October 2013

FCC Seeks Comment on the Lifeline Biennial Audit Plan

The Federal Communication Commission’s Wireline Competition Bureau (WCB), in conjunction with the Office of Managing Director (OMD), seeks comment on the Lifeline Biennial Audit Plan to develop standard procedures for independent biennial audits of carriers receiving $5 million or more annually from the low-income universal service support program.

By establishing uniform audit procedures to review the internal controls and processes of Lifeline service providers, WCB is implementing another major reform established by the FCC to protect the Federal Universal Service Fund (USF) from waste, fraud and abuse. Eligible Telecommunications Carriers (ETCs) receiving $5 million or more in a calendar year on a holding company basis are subject to this biennial audit requirement. For the first biennial audit, ETCs receiving $5 million or more in calendar year 2013 will be subject to this biennial audit requirement, and will begin such audits in 2014 upon release of the final Lifeline Biennial Audit Plan.

Why the government unpublished the source code for Healthcare.gov

When the government first launched Healthcare.gov as an informational site back in June 2013, open source advocates were delighted to hear that the code would be available for anyone to see on the public programming library GitHub. "This new flagship federal .gov website is 'open by design, open by default,'" The Atlantic wrote at the time. But after a storm of criticism over the healthcare exchange -- the second, more complex part of Healthcare.gov that launched on October 1 -- the code was removed from GitHub without explanation. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the agency administering Healthcare.gov, has finally responded to a query about the change. The code was pulled due to confusion over the difference between the two parts of the site, CMS says.

A plan to turn every lightbulb into an ultra-fast alternative to Wi-Fi

Current wireless networks have a problem: The more popular they become, the slower they are. Researchers at Fudan University in Shanghai have just become the latest to demonstrate a technology that transmits data as light instead of radio waves, which gets around the congestion issue and could be ten times faster than traditional Wi-Fi.

In dense urban areas, the range within which Wi-Fi signals are transmitted is increasingly crowded with noise -- mostly, other Wi-Fi signals. But what if you could transmit data using waves of much higher frequencies, and without needing a spectrum license from your country’s telecoms regulator? Light, like radio, is an electromagnetic wave, but it has about 100,000 times the frequency of a Wi-Fi signal, and nobody needs a license to make a light bulb. All you need is a way to make its brightness flicker very rapidly and accurately so it can carry a signal. Because of its limitations -- so-called “Li-Fi” cannot penetrate walls -- it won’t do away with other wireless networks. But it could supplement them in congested areas, and replace them in places where radio signals need to be kept to a minimum, like hospitals, or where they don’t work, such as underwater.

SoftBank Snags $1.26 Billion Stake in Brightstar

Japan’s SoftBank said that it is investing $1.26 billion to take a majority stake in wireless distributor Brightstar as part of an effort to centralize purchasing for Sprint and SoftBank’s other wireless units and affiliates. The deal, expected to close later in 2013, values Brightstar at $2.2 billion. SoftBank will own approximately 57 percent of the company, while Brightstar founder and CEO Marcelo Claure will own approximately 43 percent of Brightstar shares. Over the next five years, SoftBank’s ownership will grow to 70 percent, the companies said.

The FCC has work to do, and Ted Cruz isn’t helping

Fresh off his defeat over the government shutdown, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) has blocked President Barack Obama's nominee for the chair of the Federal Communications Commission. At any other time, the delay might be written off as another cost of doing business in today's gridlocked Congress. But having just emerged from a 16-day closure, Washington's has a bunch of catching up to do -- and the FCC is no exception, meaning that the hold on Wheeler is likely to add even more to the backlog. What's at stake is a major government auction to improve the nation's mobile broadband and other wireless networks. It's the first of its kind, making the FCC a battleground for telecom companies, the TV industry and consumer advocates who are all trying to influence the rules behind the auction. All these groups are stuck in a holding pattern until the FCC makes a final decision on how the process will work.

Here’s how Obama’s first Chief Technology Officer defends the HealthCare.gov launch

It's no secret that the launch of HealthCare.gov was plagued with problems. But President Barack Obama's first Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra defended the launch, saying "glitches happen."

Chopra left the White House in 2012 to launch an unsuccessful campaign to become the lieutenant governor of Virginia. He made the comments about the HealthCare.gov launch during a discussion with Thomas Friedman at an Aspen Institute "Socrates Salon." When Friedman asked what happened to HealthCare.gov, Chopra admitted not everything had gone right, but asked the audience to "put it in the context that glitches happen." He then compared the issues to problems in commercial products, saying that it was like when United and Continental Airlines needed time after their merger to integrate their reservations systems, or how Twitter's fail whale made a lot of appearances during the 2010 FIFA World Cup as the service became overwhelmed.

ACLU sues government over use of NSA surveillance in criminal cases

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit, asking that the US government answer questions about its policy of notifying criminal defendants when they were monitored through the National Security Agency’s surveillance programs.

The “lawsuit aims to reveal how the government justified keeping defendants in the dark about evidence based on NSA surveillance, and what the policy is today,” ACLU Staff Attorney Patrick Toomey said. The civil liberties advocacy group had challenged the law authorizing NSA surveillance, but the Supreme Court dismissed the case earlier in 2013, saying the ACLU could not prove it had been subject of the surveillance programs. It’s clear that the government is using NSA surveillance information in criminal cases, as evidenced by congressional testimony by FBI Deputy Director Sean Joyce and statements from Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), the ACLU said in the lawsuit. Both have defended NSA surveillance programs by citing examples of cases where surveillance has aided criminal investigations.

How Fruit and Veggie Marketers Are Making Produce Cool for Kids

Mickey Mouse mangos and Spider-Man strawberries? Kid-friendly characters are increasingly popping up on fruits and veggies as part of a move by marketers to make healthier foods cool through packaging gimmicks and tie-ins with children's media properties such as Disney and Nickelodeon, which have been under pressure to sever ties with unhealthy candy and snack brands. Sales of Disney-branded fruits and vegetables have tripled in 2013, with more than 3.1 billion servings sold in North America since 2006, Disney Consumer Products announced.

The top 5 things we’ve learned about the NSA thanks to Edward Snowden

In June 2013, the Internet at large became significantly more acquainted with the National Security Agency. It's all thanks to Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor with access to an unprecedented volume of documents.

What we’ve learned:

American telecommunications companies are compelled to routinely hand over metadata to the government
Digital surveillance programs PRISM and XKeyscore capture vast amounts of data
US companies have done little to resist government pressure
NSA's sister organization in the UK, GCHQ, does what the NSA can’t
NSA analysts even used capabilities to spy on their exes

What has happened since:

As a way to prevent future leaks, the NSA fired nearly all its systems administrators
Privacy-minded e-mail providers shut themselves down under pressure
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) opened up and published opinions
Patriot Act author said that NSA’s interpretation is overbroad
Congressional reforms introduced, remain slow-moving

Health IT Regulators Face Challenges As Medical Apps Proliferate

The regulation of health information technology was always bound to unspool slowly, given the involvement of multiple agencies with overlapping jurisdiction and a rapidly changing and important industry. The first piece of finalized health IT regulation, which laid out rules for mobile applications, was released Sept. 23 following two years of debate. The government is required to outline its plans for the rest of the sector by January 2014.

Three agencies are charged with regulating the sector: the Food and Drug Administration, which will approve some apps and software and oversee the use of IT in clinical practice; the Federal Communications Commission, which manages wireless spectrum; and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, which oversees electronic medical records. The agencies have indicated they will take a flexible approach to health IT regulation in the hopes of encouraging innovation.

Benton

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