October 2013

GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS

NSA COLLECTS E-MAIL ADDRESSES
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Barton Gellman, Ashkan Soltani]
The National Security Agency is harvesting hundreds of millions of contact lists from personal e-mail and instant messaging accounts around the world, many of them belonging to Americans, according to senior intelligence officials and top-secret documents provided by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The collection program, which has not been disclosed before, intercepts e-mail address books and “buddy lists” from instant messaging services as they move across global data links. Online services often transmit those contacts when a user logs on, composes a message, or synchronizes a computer or mobile device with information stored on remote servers. Rather than targeting individual users, the NSA is gathering contact lists in large numbers that amount to a sizable fraction of the world’s e-mail and instant messaging accounts. Analysis of that data enables the agency to search for hidden connections and to map relationships within a much smaller universe of foreign intelligence targets. During a single day last year, the NSA’s Special Source Operations branch collected 444,743 e-mail address books from Yahoo, 105,068 from Hotmail, 82,857 from Facebook, 33,697 from Gmail and 22,881 from unspecified other providers, according to an internal NSA PowerPoint presentation. Those figures, described as a typical daily intake in the document, correspond to a rate of more than 250 million a year.
benton.org/node/161944 | Washington Post
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COURT: NSA CAN CONTINUE SWEEPING PHONE DATA COLLECTION
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Brendan Sasso]
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has granted the National Security Agency (NSA) permission to continue its collection of records on all US phone calls. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence announced the court's approval in a statement. The court authorizes the program for only limited time periods and requires that the government submit new requests every several months for re-authorization. Shawn Turner, a spokesman for Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, said the office decided to announce the court decision, which is usually kept secret, "in light of the significant and continuing public interest in the telephony metadata collection program."
benton.org/node/161907 | Hill, The
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WYDEN IS TRYING TO TELL US SOMETHING ABOUT THE OPINION JUSTIFYING THE PHONE RECORDS PROGRAM
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Andrea Peterson]
If the public and the media should learn one thing from the revelations from former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden, it's to pay very careful attention to what Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) says. So if he hints that there's something worth reading in the original Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court opinion justifying the NSA's bulk collection of domestic phone records, that should serve as a bat signal to privacy advocates. A report from Carol Leonnig and Ellen Nakashima shows he is doing just that: "The original legal interpretation that said that the Patriot Act could be used to collect Americans’ records in bulk should never have been kept secret and should be declassified and released," Sen. Ron Wyden said. "This collection has been ongoing for years and the public should be able to compare the legal interpretation under which it was originally authorized with more recent documents."
benton.org/node/161910 | Washington Post | WashPost
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THE NSA'S WATCHFULNESS PROTECTS AMERICA
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Sen Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)]
[Commentary] Since it was exposed in June by leaker Edward Snowden, the National Security Agency's call-records program has become controversial and many have questioned whether its benefits are worth the costs. My answer: The program -- which collects phone numbers and the duration and times of calls, but not the content of any conversations, names or locations -- is necessary and must be preserved if we are to prevent terrorist attacks. The NSA call-records program is working and contributing to our safety. It is legal and it is subject to strict oversight and thorough judicial review. I believe we should increase the program's transparency and its privacy protections. Toward that end, the Senate Intelligence Committee will soon consider a bill to make improvements to these counterterrorism programs. The proposed legislation will, for example, require court review when the call records are queried, and mandate a series of limitations on how the records can be obtained, stored and used. But we must also learn the lesson of 9/11. If we end this vital program, we only make our nation more vulnerable to another devastating terrorist attack.
[Sen Feinstein is chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.]
benton.org/node/161917 | Wall Street Journal
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POST REPORTER: HERE’S WHY WE REFUSED THE NSA’S DEMAND TO CENSOR THE NAMES OF PRISM COMPANIES
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Andrea Peterson]
Barton Gellman, the Washington Post reporter who broke the news of the NSA online content collection program PRISM, says the government asked him to suppress the names of the nine companies participating in the program. Gellman said The Washington Post has a practice of talking to the government before running stories that may impact national security. According to Gellman, there were "certain things" in the PRISM slides that they agreed raised legitimate security concerns. But, he said, “The thing that the government most wanted us to remove was the names of the nine companies. The argument, roughly speaking, was that we will lose cooperation from companies if you expose them in this way. And my reply was ‘that's why we are including them.’ Not in order to cause a certain result, or to get you to lose your cooperation but if the harm that you are describing consists of reputational or business damage to a company because the public doesn't like what it's doing or you're doing, that's the accountability we are supposed to be promoting.” In other words, Gellman believes that it's because the names were released that many of those technology companies started to be vocal advocates of greater transparency about the program.
benton.org/node/161889 | Washington Post
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DOJ: IF WE CAN TRACK ONE AMERICAN, WE CAN TRACK ALL AMERICANS
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Sean Vitka]
Seven months after his conviction, Basaaly Moalin’s defense attorney moved for a new trial, arguing that evidence collected about him under the government’s recently disclosed dragnet telephone surveillance program violated his constitutional and statutory rights. Moalin’s is the only thwarted "terrorist plot" against America that the government says also "critically" relied on the National Security Agency phone surveillance program, conducted under Section 215 of the Patriot Act. The government’s filing is a heavily redacted opposition arguing that when law enforcement can monitor one person’s information without a warrant, it can monitor everyone’s information, “regardless of the collection’s expanse.” Notably, the government is also arguing that no one other than the company that provided the information -- including the defendant in this case -- has the right to challenge this disclosure in court.
benton.org/node/161902 | Ars Technica
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CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR VETOES STATE EMAIL PRIVACY BILL
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Kate Tummarello ]
Gov. Jerry Brown (D-CA) vetoed a state online privacy bill that would have protected residents’ electronic communications accounts from warrantless access by law enforcement agencies. The bill would require law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before accessing electronic communications. Law enforcement agencies would have to notify a user within three days of accessing that user’s electronic communications. Under current federal law, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA), law enforcement agencies do not need warrants to require electronic communication companies to turn over their users’ communications if they have been electronically stored for more than 180 days. If law enforcement agencies do obtain a warrant, they do not have to notify the user. If they have subpoenas or court orders they are required to inform the user. These expanded notice requirements in the California bill “go beyond those required by federal law and could impede ongoing criminal investigations,” Gov. Brown wrote in his veto statement.
benton.org/node/161932 | Hill, The
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EUROPE WON’T SAVE YOU: WHY E-MAIL IS PROBABLY SAFER IN THE US
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Cyrus Farivar]
A United States federal appellate court unsealed a set of documents pertaining to Lavabit, the e-mail provider of choice for former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. The documents show that Lavabit’s founder, Ladar Levison, strongly resisted government pressure that would have resulted in the privacy of all users being compromised as a way to get at Snowden’s e-mail. Levinson went so far as to shutter the company, destroying its servers entirely. “People using my service trusted me to safeguard their online identities and protect their information,” Levison wrote. “I simply could not betray that trust.” The Lavabit case is the best known example of a company willing to go to extreme lengths in order to protect its customers’ privacy. Since Lavabit has fallen (as has Silent Circle's Silent Mail service), many journalists and business people have speculated that foreign e-mail providers might have policies that would theoretically be more resistant to government intrusion, particularly in Europe and especially in Germany and Switzerland, which have strong data protection and privacy laws. But a closer look at German law in particular reveals that a German e-mail provider certainly wouldn't offer more protection—and would likely offer less—than a similar American e-mail provider. German firms aren't allowed to say anything if they have to hand data over.
benton.org/node/161903 | Ars Technica
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INTERNET/BROADBAND

