), and Tim Murphy (R-PA) requesting a hearing on the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Lifeline program, which provides low-income Americans with assistance to receive home phone service. Since 1985, the Lifeline program has ensured that tens of millions of Americans can call 9-1-1, provide a phone number on a job application, and communicate with family and loved ones. However, policy changes beginning during the Bush Administration have created new risks for waste, fraud, and abuse. Under the Obama Administration, the FCC has initiated reforms to clean up the program. The letter requests a hearing to examine whether these efforts are adequately ensuring the integrity of the Lifeline program.
benton.org/node/147378 | House of Representatives Commerce Committee | The House
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GEORGIA BROADBAND BILL FAILS
[SOURCE: Atlanta Journal-Constitution, AUTHOR: Aaron Gould Sheinin]
The Georgia House voted down an effort to limit local governments’ ability to create their own broadband Internet networks, an effort to spur greater private sector competition. House Bill 282 failed 70-94 with a bipartisan coalition of Democrats and rural Republicans who argued that private telecoms have failed to build reliable networks. Sponsored by Rep. Mark Hamilton, R-Cumming, the bill would have allowed local governments to enter the Internet marketplace if no private network provided at least 3 mega bytes per second of service. Rep Hamilton said allowing cities, with unlimited tax dollars, to compete with private companies erodes the free market and is a waste of taxpayer money.
benton.org/node/147391 | Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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DIGITAL DIVIDE
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Tanzina Vega]
A digital divide between Latino Americans and white Americans may be closing, but a divide still exists between native- and foreign-born Latinos, according to a report issued by the Pew Hispanic Center. The report, which examined technology consumption habits, defines foreign-born Latinos as those who were born in another country to parents who were not American citizens, including people born in Puerto Rico. Over all, more than three-quarters of Latinos in the United States used the Internet in 2012, a 14 percentage point increase from 2009, compared to 87 percent of whites, according to the report. Half of those who said they used the Internet were born in the United States; 79 percent of those who said they did not use the Internet were foreign born. The vast majority of the Hispanic population, 86 percent, own a cellphone, while 49 percent own a smartphone, according to the report. But 76 percent of foreign-born Latinos do not own cellphones and 58 percent of those who do not own a smartphone are foreign born. 72 percent of Latinos who use the Internet are either bilingual in Spanish and English or English dominant. On social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, 60 percent of those who use such sites do so mostly or entirely in English, 29 percent mostly or entirely in Spanish and 11 percent in both languages.
benton.org/node/147398 | New York Times | Pew Hispanic Center
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AREA CODE PROPOSAL
[SOURCE: Politico, AUTHOR: Brooks Boliek]
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski wants to change the rules of the telephone numbers game, according to commission officials. Chairman Genachowski began circulating a series of proposals among fellow commissioners that could make it easier for VoIP (voice over Internet protocol) providers to tap the national telephone numbers pool and eventually sever the relationship between an area code and an actual geographic area, the sources said. The proposals respond to calls by VoIP providers who do not like having to go through a phone-company middleman to get telephone numbers for customers. Numbers may seem prosaic, but they are dear to people’s hearts and a valuable commodity. While some of these changes are already taking place in the marketplace, Chairman Genachowski thinks that modifying the rules can open the door for more services and increase competition, commission aides explained.
benton.org/node/147393 | Politico
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WIRELESS/SPECTRUM

CELLPHONE UNLOCKING
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Brendan Sasso]
Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Mike Lee (R-UT) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) introduced the Wireless Consumer Choice Act to legalize cellphone unlocking and allow owners to switch their devices to other networks. The bill would instruct the Federal Communications Commission to order carriers to allow their customers to unlock their phones and switch providers after they have completed their contracts. Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) plans to introduce companion legislation in the House. "As far as I can tell, it doesn't do anything at all," said Sina Khanifar, who started the White House petition. He pointed out that FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has already pledged to look into the issue, and might compel wireless providers to allow unlocking anyway. "The root of this problem lies in parts of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and how easily they are abused at consumers' expense," said Christopher Lewis of Public Knowledge in an emailed statement. "Amending the DMCA itself will ensure stronger competition, and also that consumers can use the devices they've bought in whatever lawful way they choose."
