October 2013

BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for TUESDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2013

Follow the discussion on the E-rate and ConnectED at http://benton.org/initiatives/e-rate

THE SHUT DOWN
   Surveillance panel shut down

GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
   Meltdowns Hobble NSA Data Center
   CDT Submits Comments to the President’s Review Group on Surveillance Reform - press release
   Technologists’ Submit Comments to the NSA Review Group - press release [links to web]
   Silicon Valley must push back on NSA to protect privacy rights - editorial [links to web]

PRIVACY
   Joining the Surveillance Society? - analysis
   Do Not Track effort at a crossroads
   The move to mobile apps is bad for Do Not Track
   Ad groups prepare for “cookieless” future, develop opt-out tool for alternative tracking
   ITIF warns court ruling against Google could be 'devastating' for economy
   California driving Internet privacy policy

CONTENT
   Think piracy is killing the music industry? This chart suggests otherwise.

WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
   ITU: Mobile Broadband is Moving Up
   Verizon's rumored demands may help explain small cell slowdown [links to web]
   These iPhone 5c Price Cuts Are Coming Dangerously Close to a Trend [links to web]
   Workers Using Their Own Mobile Devices Propel Globo Shares [links to web]
   Sequoia Capital Bets Big on Mobile Travel Search [links to web]
   Startup Aims to Reinvent Wireless Communication [links to web]

OWNERSHIP
   Merger and Acqusition Activity Hits $67.5 Billion In 2013 [links to web]
   DOJ Request Pushes Sinclair-Allbritton Close Date Into ‘14 [links to web]
   Time Warner Cable Buys Southeast Fiber Network, DukeNet [links to web]

ELECTIONS AND MEDIA
   The 2016 presidential media primary is off to a fast start - research [links to web]

CHILDREN & MEDIA
   Young People Are Not as Digitally Native as You Think
   PBS hopes for Internet hit

LABOR
   US Adults Fare Poorly in a Study of Skills

INFRASTRUCTURE
   Supreme Court Won't Review FCC Pole Attachment Decision
   Behind the scenes with Google Fiber: Working with city governments - press release
   IT Spending to Reach $3.8 Trillion Next Year, as Billions of Things Get Connected
   The 2020 network: How our communications infrastructure will evolve - op-ed [links to web]

TELEVISION
   Aereo to talk patents

POLICYMAKERS
   Farzad Mostashari Joining the Engelberg Center at Brookings - press release [links to web]
   Justice Scalia uses the Internet. And he thinks you people on it are narcissists. [links to web]

STORIES FROM ABROAD
   German NSA has deal to tap ISPs at major Internet Exchange
   Google offers rivals more space to get EU deal
   See also: Google modifies Analytics in EU-wide privacy concession [links to web]
   Alliance for Affordable Internet Launches to Stimulate Global Policy Reform To Lower Access Costs To Users - press release

MORE ONLINE
   NATOA Releases Blueprint for Localism in Communications - press release [links to web]
   'Tech stress' builds with proliferation of digital devices [links to web]
   Energy efficiency: How the Internet can lower your electric bill [links to web]

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THE SHUT DOWN

SURVEILLANCE PANEL SHUT DOWN
[SOURCE: Politico, AUTHOR: Josh Gerstein, Mike Allen]
A panel President Barack Obama set up in August to assess the government’s use of surveillance technologies hit some turbulence related to the government shutdown and found itself effectively frozen after its staff was furloughed, according to a person briefed on the panel’s operations. The five-member Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies was set to meet with the top leaders of Congress’s intelligence committees, the source said. However, Review Group member Michael Morell -- who stepped down as director of the Central Intelligence Agency -- declined to take part, arguing that the panel shouldn’t be pressing on while much of the intelligence community’s workforce was staying home. “I simply thought that it was inappropriate for our group to continue working while the vast majority of the men and women of the intelligence community are being forced to remain off the job,” Morell said. “While the work we’re doing is important, it is no more important than -- and quite frankly a lot less important -- than a lot of the work being left undone by the government shutdown, both in the intelligence community and outside the intelligence community.”
benton.org/node/161723 | Politico | Washington Post
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GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS

NSA MELTDOWNS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Siobhan Gorman]
Chronic electrical surges at the massive new data-storage facility central to the National Security Agency's spying operation have destroyed hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of machinery and delayed the center's opening for a year, according to project documents and current and former officials. There have been 10 meltdowns in the past 13 months that have prevented the NSA from using computers at its new Utah data-storage center, slated to be the spy agency's largest. One project official described the electrical troubles—so-called arc fault failures—as "a flash of lightning inside a 2-foot box." These failures create fiery explosions, melt metal and cause circuits to fail, the official said. The causes remain under investigation, and there is disagreement whether proposed fixes will work, according to officials and project documents. One Utah project official said the NSA planned this week to turn on some of its computers there.
benton.org/node/161754 | Wall Street Journal
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CDT SUBMITS COMMENTS TO THE PRESIDENT’S REVIEW GROUP ON SURVEILLANCE REFORM
[SOURCE: Center for Democracy and Technology, AUTHOR: Greg Nojeim, Joseph Lorenzo Hall, Leslie Harris]
The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) made a series of recommendations to the President’s Review Group on Surveillance Reform focusing on Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (“FISA”) as amended by the FISA Amendments Act, enhanced transparency, and the structure of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (“FISC”). CDT said the Review Group should recommend an end to bulk collection of telephony metadata under Section 215, and that it should prevent bulk collection under similar legal authorities. Nine bills introduced in Congress take this approach. Additionally, CDT advocated for an end to prospective surveillance under Section 215. CDT urged the Review Group to recommend raising the standard of certainty in “foreignness” of targets beyond the NSA’s current 51% standard for Section 702 surveillance, and that it end the ongoing mass “upstream” collection of communications that merely mention a target. CDT also urged the Review Group to recommend limits on the purpose of Section 702 surveillance and that it advise the President to apply the privacy provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to its surveillance that targets people abroad. The Review Group should also recommend transparency measures and finally, CDT urged the Review Group to endorse having a Special Advocate argue for privacy and civil liberties at FISA court proceedings – a concept the President already endorsed.
benton.org/node/161731 | Center for Democracy and Technology
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PRIVACY

JOINING THE SURVEILLANCE SOCIETY?
[SOURCE: New America Foundation, AUTHOR: Seeta Gangadharan]
[Commentary] Recent digital inclusion policies that aim to increase digital literacy of new Internet and computer users, promote civic engagement, and improve economic development do not currently address the privacy needs of new users. Now, more than ever, digital inclusion policies need to pay greater attention to developing providers’ expertise and capacity to handle privacy and surveillance concerns of new Internet users. Privacy advocates and developers also have a role to play. Expanding “digital literacy” to include privacy education requires that privacy protecting tools become easier to use. Until then, the benefits of digital inclusion are at odds with the potential harms wrought by a surveillance society.
benton.org/node/161730 | New America Foundation
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DO NOT TRACK EFFORT AT A CROSSROADS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Kate Tummarello, Brendan Sasso]
A group of companies and privacy advocates working to create a tool that would allow users to opt out of online tracking will vote on whether to continue. The group has missed multiple deadlines to produce a document describing a Do Not Track standard, and some stakeholders left the talks in the recent months, citing frustration with the way the process has been handled. The most recent departure from the group was the Digital Advertising Alliance, which works with online advertising networks that depend on online tracking. When the group can’t agree, its leaders will call for objections and “pick the least objectionable option,” Justin Brookman, co-chairman of the group and director of the Center for Democracy & Technology’s Project on Consumer Privacy said. If the group does not want to move forward, it would be “better to end it now than spend another two years squabbling and not coming to resolution because people aren't invested in the process,” Brookman said.
benton.org/node/161726 | Hill, The
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THE MOVE TO MOBILE APPS IS BAD FOR DO NOT TRACK
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Brian Fung]
The last few years have seen a heated argument between the advertising industry and privacy advocates over Do Not Track, a technology that allows Internet users to indicate that they wish not to be tracked online. But as users increasingly access the Internet via mobile apps rather than Web browsers, the current generation of Do Not Track technology could become less relevant. A fifth of all Americans with cellphones say they primarily surf the Web using mobile devices — not a desktop or laptop, according to the Pew Research Center. According to Flurry, a company that helps advertisers track users' online behavior, 80 percent of US consumers' mobile-device time is spent in apps. Just 20 percent is spent in a browser. Compared against all forms of browsing (desktop and mobile), we spend 30 percent more time in apps than we do surfing the Web. According to Peter Swire, who helped lead industry negotiations on Do Not Track and who now sits on White House review panel on intelligence, the biggest focus in policy debates over Do Not Track has been on browsers. The current generation of Do Not Track technology, then, may not be effective at protecting users' privacy.
benton.org/node/161736 | Washington Post
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AD GROUPS PREPARE FOR “COOKIELESS” FUTURE, DEVELOP OPT-OUT TOOL FOR ALTERNATIVE TRACKING
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: James Temple]
The Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) and the Interactive Advertising Bureau are working to develop standard technology that allows consumers to opt out of online tracking when methods other than traditional cookies are deployed. While the move appears aimed at protecting user choice, privacy researchers worry it’s also an effort to legitimize alternative techniques for identifying consumers, inviting controversial practices like “browser fingerprinting” to become more common.
benton.org/node/161718 | San Francisco Chronicle
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GOOGLE WI-FI-DECISION
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Brendan Sasso]
A technology-focused think tank is urging a federal appeals court to reconsider its decision to allow a privacy lawsuit against Google to move forward. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco concluded that unencrypted Wi-Fi signals are not “readily accessible to the general public.” As a result, the court ruled that Google may have violated federal wiretapping laws when it collected unencrypted Wi-Fi data as part of its Street View project. But in a brief, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) warned the court of "the devastating consequences its ruling will have on all aspects of the economy that rely on wireless technology infrastructure, including but not limited to healthcare, financial institutions, retailers, and residential computer users." The advocacy group argued that the decision puts standard industry security practices into legal question. Information technology professionals regularly scan Wi-Fi data to combat hackers and identify security problems, the group wrote.
benton.org/node/161752 | Hill, The
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CALIFORNIA DRIVING INTERNET PRIVACY
[SOURCE: Politico, AUTHOR: Michelle Quinn]
With the federal government and technology policy shut down in Washington, California is steaming ahead with a series of online privacy laws that will have broad implications for Internet companies and consumers. Gov Jerry Brown (D-CA) has signed a litany of privacy-related legislation, including measures to create an “eraser button” for teens, outlaw online “revenge porn” and make Internet companies explain how they respond to consumer Do Not Track requests. The burst of activity is another sign that the Golden State — home to Google, Facebook and many of the world’s largest tech companies — is setting the agenda for Internet regulation at a time when the White House and Congress are moving at a much more glacial pace.
benton.org/node/161750 | Politico
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CONTENT