'CORE INTERNET INSTITUTIONS' SNUB US GOVERNMENT
[SOURCE: InfoWorld, AUTHOR: Serdar Yegulalp]
The US may just have lost that much more control over the way the Internet is governed. Ever since its creation, the core functionality of the Internet has more or less been under the direct supervision of the US, by way of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) Functions Contract. But now, after an Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) summit meeting in Montevideo, Uruguay, many of the major bodies responsible for Internet governance are calling for "accelerating the globalization of ICANN and IANA functions, towards an environment in which all stakeholders, including all governments, participate on an equal footing." Milton Mueller, writing for the Internet Governance Project, reported on this meeting with no small amount of sangfroid, describing the released statement as "an explicit rejection of the US Commerce Department’s unilateral oversight of ICANN.” Mueller attributed this movement away from the US' default oversight to backlash from "the Snowden revelations about NSA spying on the global Internet," and noted that "You know you’ve made a big mistake, a life-changing mistake, when even your own children abandon you en masse."
benton.org/node/161881 | InfoWorld | Internet Governance Project
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COMPETITION DRIVES IP TRANSIT PRICES BELOW $1 PER MBPS, STUDY SAYS
[SOURCE: Fierce, AUTHOR: Jim Barthold]
The ongoing demand for higher capacities to drive even faster network speeds, combined with technological enhancements to deliver greater throughput per bit, is pushing the price of IP transit below $1 per Mbps, according to new data developed by TeleGeography. The price drop, which the research firm did not see as necessarily bad, is being fueled by a highly competitive marketplace where high bandwidth is requisite and price wars are popping up as carriers offer to deliver more speed for less cost.
benton.org/node/161878 | Fierce
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TELECOM