benton.org/node/147362 | Hill, The | WSJ | ars technica
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UNLOCK THOSE CELL PHONES
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] Score one for the tens of millions of cell phone users. The White House is heeding an online consumer petition and will push to overturn a federal ruling that hamstrings handset users from full use of their popular gadgets. The change will make it easier for phone and tablet users to unlock their favorite devices and overcome built-in software that keeps customers tethered to one wireless firm. Cell phone firms have signaled a willingness to allow unlocking when a service term ends. That's a useful start, but freeing up phones should be a consumer guarantee. The next step calls for amending federal law to ensure these changes are made. The vital and innovative digital world needs a dose of consumer protection. Allowing unlocked phones is a good place to start.
benton.org/node/147395 | San Francisco Chronicle
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VERIZON-VODAFONE
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Miriam Gottfried]
Verizon Communications’ desire to eventually take full control of Verizon Wireless by purchasing the stake held by London-based Vodafone has never been a secret. But Verizon executives have been more vocal than usual about the issue in recent weeks, leading investors and analysts to believe Verizon plans to take action this year. Indeed, the timing may finally be right. Low interest rates make financing easier and have contributed to the 22% run-up in Verizon's stock price over the past year as yield-hungry investors have flocked to its dividend. Vodafone's U.S.-listed shares are flat in the same period. The British pound is weak. And Verizon has also completed a management transition, giving it the stability necessary to execute the deal. Any deal would still be a big undertaking. Verizon Wireless, the No. 1 U.S. carrier by subscribers, is valued at $248 billion, based on a multiple of 7.5 times 2013 estimated earnings before interest taxes, depreciation and amortization, according to UBS. That makes Vodafone's 45% stake valued at about $112 billion.
benton.org/node/147396 | Wall Street Journal
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TELEVISION

CABLEVISION-VIACOM
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Peter Kafka]
Here’s the next step in the Cablevision/Viacom cable bundling fee fight: After back and forth between the two companies about which stuff they want to keep private, they have released a public version of Cablevision’s legal complaint. This is just a more formalized version of the argument Cablevision made last week, when it said Viacom had illegally forced it to take lots of crappy Viacom channels in order to get the ones it really wanted, like MTV and Comedy Central. The one really interesting part in here should be where Cablevision explains just how much more expensive it is for them to buy a handful of channels instead of taking the whole package. Their contention is that while Viacom theoretically offers its channels to distributors on an a la carte basis, it charges so much for them that there’s no practical way anyone would do that, because it’s much cheaper to take the bundle. That is, it’s a choice without a choice. But at Viacom’s request, all the pricing information has been redacted from the complaint. So Cablevision can only say that the price difference between Viacom’s a la carte option and the bundle is something between $1 billion and $9 billion, and that that number is “more than Cablevision’s entire programming budget” for 2013.
benton.org/node/147381 | Wall Street Journal
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CABLE BILLS
[SOURCE: Public Knowledge, AUTHOR: John Bergmayer]
[Commentary] Why is it that cable bills keep getting higher? While a lot of the blame falls on the cable industry itself, even some large cable companies can find themselves squeezed by high programming costs that they then pass along to consumers. For years, cable prices have increased at a rate faster than inflation. According to a report released last year by the NPD group, the average cable bill (just video, not including broadband or voice) reached $86 per month. Compared to an $8 per month Netflix subscription, or an Amazon Instant Video subscription that works out to about $7 per month (and includes free shipping on actual physical goods sold by Amazon for a year), that's a lot. Cable certainly provides access to a lot of shows you can't get anywhere else, some of it live programming, like sports, that don't fit neatly into the on-demand Internet mode. But do consumers really get more than 10 times the value from cable that they get from lower-priced alternatives? A recent FCC price survey found some cable prices rising about 6% in a year. Is cable really getting that much better year after year? Some people might just say that if people pay for something it's worth it to them. Q.E.D. But increasing numbers of people are cancelling their cable subscriptions, never getting one to begin with, or hanging on only because of one or two much-watch kinds of programming.