THINK PIRACY IS KILLING THE MUSIC INDUSTRY? THIS CHART SUGGESTS OTHERWISE.
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Timothy Lee]
For more than a decade, the recording industry has been complaining that online copyright infringement is devastating the music industry. And it's true that the revenues of conventional record labels have plunged in recent years. But if you look at the bigger picture, things don't look so grim. Indeed, sales of recorded music are falling off a cliff. But fortunately, that's not the only way musicians can make money. Concert revenues have soared in the last 15 years. Other sources of revenue have also grown robustly.
benton.org/node/161744 | Washington Post
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WIRELESS/SPECTRUM

ITU: MOBILE BROADBAND IS MOVING UP
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The latest figures from the International Telecommunications Union buttress the Obama Administration's focus on wireless broadband deployment, with the number of worldwide mobile broadband subscriptions approaching 2 billion. According to a summary of the fifth edition of the "Measuring the Information Society" report, released on Oct 7, 2013, mobile broadband accessed by tablets and smart phones is the fastest-growing segment of the global ICT market. The report found declining prices for both mobile and fixed broadband service and "unprecedented adoption of 3G—3G is the report's benchmark for qualifying as high-speed mobile broadband access. ITU predicts that by the end of 2013, almost 40% of the world's population will be online. The report found there continues to be an economic divide, with broadband uptake, fixed and mobile continuing to be limited in developing countries. Some 4.4 billion people worldwide are not yet online, the report says, concluding that more action must be taken to improve accessibility and affordability.
benton.org/node/161739 | Multichannel News
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CHILDREN & MEDIA