VERIZON’S VOICE LINK
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Edward Wyatt]
Hurricane Sandy devastated Mantoloking (NJ), a barrier island community of multimillion-dollar homes, but in some residents’ view, Verizon Communications has delivered a second blow: the telecommunications giant did not rebuild the landlines destroyed in the storm, and traditional telephone service here has now gone the way of the telegraph. Verizon said it was too expensive to replace Mantoloking’s traditional copper-line phone network -- the kind that has connected America for more than a century -- and instead installed Voice Link, a wireless service it insisted was better. Verizon’s move is a look into the not-too-distant future, a foreshadowing of nearly all telephone service across the United States. The traditional landline is not expected to last the decade in a country where nearly 40 percent of households use only wireless phones. Even now, less than 10 percent of households have only a landline phone, according to government data that counts cable-based phone service in that category. The changing landscape has Verizon, AT&T and other phone companies itching to rid themselves of the cost of maintaining their vast copper-wire networks and instead offer wireless and fiber-optic lines like FiOS and U-verse, even though the new services often fail during a blackout.
benton.org/node/161943 | New York Times
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AT&T-BACKED REPORT PROMPTS QUESTION: SHOULD THE US GET RID OF PHONE LINES?
[SOURCE: Forbes, AUTHOR: Elise Ackerman]
[Commentary] AT&T and Verizon have been pushing federal regulators to sunset the nation’s traditional copper-based communications network -- and many of the pesky regulations that come with it. Their latest effort to win support comes in the form of a new report written by a visiting scholar at Georgetown University and paid for by an organization known as the Internet Innovation Alliance that consistently supports AT&T’s agenda. AT&T also provides an undisclosed amount of financial support to the group. At its heart, the report asserts that regulations that force the carriers to maintain the traditional telecommunications network are unnecessarily diverting investment away from modern broadband networks that don’t carry the same onerous regulatory requirements. To be clear, the report, which is titled “Telecommunications competition: the infrastructure-investment race,” frames the issue just a little differently and uses somewhat stronger language. It asserts that “outdated regulations that force companies to build and maintain obsolete copper-based legacy telephone networks are unnecessarily diverting investment away from modern broadband networks and services that 95 percent of U.S. households prefer, desire and use.” Shamelessly misleading, the report makes a big deal about the explosive growth of IP-based video traffic and how it dwarfs legacy phone calls in size. This isn’t surprising given that phone calls are measured in kilobits and videos in megabytes. It’s also not particularly relevant since video is not an alternative to phone calls. But the report treats the two as equivalent.
benton.org/node/161893 | Forbes
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AT&T, VERIZON EXECS CITE 'CHILLING' EFFECT OF MURKY TDM-TO-IP TRANSITION REGS
[SOURCE: Fierce, AUTHOR: Sean Buckley]
AT&T and Verizon envision a blended wireless and wireline service world, but regulatory executives from both telecommunications companies said that a lack of regulatory clarity in transitioning their legacy time-division multiplexing (TDM) networks to Internet protocol (IP) is a key barrier. "In 2009, the Federal Communications Commission set some very ambitious objectives, one of which was a complete shutdown of the TDM architecture and merge to IP by 2017," said James Cicconi, senior executive vice president of external and legislative affairs for AT&T. "We're here in 2013 and not a single thing that I can discern has been done to advance that objective." Cicconi said that he has gotten little, if any, guidance from the FCC on the next step. And Craig Silliman, senior vice president of public policy for Verizon, said that while the telco has benefited from a "light touch" regulatory approach for advancing its wireless business, legacy voice service regulations have hindered its wireline moves.
benton.org/node/161877 | Fierce
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REPUBLICANS: 'OBAMAPHONE' PROGRAM IS 'EVERYTHING THAT'S WRONG WITH WASHINGTON'
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Brendan Sasso]
The government shutdown isn't slowing down Republican criticism of the Federal Communications Commission's Lifeline program, a phone subsidy for the poor. In letter to FCC Acting Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn, forty-four House Republicans called Lifeline a "failed program" that symbolizes "everything that is wrong with Washington." "Sadly, Lifeline has become a prime example of how the culture of dependency is weakening America," they wrote. The lawmakers, led by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) said they would repeal the program if they could. The program is often derisively referred to as the "Obamaphone program," although it began long before President Barack Obama took office. Earlier in October 2013, the FCC proposed more than $14.4 million in fines against five companies for allegedly defrauding the program. The Republicans said they were surprised by the FCC crackdown but that it's too late to restore the public's trust in the program. They claimed that the program doesn't help the poor because the fees that fund it apply to all phone subscribers equally, regardless of their income. They asked Chairwoman Clyburn to consider requiring a $2 "co-pay" as a condition of participating in the program. They also asked for suggestions to cut the cost of the program in half by the end of 2014.
benton.org/node/161906 | Hill, The
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WIRELESS/SPECTRUM

