April 2016

BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20, 2016

Today’s events https://www.benton.org/calendar/2016-04-20

INTERNET/BROADBAND
   House Communications Subcommittee Approves Lifeline CURB Act
   Verizon urges FCC not to adopt opt-in requirements for ISPs
   RS Fiber: Fertile Fields for New Rural Internet Cooperative - Institute for Local Self-Reliance
   Broadening the Oversight of a Free and Open Internet - op-ed
   If net neutrality advocates only knew how Tim Wu originally defined “net neutrality” - AEI op-ed

SECURITY/PRIVACY
   Burr-Feinstein antiencryption bill a firing offense - X-Lab op-ed
   Read the tech industry's open letter about 'unworkable' encryption bill [links to Verge, The]
   Chairman Walden: People 'astonished' over mobile vulnerabilities
   Apple Gets Thousands of Requests From Law Enforcement, Transparency Report Shows [links to Benton summary]
   Police: Apple, Google should ban foreign encrypted apps [links to Hill, The]
   FBI can't unlock 13% of password-protected phones it seized, official says [links to USAToday]
   Apple lawyer to brief senators on FBI iPhone spat April 20 [links to Hill, The]
    Lawful Hacking: Should, Or Can, The FBI Learn To Overcome Encryption Itself? [links to NPR]
   A brief history of US encryption policy - Brookings [links to Benton summary]
   US and Russia meet on cybersecurity [links to CNN]
   Box CEO: Why the latest attempt by Congress on cybersecurity is already outdated [links to Washington Post]
   Why Google is warning that ‘google.com’ is ‘partially dangerous’ [links to Benton summary]
   Bill Gates: No ‘absolutists’ on privacy and government searches [links to Hill, The]
   FBI Says It Needs Hackers to Keep Up With Tech Companies [links to New York Times]

AGENDA
   FCC to Focus on USF Enforcement, Pay TV Customer Protection
   FEC Commissioner Warns of Creeping Threat of Media Regulation at FEC

EMERGENCY COMMUNICATION
   R&D Roadmap for Using Data Analysis to Enhance Public Safety [links to Department of Commerce]

BROADCASTING/NAB SHOW
   Remarks of Commissioner Clyburn at 2016 NAB Show [links to Benton summary]
   Remarks of Commissioner O'Rielly at 2016 NAB Show Re: "The Black Box of the FCC's Set Top Box Proposal" - speech [links to Benton summary]
   Remarks of Commissioner Pai at 2016 NAB Show Re: Repacking Broadcasters Following Incentive Auction - speech [links to Benton summary]

TELEVISION/SET-TOP BOX
   Public Knowledge's Kimmelman: 'Data' is FCC set-top proposal's 'dirty little secret' [links to Benton summary]
   Adonis Hoffman op-ed: An imperious president fiddles with your set-top box [links to Multichannel News]
   Guest Blog: Obama Rex [links to Broadcasting&Cable]
   Comcast Unifies Broadcast, Digital Video Distribution Platform [links to Benton summary]
   Canada's Cable Unbundling Falls Short With "Skinny" TV Packages [links to Hollywood Reporter]
   6 More Trends Driving the Future of TV [links to Multichannel News]
   9% of Young Adults Don’t Subscribe to Pay TV [links to Broadcasting&Cable]

ELECTIONS & MEDIA
   Breitbart national security editor paid by Donald Trump campaign [links to Politico]
   Trump owns GOP media appearances on Fox [links to Politico]
   The Media vs. Trump story that’s been overlooked: Freedom of Speech - Columbia Journalism Review op-ed [links to Benton summary]
   Eric Wemple: The libel laws targeted by Donald Trump are helping him big-time [links to Washington Post]

CONTENT
   Virtual Reality Lures Media Companies to a New Frontier [links to New York Times]
   Google claims YouTube ads are more effective than TV [links to Guardian, The]

LABOR
   The tech industry has cut a Google’s worth of jobs in the past 12 months [links to Revere Digital]
   Intel to slash 12,000 jobs as it moves away from PCs [links to Los Angeles Times]
   Verizon Turns to Shadow Workforce Amid Strike [links to Wall Street Journal]

OWNERSHIP
   Consolidated Buys Champaign Telephone, Expands Business Services Footprint [links to telecompetitor]

