October 2013

Federal Prosecutors, in a Policy Shift, Cite Warrantless Wiretaps as Evidence

The Justice Department for the first time has notified a criminal defendant that evidence being used against him came from a warrantless wiretap, a move that is expected to set up a Supreme Court test of whether such eavesdropping is constitutional.

Prosecutors recently filed such a notice in the case of Jamshid Muhtorov, who was charged in Colorado in January 2012 with providing material support to the Islamic Jihad Union, a designated terrorist organization based in Uzbekistan. A criminal complaint against him showed that much of the government’s case was based on intercepted e-mails and phone calls. The government’s notice allows Muhtorov’s lawyer to ask a court to suppress the evidence by arguing that it derived from unconstitutional surveillance, setting in motion judicial review of the eavesdropping. The New York Times reported on Oct. 17 that the decision by prosecutors to notify a defendant about the wiretapping followed a legal policy debate inside the Justice Department. The practice contradicted what Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. had told the Supreme Court in 2012 in a case challenging the law, the FISA Amendments Act of 2008. In a statement, Patrick Toomey, staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, which had represented Amnesty International and the other plaintiffs in the case, “We welcome the government’s belated recognition that it must give notice to criminal defendants who it has monitored under the most sweeping surveillance law ever passed by Congress. By withholding notice, the government has avoided judicial review of its dragnet warrantless wiretapping program for five years.”

Sen Feinstein lashes out at NSA

Senate Intelligence Chairman Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) called for a “total review” of all intelligence collection programs as she criticized the National Security Agency for spying on foreign leaders.

“It is abundantly clear that a total review of all intelligence programs is necessary so that members of the Senate Intelligence Committee are fully informed as to what is actually being carried out by the intelligence community," Chairman Feinstein said. She has been one of the NSA’s staunchest congressional defenders amid the uproar over its phone records surveillance, but she said that the spying on foreign leaders without President Obama’s knowledge was a “big problem.” “Unlike NSA’s collection of phone records under a court order, it is clear to me that certain surveillance activities have been in effect for more than a decade and that the Senate Intelligence Committee was not satisfactorily informed,” she said.

Markey, Barton reintroducing bill to reduce online tracking of kids

Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) announced that they would be reintroducing their bill to reduce online tracking of young Internet users.

The two introduced the Do Not Track Kids Act in the last Congress, when Sen Markey was a member of the House. It would have prohibited targeted advertising to Internet users under the age of 16 and created an “eraser button” for young Internet users to delete the content they post online. “The Do Not Track Kids legislation would update the Federal Trade Commission’s Children’s’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) for this new Internet ecosystem, establish new protections for the personal information of children and teens and ensure that parents have the tools they need to protect their children’s privacy,” Sen. Markey and Rep. Barton said in a statement.

Toll-free number won’t save consumers from ObamaCare website

Applications for ObamaCare insurance must be made through its troubled website, even if consumers use a toll-free number touted by President Barack Obama.

Officials have urged people struggling to sign up to try calling or mailing their information to the government. But officials told The Hill that all applications must eventually be processed through the government website, which has been plagued by glitches and errors. People can give their information to government representatives over the phone or through the mail, but those representatives have to enter that information into HealthCare.gov.

Closing the Digital Divide in Hispanic Communities

The United States recently celebrated Hispanic-American Heritage Month. And as we continue to reflect on the many contributions Hispanic Americans have made to our country, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has been working hard to ensure Hispanics and other minorities are obtaining the digital skills they need to better compete in a global economy that is increasingly reliant on technology.

The latest data, compiled with the help of the US Census Bureau as part of NTIA’s “Digital Nation” series, shows that 63 percent of Hispanic households adopted broadband in the home as of October 2012. This is a significant increase from July 2011 data, which showed that only 56 percent of US Hispanic households had broadband in their homes. The data shows that, while work remains, the nation is making progress in addressing this important issue. With the help of NTIA’s broadband grant program, many Hispanic communities have benefitted from projects aimed at expanding digital literacy and promoting broadband adoption. These include the Learner Web Partnership, which is working with such institutions as South Texas College, where 95 percent of the student body is Hispanic, to provide access to new technologies by opening up computer centers in two heavily Hispanic counties in south Texas.

NAB to FCC: Don't Take Our ENG Channels

The National Association of Broadcasters reiterated to the Federal Communications Commission that it needs to retain all the electronic news-gathering (ENG) spectrum it currently has. Wireless companies have recommended that the FCC take back the top two channels of Broadcast Auxiliary service spectrum as part of an effort to clear up 15 MHz of spectrum per congressional directive. But NAB says there is other spectrum that would fill that bill without compromising local broadcast news, which relies on BAS spectrum to transmit news from the field--those news trucks with the dish antennas that are a fixture at breaking news sites.