CONNECTED DEVICES: CREATING JOBS AND GROWTH
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Jim Kohlenberger]
[Commentary] If we could better control the physical world, how might we improve our lives? This question is being asked by daring mobile innovators in laboratories, startups and garages across the country as the connected revolution moves from smartphones to the world around us. An exploding ecosystem, already numbering 10 billion connected devices, is a prime venue for economic transformation and exponential growth. We are on the verge of another wireless-driven technological revolution fueled by a vast sea of connected devices. Today, total global revenue from the Internet of things is $200 billion. By 2020, that revenue is estimated to reach $1.2 trillion. Pragmatic policy choices can help ensure continued American leadership in the innovation economy. To advance the emerging connected device revolution, we need to continue to free up spectrum for commercial wireless use, and accelerate the transition to IP networks. President Barack Obama has already taken important steps to make more spectrum available and accelerate the transition to faster and more capable next-generation IP-based wireless LTE networks. It is absolutely essential that we continue to invest and upgrade our next-generation networks today in order to keep pace with innovation and meet the wireless demands of consumers and businesses tomorrow. To amplify the benefits when things start talking, policymakers need to start talking too. They need to ask for a bigger vision and bolder action for a brighter connected future. With pragmatic policies that tap our talent and tenacity, harness innovation and investment and expand wireless capacity and digital networks, the coming connected device decade will forever change our daily lives.
[Kohlenberger is a former White House policy advisor to two US presidents and is president of JK Strategies. He serves as executive director of jobs4america and serves on the board of the Benton Foundation and the Advisory Board for Mobile Future.]
benton.org/node/161923 | GigaOm
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PRIVACY

ARE OBAMA’S NEW CYBERSECURITY STANDARDS A FORM OF PRIVACY REGULATION IN DISGUISE?
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Brian Fung]
While the National Security Agency has been working to gather data about Americans' communications, other branches of government have been working to develop new rules to promote online privacy and security. Among them is the National Institute of Standards and Technology. With the private sector's input, NIST has been putting together an obscure but important proposal to improve the nation's resilience against malicious hackers. Buried in the back of it is a series of recommendations that, if approved, might pave the way for stronger government oversight of businesses when it comes to their use of personal information. They include suggestions such as figuring out what exactly a company knows about its employees and its customers; whether its handling of the information poses a security risk; and how to treat personal data in the event of an online attack. These ideas are based on a common set of privacy principles that don't have the force of law. But according to Stewart Baker, the NSA's one-time top lawyer and former Bush administration official, the NIST guidelines could eventually turn into more enforceable regulations.
benton.org/node/161911 | Washington Post
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STANFORD RESEARCHERS DISCOVER ‘ALARMING’ METHOD FOR PHONE TRACKING, FINGERPRINTING THROUGH SENSOR FLAWS
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: James Temple]
One afternoon late last month, security researcher Hristo Bojinov placed his Galaxy Nexus phone face up on the table in a cramped Palo Alto conference room. Then he flipped it over and waited another beat. And that was it. In a matter of seconds, the device had given up its “fingerprints.” Code running on the website in the device’s mobile browser measured the tiniest defects in the device’s accelerometer -- the sensor that detects movement -- producing a unique set of numbers that advertisers could exploit to identify and track most smartphones. It’s a novel approach that raises a new set of privacy concerns: Users couldn’t delete the ID like browser cookies, couldn’t mask it by adjusting app privacy preferences -- and wouldn’t even know their device had been tagged. Asked if this sort of work risks putting ideas into the heads of online advertisers, Bojinov said he’d be surprised if someone in the industry wasn’t already exploring these approaches.
benton.org/node/161876 | San Francisco Chronicle
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GOOGLE SETS PLAN TO SELL USERS’ ENDORSEMENTS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Claire Cain Miller, Vindu Goel]
Google, following in Facebook’s footsteps, wants to sell users’ endorsements to marketers to help them hawk their wares. Google announced an update to its terms of service that allows the company to include adult users’ names, photos and comments in ads shown across the Web, based on ratings, reviews and posts they have made on Google Plus and other Google services like YouTube. When the new ad policy goes live Nov. 11, Google will be able to show what the company calls shared endorsements on Google sites and across the Web, on the more than two million sites in Google’s display advertising network, which are viewed by an estimated one billion people. Google said it would give users the chance to opt out of being included in the new endorsements, and people under the age of 18 will automatically be excluded.
benton.org/node/161891 | New York Times | LA Times | The Hill
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NO HARM, NO FOUL: GOOGLE WINS CASE OVER BROWSER TRACKING
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Jeff John Roberts]
US District Judge Sue Robinson has thrown out a class action against Google, saying the search giant didn’t harm anyone when it tricked Internet Explorer and Apple’s Safari browsers into accepting advertising cookies -- even though those browsers’ settings specifically forbid such cookies. Judge Robinson found Google and two other firms had circumvented the no-advertising settings, but that the consumers were unable to show they had been harmed by the fact the companies collected their data and used it to target ads to them.
benton.org/node/161884 | GigaOm
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CYBERSECURITY