benton.org/node/147379 | Public Knowledge
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CONTENT

E-BOOKS AND MUSIC MARKETPLACE
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: David Streitfeld]
The paperback of “Fifty Shades of Grey” is exactly like the digital version except for this: If you hate the paperback, you can give it away or resell it. If you hate the e-book, you’re stuck with it. The retailer’s button might say “buy now,” but you are in effect only renting an e-book — or an iTunes song — and your rights are severely limited. That has been the bedrock distinction between physical and electronic works since digital goods became widely available a decade ago. That distinction is now under attack, both in the courts and the marketplace, and it could shake up the already beleaguered book and music industries. Amazon and Apple, the two biggest forces in electronic goods, are once again at the center of the turmoil. In late January, Amazon received a patent to set up an exchange for all sorts of digital material. The retailer would presumably earn a commission on each transaction, and consumers would surely see lower prices. But a shudder went through publishers and media companies. Those who produce content might see their work devalued, just as they did when Amazon began selling secondhand books 13 years ago. The price on the Internet for many used books these days is a penny. On March 7, the United States Patent and Trademark Office published Apple’s application for its own patent for a digital marketplace. Apple’s application outlines a system for allowing users to sell or give e-books, music, movies and software to each other by transferring files rather than reproducing them. Such a system would permit only one user to have a copy at any one time.
benton.org/node/147392 | New York Times
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STORIES FROM ABROAD

REDING WARNS US COMPANIES
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Stephanie Bodoni]
US-based technology firms Google, Facebook, Apple and other non-European companies that offer services in the European Union must abide by its overhauled data-protection rules, according to the bloc’s justice chief. The same limits have to apply to all companies that do business in the 27-nation area, EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding said in a speech in Brussels. Consumers in Europe need to know that their data is processed in line with European rules “that reflect the fact that data protection is a fundamental right,” Reding said. Reding presented plans in January 2012 to entirely reform the data-protection rules that apply to the bloc’s 27 member nations. She has insisted from the start that the rules, once they received the backing by EU lawmakers and ministers and can be enforced, would also apply to U.S. companies such as Facebook and Google. The new protections would “refresh” an existing EU data-protection law which dates back to 1995, Reding said. “The reasoning is simple: if companies outside Europe want to take advantage of the European market with its potential 500 million customers then they have to play by the European rules,” Reding said in the speech.
benton.org/node/147286 | Bloomberg
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CHINA’S SOCIAL WEB
[SOURCE: The Atlantic, AUTHOR: Anka Lee, David Wertime]
[Commentary] In order to craft an appealing diplomatic message that reaches beyond the heights of Chinese bureaucracy, Secretary of State John Kerry must elevate the role of China's vibrant social media within the mix of American policy-making information. It must lie on equal footing with official meetings, intelligence assessments, "Track 2" dialogues, and academic exchanges. Only then can American officials begin to take a reliable reading of the Chinese public's temperature on Beijing's role in the world, China's relationship with the United States, and Chinese peoples' conceptions of their own rights and duties as citizens. If Secretary Kerry were to scan Chinese social media today, or use available English-language tools that specialize in tracking it, he might be surprised by the candor he encountered. Virtually every other day, a corrupt Chinese official is felled by online sleuths. Angry anti-government rhetoric abounds, and while some of it is censored, much of it remains conspicuously visible. A year and a half ago, for example, citizens in the village of Wukan relied on social media to follow and debate protests against corrupt land deals there. And while Chinese social media has not led to Chinese democracy, it has become a hotbed for crowd-sourced political activism. Earlier this month, online citizens (or "netizens") frustrated with corruption teamed up en masse to collect and share photographs of luxury cars carrying license plates of the People's Liberation Army, China's armed forces.
[Lee is an Asia Security Analyst at the CNA Corporation. Wertime is the co-founder of Tea Leaf Nation]
benton.org/node/147284 | Atlantic, The
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