June 2014

Privacy in America panel convenes a year after Snowden

You're a conservative, people will tell the Sen Mike Lee (R-UT). How can you be critical of the rampant surveillance by the National Security Agency? But there's no contradiction there in Sen Lee's view.

It's more like a natural outgrowth of his beliefs. "Some of the programs threaten to undermine privacy," Sen Lee says, adding that the federal government is simply too intrusive.

Sen Lee was the kickoff speaker at a panel discussion roughly a year after the first revelations of widespread government snooping in classified documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

While the Snowden disclosures have led triggered public concern about the impact of government surveillance on privacy, totally unapologetic was one of the panelists, Mike Hayden, a former head of the NSA and the CIA. Hayden, who said the panel's title should have included security as well as privacy, asserted several times that there have been no abuses in the collection of telephone records of ordinary American citizens not suspected of terrorism as well as the scooping up of e-mail in another program.

The colloquy, titled Privacy in America: The NSA, the Constitution and the USA Freedom Act, was sponsored by Microsoft, the ACLU and The Washington Times.

AT&T backs Microsoft's dispute over warrant for emails held abroad

AT&T is backing Microsoft in its challenge of a US search warrant for private email communications located in a facility in Dublin, Ireland.

The telecommunications company filed in a New York court asking permission to submit an amicus curiae brief in support of Microsoft. Described as a "friend of the court," an amicus curiae is not directly involved in a litigation but believes it may be impacted or has views on the matter before the court.

Along with Verizon, all three companies have expressed concern that the US government's demands for data held abroad could alienate overseas customers from placing their data with US providers, particularly after the disclosures of surveillance abroad by the US National Security Agency.

AT&T says customer data accessed to unlock smartphones

Personal information, including Social Security numbers and call records, was accessed for an unknown number of AT&T Mobility customers by people outside of the company, AT&T has confirmed.

The breach took place between April 9-21, but was only disclosed recently in a filing with California regulators.

While AT&T wouldn't say how many customers were affected, state law requires such disclosures if an incident affects at least 500 customers in California.

"Employees of one of our service providers violated our strict privacy and security guidelines by accessing your account without authorization," the company said in a letter to affected customers. "AT&T believes the employees accessed your account as part of an effort to request codes from AT&T than are used to unlock AT&T mobile phones in the secondary mobile phone market."

Mobile video on the rise: Regulating disruptive competition

[Commentary] Online video continues to assert its claim to the title of Killer App of the Early 21st Century.

Cisco Systems has released its annual Internet traffic forecast, which Re/code amusingly summarized with the headline “Cat Videos, Binge TV Watching Will Account for 84 Percent of Internet Traffic.”

Another study suggests that Netflix is making significant inroads into traditional pay television markets.

This growth disrupts old business models, putting pressure on traditional media providers to find innovative new ways to connect with viewers. But it also puts pressure on regulators, who face the unenviable task of protecting consumers in a dynamic, chaotic business environment. Too little regulation risks anticompetitive behavior that harms consumers. But importantly, too much regulation also risks consumer harm, by preventing companies from testing new, innovative business models that may benefit consumers.

When navigating uncertain competitive terrain, the regulator must resist the urge to reflexively apply old rules to a new business environment where they may do more harm than good.

[Lyons is associate professor at Boston College Law School]

Test event finds mobile phones have poor hands-free performance

The results of an International Telecommunication Union test event have highlighted the need for phone manufacturers to improve their products’ compatibility with car hands-free systems.

The event found that an overwhelming majority of the phones tested would cause shortfalls in the audio quality of hands-free-supported conversations, a concern that automobile manufacturers say could be resolved through greater cooperation from phone manufacturers.

In a plea to solve a persistent problem, major car manufacturers, including Mercedes and Toyota, with hands-free terminal (HFT) supplier Bosch, have issued a strong call to mobile phone manufacturers to perform standardized tests on the behavior of their products within hands-free systems and to participate in the ITU-T Study Group 12 standardization work that develops interoperability tests.

Serious faults were observed in the worst-performing phones; some causing as much as a three-fold decline in voice quality, others completely failing to acknowledge that they had been connected to a vehicle’s hands-free system. Quality degradation of this extent has led to customer complaints to the car manufacturers, and experts say could give rise to safety risks as it could encourage drivers to use their phone by hand while driving.