NEW NIST CYBERSECURITY STANDARDS COULD POSE LIABILITY RISKS
[SOURCE: ComputerWorld, AUTHOR: Jaikumar Vijayan]
Critical infrastructure companies could face new liability risks if they fail to meet voluntary cyber security standards being developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The slated release of the standard draft was delayed due to the federal government shutdown. A preliminary version of the draft standard has been circulating, however. The formal draft version, when released, will be available for public review until February 2014, according to the original schedule. Once the review is complete, a final version of the standards that incorporates changes recommended by stakeholders will be released. The NIST cyber security framework is designed to serve as a security best practices guide for organizations in critical infrastructure sectors, like power, telecommunications, financial services and energy. It is not designed to mandate specific security controls. Rather, it offers broad standards for identifying and protecting critical data, services and assets against cyber threats. While participation in the standards program is voluntary, in practice, critical infrastructure owners and operators will likely be left with little choice but to follow the standards, or at least show they have comparable security measures in place, said Jason Wool, an attorney with Venable LLP, a Washington DC-based law firm. Companies that ignore the standards and are breached will open themselves up to negligence, shareholder and breach of contract lawsuits along with other liability claims. The standards will likely be viewed as the minimum level of care and integrity within critical infrastructure sectors, Wool noted.
benton.org/node/161882 | ComputerWorld
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EDUCATION

TABLETS IN SCHOOLS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Stephanie Banchero, Erica Phillips]
As schools rush to embrace computer tablets as teaching tools, glitches have officials in a few districts rethinking the usefulness and even security of the latest technology trend. The highest-profile snafu came in Los Angeles, where a $1 billion program -- funded by voter-approved bonds -- to provide Apple iPads for K-12 students came under fire after some students sidestepped the security system and accessed social media, online games and other content that was supposed to be blocked. The Los Angeles Unified School District temporarily took back thousands of tablets from students at three high schools and required the devices to remain on-campus in all 30 schools where the effort had been rolled out. School board officials called a special meeting for Oct. 29 to assess the $50 million first phase of the program ahead of votes to fund the second and third phases. The fitful Los Angeles rollout comes as K-12 schools nationwide are expected to spend $9.7 billion on technology in 2013, up from $6 billion in 2003, according to the Center for Digital Education, a national research and advisory institute specializing in education technology trends and policy.
benton.org/node/161942 | Wall Street Journal
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GETTING COMPUTER SCIENCE INTO EVERY SCHOOL
[SOURCE: San Jose Mercury News, AUTHOR: Mike Cassidy]
An audacious plan to build a diverse supply of skilled programmers by ensuring that computer science classes are available in every K-12 school in the United States received a tremendous boost when a who's who of Silicon Valley and the tech industry announced they would back the effort with money and know-how. Tech superstars such as Microsoft's Bill Gates, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Susan Wojcicki of Google, Jack Dorsey of Square, Reid Hoffman of LinkedIn, investors John Doerr and Ron Conway and powerhouse companies including Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, Amazon and Salesforce have all signed on with Code.org, a nonprofit that started just over a year ago as the dream of Iranian immigrants and tech investors Hadi and Ali Partovi.
benton.org/node/161941 | San Jose Mercury News
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GROUP PRESSES FOR SAFEGUARDS ON THE PERSONAL DATA OF SCHOOLCHILDREN
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Natasha Singer]
A leading children’s advocacy group is challenging the educational technology software industry, an estimated $8 billion market, to develop national safeguards for the personal data collected about students from kindergarten through high school. In a letter sent to 16 educational technology vendors -- including Google Apps for Education, Samsung School, Scholastic and Pearson Schoolnet -- Common Sense Media, an advocacy group in San Francisco that rates children’s videos and apps for age appropriateness, urged the industry to use student data only for educational purposes, and not for marketing products to children or their families. “We believe in the power of education technology, used wisely, to transform learning,” said James Steyer, the chief executive of the group. “But students should not have to surrender their privacy at the schoolhouse door.” Tim Drinan, a Google spokesman, said that advertising was turned off by default in Google Apps for Education products like document-sharing and that the system did not scan students’ e-mails for advertising purposes.
benton.org/node/161919 | New York Times
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ELECTIONS AND MEDIA

MEDIA COVERAGE OF THE 2012 ELECTION WAS FAIR AND BALANCED AFTER ALL
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: John Sides]
[Commentary] A majority of Americans distrust the media. And these sentiments often reach fever pitch during a political campaign when the news media are accused of emphasizing trivia or being flat-out biased toward one candidate. In “The Gamble,” Lynn Vavreck’s and my new book on the 2012 presidential campaign, we have a lot to say about what, and how, the media did in covering the campaign. This is one unique feature about our book, compared to the campaign books written by journalists. We make the media a central character — an actor in the process, not just an observer. We do this with data on 11,000 different news outlets gathered by the company General Sentiment, which gauged not only how often the candidates were mentioned but how positive or negative that coverage was. Here is what we found:
In the Republican presidential primary, news coverage drove the candidates’ surges in the polls.
In the primary, news coverage helped end these surges as well.
In the general election campaign, it was the other way around: the polls drove the news.
Overall, media coverage of President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney was actually fair and balanced. No, really.
The news media are more prone to “root for the story” than “root for the candidate.”
[Sides is an Associate Professor of Political Science at George Washington University.]
benton.org/node/161933 | Washington Post
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JOURNALISM