YOUNG PEOPLE ARE NOT AS DIGITALLY NATIVE AS YOU THINK
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Eric Pfanner]
Everyone knows young people these days are born with smartphones in hand and will stay glued to the Internet from that time onward. Right? Well, not quite. Actually, fewer than one-third of young people around the world are “digital natives,” according to a report and billed as the first comprehensive global look at the phenomenon. The study, conducted by the Georgia Institute of Technology and the International Telecommunication Union, shows that only 30 percent of people ages 15 to 24 have spent at least five years actively using the Internet, the criterion used to define digital nativism. In many developed countries, more than 90 percent of young people are considered digital natives, with South Korea leading the way at 99.6 percent. But many developing countries lag far behind — all the way down to the Pacific island of Timor-Leste, where a mere 0.6 percent of 15- to-24-year-olds are digital natives.
benton.org/node/161742 | New York Times
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PBS HOPES FOR INTERNET HIT
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Cecilia Kang]
On television, Big Bird stands tall among children’s shows. But on the iPad, he is just a little chick. That dynamic has become a growing worry to the executives of PBS who have a stable of popular educational shows for the living room television but are making far less headway on smartphones, tablets and other mobile gadgets. With children adopting mobile technology at a breakneck pace and spending immense time on those devices, executives said they have had to broaden their offerings to stay relevant. “Audience on TV is harder and harder to reach, so the audience on all platforms is critical,” said Scott Chambers, Sesame Workshop’s senior vice president of worldwide media distribution. “Are we gaining a larger audience overall? It’s really hard to say and difficult to track, which is something we lose sleep over.” Not all are confident that PBS Kids, the network’s educational division, will be able to make the transition. “The idea of public broadcast was for it to be a TV experience, not a math experience and not a mobile app experience,” said Lloyd Morrisett, chairman emeritus for the board of the Sesame Workshop. “It will be difficult for PBS, as it will for Sesame Workshop, as television organizations to change the culture of those organizations.”
benton.org/node/161749 | Washington Post
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LABOR

SKILLS STUDY
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Richard Perez-Pena]
American adults lag well behind their counterparts in most other developed countries in the mathematical and technical skills needed for a modern workplace, according to a new study. The study, perhaps the most detailed of its kind, shows that the well-documented pattern of several other countries surging past the United States in students’ test scores and young people’s college graduation rates corresponds to a skills gap, extending far beyond school. In the United States, young adults in particular fare poorly compared with their international competitors of the same ages — not just in math and technology, but also in literacy. More surprisingly, even middle-aged Americans — who, on paper, are among the best-educated people of their generation anywhere in the world — are barely better than middle of the pack in skills.
benton.org/node/161753 | New York Times
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INFRASTRUCTURE

SUPREME COURT WON'T REVIEW FCC POLE ATTACHMENT DECISION
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
The Supreme Court declined to review a US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit upholding the Federal Communications Commission's pole attachment rate order. The court does not have to explain why it denies an appeal, simply saying that the petitions for appeal in Electric Power Service v. FCC had been denied and that Justice Alito had taken no part in the decision. The DC Circuit had found that the FCC, in changing decades old policy on pole attachments, had justified the standard for its change in policy. The FCC in July 2011 had voted to reform its pole attachment rules as another way to promote broadband deployment and ease telecom's route to that deployment. “We are pleased that the Supreme Court has rightly put a final stake in the efforts of the electric utility industry to delay the FCC’s implementation of the statute’s clear directive," said USTelecom Vice President Glenn Reynolds.
benton.org/node/161740 | Multichannel News
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BEHIND THE SCENES WITH GOOGLE FIBER: WORKING WITH CITY GOVERNMENTS
[SOURCE: Google, AUTHOR: Derek Slater]
most Americans connect to the Internet from their homes, their signal travels along a local telecommunications infrastructure, currently built mostly of copper cables that run along utility poles or underground. Now that technology has advanced, communities are starting to upgrade to fiber-optic cable that’s better suited to 21st century communications demands, like high-speed Internet. And that involves a lot of detailed planning — utility pole by utility pole and block by block. That’s what Google Fiber teams are working on right now in the Kansas City area, Austin, and Provo. Before anyone picks up a shovel or climbs a ladder, Google examines:
Access to infrastructure, where Google works with the city and, where applicable, the local electric utility and telephone company to figure out which poles and conduit can be used for Google Fiber;
Access to local infrastructure maps about poles and conduits; and
Expedited construction permits, so that Google Fiber cities can be ready to receive thousands of permit requests from Google. [Derek Slater is Government Relations Manager at Google]
benton.org/node/161743 | Google
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IT SPENDING TO REACH $3.8 TRILLION NEXT YEAR, AS BILLIONS OF THINGS GET CONNECTED
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Arik Hesseldahl]
When you start adding up all the IT budgets of every company and government agency, you start talking about, as they say, real money. Here’s the figure: $3.8 trillion. That’s the new figure that research firm Gartner said global IT spending will reach in 2014. And good news if you’re in the business of selling IT products and services: it amounts to a rise of nearly four percent from 2013. One big trend is the Internet of Things. The way Peter Sondergaard, Gartner’s head of research sees it, there were about 2.5 billion devices connected to the Internet, and most were phones or PCs. By the year 2020 there will be 30 billion devices, each with its own IP address. By 2020, Gartner reckons companies and governments will derive about $1.9 trillion of total economic value from Internet of Things technology, in the industries of health care, retail and transportation.
benton.org/node/161746 | Wall Street Journal
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TELEVISION