Bringing Women and Minorities to IT

The failure of educational institutions to realize and acknowledge differences between the minds of men and women could be part of the reason that finding a woman in a computer science class can be like finding a parking space at the mall.

Women earn 57 percent of all undergraduate degrees in the country, and 52 percent of all math and science undergraduate degrees. But in computer and information science, women represent only 18 percent of all undergraduate degrees. And the trend starts early: Females constitute 56 percent of all high school Advanced Placement (AP) test-takers, but represent only 19 percent of AP computer science test-takers. There’s growing evidence that this gender gap is hurting the nation’s economy. The US Department of Labor estimates that between 2010 and 2020, there will be more than 1.4 million computing-related job openings nationally, but at current graduation rates, only 30 percent of those positions can be filled. While opinions may differ on how to lure more students into scientific, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields, limiting the country’s talent pool by failing to address this lack of diversity is a poor strategy for success in a competitive global market.

What Ted Cruz Doesn't Want You to Know

[Commentary] By now it seems pretty clear that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) has a plan to occupy the White House. But he doesn't want people to know too much about it. And he definitely doesn't want you to know about the special interests that have already begun to bankroll his political ambitions. That's why the Texas senator's latest crusade targets the Federal Communications Commission -- and its efforts to better identify the funders of political ads.

While the Federal Elections Commission has a limited ability to identify the funders of the groups that emerged in the wake of the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, the FCC has a clear legal path to transparency. Broadcasters are obliged by law to disclose who pays for political ads in exchange for using the airwaves. Free Press and our allies won a major victory in 2012 when the FCC ordered all television stations to post this information to an online database the agency manages. Now you can go to a single website and find important data on who is spending how much on political ads at major stations in the nation's 50 largest television markets. Communications law expert Andrew Schwartzman, who serves as a legal adviser to Free Press, has petitioned the FCC to enforce existing sponsor identification requirements and disclose the names of principal funders in the body of the ads themselves. And that scares Sen. Cruz and his supporters in groups like the Koch brothers funded-Americans for Prosperity, which raises millions of dollars from anonymous donors to run attack ads against their political foes.

FCC Takes Action To Promote Interoperability In The Lower 700 Mhz Band

The Federal Communications Commission has approved a Report and Order and Order of Proposed Modification to move forward with implementing a voluntary industry agreement that will establish interoperable LTE service in the Lower 700 MHz band. The Order finds that the terms of the voluntary agreement serve the public interest by encouraging efficient use of spectrum and enabling consumers to enjoy the benefits of greater competition. The standards developed by several wireless providers, along with the Competitive Carriers Association, will also give consumers more choice in using their devices with large and small carriers alike and will promote widespread deployment of mobile broadband services, especially in rural areas.

FCC Takes Major Steps To Combat Call Completion Problems

The Federal Communications Commission took steps to remedy the serious and unacceptable problem of long-distance calls failing to reach rural homes and businesses.

New rules unanimously adopted by the FCC will provide immediate solutions and empower future agency enforcement efforts while giving providers incentives to improve their service. The new rules require key providers to record, retain and report rural call completion data to give the FCC the information it needs to investigate and eliminate the problem. Providers may use this information to improve performance on their own. The data will also allow state regulators to better monitor performance and identify problem areas. As soon as the new rules take effect, providers will be barred from transmitting an audible ring to a caller’s handset when the phone on the other end of the call is not actually ringing. As a result, callers will no longer prematurely hang up, and providers will get better information about call performance. In addition to providing the FCC with data to better monitor and redress call completion problems, the Order includes a safe harbor provision with incentives for providers to improve their call completion practices and performance.

Building on a number of recent FCC actions, the Order includes the following provisions:

Providers with over 100,000 lines that make the initial choice as to how to route a call must collect and retain data for six months and file quarterly reports.
False audible ringing is prohibited (signaling that leads the calling party to believe the phone is ringing at the called party’s premises when it is not).
Providers taking advantage of the safe harbor, which incorporates an industry best practice to limit the number of intermediate long distance providers to two, will receive the benefit of reduced data retention and reporting obligations.
To encourage providers to have all mechanisms in place to ensure calls to rural areas are completed, such as by meeting all industry best practices, providers will also have the option of requesting a waiver to have their retention and reporting obligations further reduced.

Benton

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