HOW AMERICANS GET TV NEWS AT HOME
[SOURCE: Pew Research Journalism Project, AUTHOR: Kenny Olmstead, Mark Jurkowitz, Amy Mitchell, Jodi Enda]
Even at a time of fragmenting media use, television remains the dominant way that Americans get news at home, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis of Nielsen data. And while the largest audiences tune into local and network broadcast news, it is national cable news that commands the most attention from its viewers. Almost three out of four US adults (71%) watch local television news and 65% view network newscasts over the course of a month, according to Nielsen data from February 2013. While 38% of adults watch some cable news during the month, cable viewers -- particularly the most engaged viewers -- spend far more time with that platform than broadcast viewers do with local or network news. On average, the cable news audience devotes twice as much time to that news source as local and network news viewers spend on those platforms. And the heaviest cable users are far more immersed in that coverage -- watching for more than an hour a day -- than the most loyal viewers of broadcast television news. Even those adults who are the heaviest viewers of local and network news spend more time watching cable than those broadcast outlets. This deeper level of viewer engagement with cable news may help to explain why cable television -- despite a more limited audience -- seems to have an outsized ability to influence the national debate and news agenda.
benton.org/node/161920 | Pew Research Journalism Project
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WHEN OUR NEWS IS GERRYMANDERED, TOO
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: David Carr]
[Commentary] Political analysts trying to explain the current standoff in Washington are quick to point to redistricting as helping to foster ideological extremism in Congress. Representatives have been skillfully gerrymandered into safe districts of like minds where they can do as they please, listening only to reflections of their own thinking without fear of political consequence. But given that politics in its current form is threatening to produce a crisis that threatens to create financial mayhem on a global scale -- while striking one more blow against claims of American “greatness” -- perhaps something more complicated than sketching out voting districts is at play. The polarized political map is now accompanied by a media ecosystem that is equally gerrymandered into districts of self-reinforcing discourse. Millions of news consumers select and assemble a world view from sources that may please them, but rarely challenge them. Cable blowhardism would not be such a good business if there hadn’t been a kind of personal redistricting of news coverage by the citizenry. Data from Pew Research Center for the People and the Press on trends in news consumption released in 2012 suggests people are assembling along separate media streams where they find mostly what they want to hear, and little else. Fully 78 percent of Sean Hannity’s audience on Fox News identified as conservative, with most of the rest of the audience identifying as moderate and just 5 present as liberal. Over on MSNBC, conservatives make up just 7 percent of Rachel Maddow’s audience. It isn’t just politicians that are feeding their bases, it is the media outlets, as well. The village common -- you know, that place where we all meet to discuss our problems, relying on the same set of facts -- has shrunk to the size of a postage stamp, surrounded by the huge gated communities of like minds who never venture into the great beyond.
benton.org/node/161890 | New York Times
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ADVERTISING

DMA STUDY
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Kate Tummarello]
An online advertising group is going on the offensive, providing lawmakers and regulators with data about online advertising and tracking through a new study touting the benefits of data-driven marketing on the US economy. The Direct Marketing Association (DMA), which represents online advertisers and other “data-driven marketers,” released a study that said data-driven marketing led to $156 billion and 675,000 jobs in the U.S. in 2012. According to the study, commissioned by the DMA’s Data-Driven Marketing Institute and conducted by Harvard Business School Professor John Deighton and Columbia University Adjunct Professor Peter Johnson, 70 percent of that economic contribution comes from companies being able to exchange data. The study is a response to an increased regulatory interest in online tracking and data-driven marketing rather than one specific action by one lawmaker or regulator, said DMA Vice President of Government Affairs Rachel Thomas.
benton.org/node/161940 | Hill, The
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THE AMOUNT OF QUESTIONABLE ONLINE TRAFFIC WILL BLOW YOUR MIND
[SOURCE: AdWeek, AUTHOR: Mike Shields]
The online ad industry is facing a swelling crisis, one defined by fake traffic, bogus publishers, and invisible Web visitors. Once thought contained to a handful of rogue players that had figured out how to exploit ad exchanges, bogus ad inventory, as it turns out, is rampant. In fact, according to numerous sources across the ecosystem, fake traffic is essentially systemic to online advertising -- it’s part of how the business works. And a slew of top companies are involved in this -- whether wittingly or not. “You see it with almost any partner you work with,” as Alan Silverberg, media platforms director at Moxie Interactive, puts it. “From AOL and Yahoo to Facebook, from pure-play partners and the network space to portals. We can’t stop it,” he says, referring to the preponderance of questionable traffic. Though for many publishers, it may be a question of whether they can’t stop it, or won’t. During a recent interview, online ad veteran Wenda Millard, president of Medialink, made the bold claim that a quarter of the online ad market is fraudulent. “What we have found is the devaluation of digital media is causing us to lose about 25 percent of the roughly $30 billion that is being spent,” she reported. “It’s stolen [ad revenue].” In defining fraud, Millard lumped together piracy, nonviewable ads, ads stacked on top of one another, inappropriate content and, of course, deliberate malicious behavior, in her analysis. “In most people’s wildest dreams, they wouldn’t imagine how much [questionable traffic] there is,” she says. “People should be very, very worried.”
benton.org/node/161930 | AdWeek
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TELEVISION