AERO TO TALK PATENTS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Kate Tummarello, Brendan Sasso]
Broadcasters will get two hours to grill Internet-TV service Aereo on the patents it holds, despite the company’s objections, a New York magistrate judge ruled. Judge Henry Pitman ruled that Aereo CEO Chet Kanojia and Chief Technology Officer Joseph Lipowski must submit to one hour each of deposition regarding Aereo’s patents. The deposition will come as part of the copyright-infringement case between Aereo and broadcasters, who claim the company is infringing their copyrights by digitally streaming broadcast content. Aereo has argued that its technology is “not substantially different from what consumers could accomplish with off-the-shelf components,” which could mean the company is not irreparably harming broadcasters, Judge Pitman wrote. However, in its patent applications, Aereo claimed its technology is new in that it allows users to view broadcast content on “other video-capable devices.”
benton.org/node/161751 | Hill, The
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STORIES FROM ABROAD

GERMAN NSA HAS DEAL TO TAP ISPS AT MAJOR INTERNET EXCHANGE
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Cyrus Farivar]
The German equivalent of the National Security Agency has secret arrangements with local telecom firms, providing direct access to data flowing over domestic fiber. According to the German magazine Der Spiegel, the Federal Intelligence Service (known by its German acronym, BND) has taps on the major Internet exchange point in Frankfurt known as DE-CIX. The magazine cited a “three-page confidential letter” that was signed by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office and the Ministry of the Interior. The letter noted that the BND would also have access to data sent over 25 major German ISPs, including 1&1, Freenet, Strato, GSC, and Lambdanet Plus. This revelation seems to be the rough German equivalent of the NSA's own XKeyscore surveillance system. The BND, which is prevented by German law from conducting domestic spying, ostensibly has its attention turned toward Russia, Central Asia, the Middle East, and North Africa. However, Der Spiegel does note that the BND is allowed to spy on Germans "in some cases." The German tech news site Heise reports that it still unknown exactly how the BND avoids capturing domestic traffic sent over German networks.
benton.org/node/161741 | Ars Technica
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GOOGLE OFFERS RIVALS MORE SPACE TO GET EU DEAL
[SOURCE: CNNMoney, AUTHOR: Virginia Harrison]
Google has agreed to give rivals more space on its website, raising the chances of a deal with Europe's antitrust authorities and reducing the risk of a hefty fine of possibly up to 10 percent of its global sales. The European Commission said it welcomed revised proposals from Google on how to display search results after a long-running investigation found the company was in breach of EU competition law. The company's initial submissions drew fierce criticism from competitors, so the regulators asked Google to go back to the drawing board. The fresh concessions made by the search giant appear to have pushed it closer to a settlement. The new proposal would make links to rival websites, services and search engines much more visible. Competitors will be able to display logos next to links, and dynamic text will provide more information about their content.
benton.org/node/161738 | CNNMoney
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ALLIANCE FOR AFFORDABLE INTERNET LAUNCHES TO STIMULATE GLOBAL POLICY REFORM TO LOWER ACCESS COSTS TO USERS
[SOURCE: Alliance for Affordable Internet, AUTHOR: Press release]
The Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI) is a new coalition aimed at leading policy and regulatory reform and spurring action to drive down artificially high Internet prices in developing countries. By advocating for open, competitive and innovative broadband markets, A4AI aims to help access prices fall to below 5% of monthly income worldwide, a target set by the UN Broadband Commission. A4AI’s 30+ members reach across boundaries of geography, industry, and organization type and include governments, companies, and civil society organizations from both developed and developing countries. Members share a belief that that policy reform, underpinned by robust research and genuine knowledge-sharing, is one of the best ways to unlock rapid gains in Internet penetration rates. The Alliance was initiated by the World Wide Web Foundation, and its honorary chairperson is Dr Bitange Ndemo, the immediate former Permanent Secretary of Kenya’s Ministry of Information and Communications, who is widely regarded as the father of Broadband in Kenya.
The Alliance will begin in-country engagements with three to four countries by the end of 2013, expanding to at least twelve countries by the end of 2015.
Members have committed to a set of policy best practices that will guide advocacy work at the international level.
Key policy levers to drive prices down include allowing innovative allocation of spectrum, promoting infrastructure sharing, and increasing transparency and public participation in regulatory decisions.
A4AI will produce an annual ‘Affordability Report’, with the first edition being unveiled in December 2013.
benton.org/node/161737 | Alliance for Affordable Internet
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