Exclusive: Google Wants To Collect Your Health Data With 'Google Fit'

Google is planning to launch a new health service called Google Fit to collect and aggregate data from popular fitness trackers and health-related apps, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the company’s plans.

It will launch the service at the Google I/O conference for developers, being held on June 25 and 26. Such a service would mark a direct challenge to Apple’s HealthKit framework, rolling out with its new mobile platform iOS 8 in the fall to aggregate data from wearable devices and apps.

Google Fit will aggregate data through open application programming interfaces (APIs), instruction sets that allow apps to share information, and will also announce partnerships with wearable device makers at its I/O conference, Forbes understands.

One source with knowledge of Google’s plans said Google Fit would allow a wearable device that measures data like steps or heart rate to interface with Google’s cloud-based services, and become part of the Google Fit ecosystem. Google could not be reached for comment at the time of writing.

Google In Talks To Take Virgin Galactic Stake

Sky News has revealed that discussions with Virgin Galactic are part of Google’s ambitious project to put hundreds of satellites in low-Earth orbit in an attempt to extend Internet access to billions of people.

Negotiations between the two companies have been taking place for months, and are said to be at an advanced stage. The talks are likely to lead to a deal with two main elements, according to insiders.

The first will see Google inject hundreds of millions of dollars into a joint venture, with Virgin Galactic folding in the technology it has developed as part of its efforts to build the world’s first space tourism business. The second component will involve Google spending roughly $30 million in return for a small stake in the Virgin Galactic holding company.

The terms of the alliance have not yet been finalized and could yet be altered before a deal is struck.

TDG: Tablet Users Prefer OTT Service Apps to TV Apps

According to new research from The Diffusion Group (TDG), despite the widening availability of ‘TV Everywhere’ services, tablet owners are significantly more likely to use over-the-top service apps such as Netflix than those offered by both TV networks and operators.

Almost half (48%) of adult tablet owners report using OTT video apps on occasion, compared with 37% that use broadcast network apps, 31% that use cable network apps, and 23% that use TV operator apps.

The use of tablet apps for both free and fee-based online services is not only more widespread but occurs more frequently than the use of TV-specific apps. For example 41% of tablet users engage OTT service apps at least once a month, compared to 26% who use apps from the ‘Big Four’ broadcasters, 21% that use cable channel apps, and only 16% who turn to TV operator apps at least once a month.

“Some 60% of adult broadband users now own a tablet such as iPad or Kindle Fire,” notes Michael Greeson, TDG President and Director of Research. “These portable platforms are rapidly becoming second televisions in the home, where three-fourths of tablet video viewing takes place. This is consistent with predictions TDG offered the very week the iPad was first introduced.”

Judiciary Version Of STELA Set For June 19 Markup

The Senate Judiciary Committee is not wasting any time marking up its "clean" version of the Satellite Television Extension and Localism Act (STELA).

It has set June 19 as the date for the markup hearing. That markup will be an opportunity for senators to add amendments. The Senate bill (S. 2454) was introduced as essentially a straight, five-year, reauthorization of the law, which expires at the end of 2014 unless it is renewed.

Powell: Cable Is Already A Managed Service

National Cable & Telecommunications Association president Michael Powell defended managed services, saying that over 80% of the cable pipe currently is dedicated to delivering such a managed service: "It's called cable."

Powell was interviewed for C-SPAN's Communicators series, a copy of which was supplied to B&C/Multi. He said that cable should absolutely be allowed to deliver managed services and to prohibit cable companies from offering managed services over that pipe is tantamount to "confiscation of our business. It is essentially the argument that you should demand as a matter of law that you take away our private service and put it in the public domain."

Powell added that cable only uses a portion of that pipe for the public Internet, but that the majority goes to other services that the cable industry develops. He said that unless cable itself should not exist as a private service, then one has to at least concede that managed services have consumer-benefitting purposes.

"We are not government owned rights of way," he said. "We built our infrastructure with purely private capital to sell a service to the American public, and I think the government has to be careful not to suggest that, even for a public purpose, that somehow you can remove those services and repurpose them for something that a regulator might prefer to see them used for."

Benton

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