BROADCASTERS TAKE AEREO FIGHT TO SCOTUS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Amol Sharma, Shalini Ramachandran]
Major TV broadcasters petitioned the Supreme Court over Aereo, a streaming-video startup backed by media mogul Barry Diller. broadcasters argue that Aereo, which streams local TV signals over the Web without their permission, violates their copyrights. The broadcasters, that include Walt Disney 's ABC, Comcast’s NBC, CBS and 21st Century Fox, are appealing a ruling earlier this year by the US Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which denied their request to shut down the fee-based service. The circuit court's decision "is already transforming the industry and threatening the very fundamentals of broadcast television," the broadcasters wrote in the petition. "We will respond, as appropriate, in due course," an Aereo spokeswoman said. "The longer Aereo is left unchecked, the more it can roll out its service," said David Wittenstein, head of the media and information technology practice at law firm Dow Lohnes. "If Aereo gets a lot of customers in a lot of places, it begins to be harder to shut it down." Cablevision said the petition is a "brazen attempt … to go after the legal underpinning of all cloud-based services," which amounts to a "willful attempt to stifle innovation." "If Aereo ends up prevailing, it will serve the broadcasters right," the company said.
benton.org/node/161913 | Wall Street Journal | The Hill
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BUDGET

DEVICE SALES DELAYS POSSIBLE AS REVIEWS HALTED BY US SHUTDOWN
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Todd Shields]
Device makers such as Google may have to delay introductions of new smartphones and other products because the partial US government shutdown halted certifications that the gadgets don’t cause interference. Every computer, mobile phone, gaming system, TV, wireless medical device and anything that emits radio waves needs to pass a review by the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC clears about 16,000 electronic devices annually, according to figures presented last month to lawmakers by FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. That output is now at zero, and that “could be something that’s a real drag on the digital economy the longer it goes on,” said Commissioner Rosenworcel. The FCC may become backed up once it resumes operations, creating the potential for delays in introductions of devices from Google, Apple, Samsung Electronics, HTC, and LG Electronics, law firm Hogan Lovells said in an Oct. 9 note.
benton.org/node/161887 | Bloomberg
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COMPANY NEWS

BENTON FOUNDATION MOVES TO EXPAND COMMUNICATIONS NEWS AND ANALYSIS SERVICE
[SOURCE: Benton Foundation, AUTHOR: Press release]
The Benton Foundation announced that Rebecca Ellis has joined the organization as Writing Associate for the foundation’s Headlines service. Ellis will report directly to Kevin Taglang, who has recently been promoted to Executive Editor. Since 1996, the Benton Foundation has provided free, daily summaries of articles from the consumer and trade press concerning the quickly-changing communications policy landscape. Taglang will focus on creating new content and resources for Benton’s readers. To help guide Benton’s effort to expand its communications news and analysis services, the foundation announced that Robert A. Cohen recently joined its Board of Directors. Cohen is a leading media management consultant with extensive executive and operations experience. He specializes in developing profitable business strategies for existing digital and print businesses, launching and repositioning media brands, integrating print and digital media, and improving subscription, membership, and retail sales for websites, magazines, newspapers, newsletters and other properties. “The Benton Foundation now has the right people and the right tools in place,” said Executive Director Adrianne Furniss, “to deliver to communications policymakers and advocates the news and analysis they need to advance discussions that ensure that media and telecommunications serve the public interest and enhance our democracy.”
http://benton.org/node/161872
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STORIES FROM ABROAD

GOOGLE JOUSTS WITH WIRED SOUTH KOREA OVER QUIRKY INTERNET RULES
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Eric Pfanner]
South Korea is one of the world’s most digitally advanced countries. It has ubiquitous broadband, running at speeds that many Americans can only envy. Its Internet is also one of the most quirky in the world. The highly regulated Internet comes as a surprise to many people, Koreans included, because South Korea is a strong democracy with a vibrant economy seemingly ready for the digital information age. South Koreans were early adopters of Internet games and smartphones. It has world-beating electronics companies like Samsung and LG. But here the Internet is just different. Travelers who want to go from Gimpo International Airport to the Gangnam neighborhood of Seoul cannot rely on Google Maps. Google Maps can provide directions only for public transport, not for driving, to any place in Korea. Anyone crazy enough to try the journey on bicycle or on foot, directions for which Google Maps provides elsewhere, will be similarly stymied. South Korean security restrictions that were put in place after the Korean War limit Google’s maps, the company says. The export of map data is barred, ostensibly to prevent it from falling into the hands of South Korea’s foe to the north. Google and other foreign Internet companies say the rule also prevents them from providing online mapping services, like navigation, that travelers have come to rely on in much of the rest of the world. Foreign Internet companies say the country’s rules prevent them from competing against domestic rivals because they cannot provide the same services they do elsewhere Now the government of President Park Geun-hye is moving to ease some of the Internet regulations. However, for Google and other foreign companies, there is a hitch. They will be permitted to use the map as of 2014, on a case-by-case basis. Now, Google adapts its English-language maps of South Korea from the government’s Korean-language maps. Google is permitted to provide directions using public transit systems like the Seoul subway, because train and bus routes and schedules are available through public records.
benton.org/node/161918 | New York Times
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SKYPE UNDER INVESTIGATION IN LUXEMBOURG OVER LINK TO NSA
[SOURCE: The Guardian, AUTHOR: Ryan Gallagher]
Skype is being investigated by Luxembourg's data protection commissioner over concerns about its secret involvement with the US National Security Agency (NSA) spy program Prism. In 2003, the calling service had a reputation as a tool for evading surveillance but now it is under scrutiny for covertly passing data to government agencies. The Microsoft-owned Internet chat company could potentially face criminal and administrative sanctions, including a ban on passing users' communications covertly to the US signals intelligence agency. Skype itself is headquartered in the European country, and could also be fined if an investigation concludes that the data sharing is found in violation of the country's data-protection laws. Luxembourg's data-protection commissioner initiated a probe into Skype's privacy policies following revelations in June about its ties to the NSA.
benton.org/node/161880 | Guardian, The
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AT&T INVITED TO BRUSSELS TO EXPLAIN WHY SPECTRUM MATTERS
[SOURCE: American Enterprise Institute, AUTHOR: Roslyn Layton]
[Commentary] Vice President of the EU Commission Neelie Kroes gathered with leaders of the telecom community and its investors in Brussels to discuss the digital single market. There is a gloomy outlook for the future as telecom revenue and investment are down. Kroes noted that there is an opportunity to add 1% of GDP in economic growth if the EU can harness its capabilities in ICT. This requires a solid telecom sector, but is at odds with the reality of 28 individual markets, heavy-handed regulation and embargoes on consolidation. Fleur Pellerin, Minister Delegate with responsibility for Small and Medium Enterprises, Innovation, and the Digital Economy, noted that Europe once was leading the world with mobile, but lost its place with web 2.0 and is now being relegated. In 2002 there were six European phone makers making up 50 percent of the world’s phones, but now with the Microsoft acquisition of Nokia, there are none. Alcatel-Lucent just laid off 10,000 workers. The telecom industry is expected to shed 10 percent of its workforce because of lack of revenue. AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson offered four lessons for Europe on spectrum:
The map matters. Spectrum demands a broad footprint. Carving up little countries with bits and pieces of spectrum is not efficient.
Owners’ economics drive the greatest development and conservation. He advised European policymakers to offer 30 year licenses.
Markets are best suited to drive technological decisions. The government should be technology neutral. European policies that predefine spectrum to 2G but don’t allow a carrier to substitute 4G are not in anyone’s best interest.
Markets that are efficient are harmonizing spectrum. The US was in the European situation in the past, but made it through because it was allowed to swap and trade spectrum. Allow the secondary market to be fluid.
benton.org/node/161874 | American Enterprise Institute
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MARKETERS COULD BE HIT BY TOUGH NEW DATA LAWS FOR EU
[SOURCE: AdAge, AUTHOR: Emma Hall]
The battle between big data and individual privacy will be put in the spotlight on Oct. 21 when the European Parliament votes on the introduction of the harsh new Data Protection Regulation. Organizations -- including the World Federation of Advertisers and the Industry Coalition for Data Protection (a collection of trade bodies that includes the WFA and the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU) -- have been furiously lobbying ahead of the vote, hoping for a lighter-touch regime to protect the interests of business. Malte Lohan, director of public affairs at the WFA, said, "The European Parliament wants to make the toughest privacy law the world has ever seen. The EU is championing the rights of citizens, but it's not that straightforward -- this could undermine the digital economy." The first crucial issue is around the definition of personal data. The second centers on the definition of consent. The vote by the European Parliament is not the final stage in the process, but it is a key step in determining the outcome. Once approved, the regulation will be put to the European Council, where individual countries get to have their say, bringing in another layer of complexity as different countries have very different approaches to privacy.
benton.org/node/161886 | AdAge
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October 2013

October 15, 2013 (NSA collects millions of e-mail address books)

NSA collects millions of e-mail address books globally

On a New Jersey Islet, Twilight of the Landline

Schools Learn Tablets' Limits

Code.org: Mark Zuckerberg, other icons lead effort to teach computer science in every school

Online ad industry goes on the offensive with new study

California's changes in Shield Law good for the public

Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg to visit DC

A Truce in the Videogame Wars

SoftBank to Pay $1.5 Billion for Supercell Majority Stake