DIVERSITY
   Can AI Help Gender Diversity Help AI? [links to Vice]
   What Do Women Want At Hackathons? NASA Has A List [links to Fast Company]

STORIES FROM ABROAD
   EU widens battle with Google
   Google scores an antitrust win in Canada (while European charges still loom) [links to Benton summary]
   US and Russia meet on cybersecurity [links to CNN]
   Canada's Cable Unbundling Falls Short With "Skinny" TV Packages [links to Hollywood Reporter]
   India uses tech to reduce bribes among police and government officials [links to American Public Media]
   5 ways Americans and Europeans are different - Pew research [links to Benton summary]

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INTERNET/BROADBAND

HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE APPROVES LIFELINE CURB ACT
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
A divided House Communications Subcommittee approved by a vote of 17 to 11 the CURB Lifeline Act (HR 4884) along with a handful of other communications-related bills. The Lifeline CURB Act caps the Lifeline fund at its current $1.5 billion annually—the Federal Communications Commission voted to increase the subsidy to $2.25 billion and even a Republican-backed compromise would have raised it to $2 billion. It would also prevent the subsidy—which is $9.25 per month—from being used for a cell phone or other device and would also end voice-only mobile service subsidies—the FCC proposals phases out voice-only mobile over several years and even then allows for extending that if necessary. The bill passed after lengthy debate along party lines and after a series of amendments from Democratic Reps were voted down. Democratic Reps do not want the program cut or capped, saying it could adversely impact broadband adoption for seniors, veterans, and low-income families. One Democratic amendment was adopted. It required the FCC Comptroller General to study whether a cap on the fund discourages waste, fraud and abuse. April 19’s vote is just the first step in what could be a long partisan path. The House must wait until mid-May to begin debating appropriations bills, so it’s not hard to imagine a full committee vote next, followed by a floor vote. (There has been no announcement to that effect from House GOP leaders.) If the bill made it through the House, the Senate would move slower. But there appears to be willingness among Republicans to consider putting some pressure back on the independent agency. “We don’t like where the FCC is headed,” Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-SD) said.
benton.org/headlines/house-communications-subcommittee-approves-lifeline-curb-act | Broadcasting&Cable | House Communications Subcommittee Press Release | Morning Consult
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VERIZON URGES FCC NOT TO ADOPT OPT-IN REQUIREMENTS FOR ISPS
[SOURCE: Fierce, AUTHOR: Colin Gibbs]
Verizon met with Federal Communications Commission officials to urge them not to adopt rules that would require broadband providers to obtain their customers' permission before using consumer data to send targeted ads. The FCC voted earlier in April to move forward with proposed rules requiring Internet service providers to ask consumers to opt in to any sharing of their data with third parties, among other things. Those rules would apply to providers of both mobile and fixed-line broadband services, but not to Internet companies like Facebook or Google. Verizon said in a new filing with the Commission that while it is in "general agreement with the use of a notice and consent framework for addressing the privacy practices," the opt-in requirements would be unfairly burdensome on ISPs looking to compete against Internet companies for ad revenues. "We noted that the broad opt-in requirements proposed in this proceeding are unnecessary to protect consumers and inconsistent with the practices of other Internet companies," wrote William Johnson, Verizon's senior vice president of federal regulatory and legal affairs. "The proposed opt-in requirement -- including for the marketing of a provider's own products and services to its customers and for the internal sharing of customer information with affiliates -- would create substantial practical challenges for broadband providers and would make it more difficult for these providers to bring new competition to the market for online advertising."
benton.org/headlines/verizon-urges-fcc-not-adopt-opt-requirements-isps | Fierce
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RS FIBER
[SOURCE: Institute for Local Self-Reliance, AUTHOR: Scott Carlson, Christopher Mitchell]
A new trend is emerging in rural communities throughout the United States: Fiber-to-the-Farm. Tired of waiting for real Internet access from big companies, farmers are building it themselves. Communities in and around Minnesota’s rural Sibley County are going from worst to best after building a wireless and fiber-optic cooperative. While federal programs throw billions of dollars to deliver last year’s Internet speeds, local programs are building the network of the future. This paper documents a groundbreaking new model that’s sprung up in South Central Minnesota that can be replicated all over the nation, in the thousands of cities and counties that have been refused service by big cable and telecom corporations. From the technologies to the financing, rural communities can solve their problems with local investments. “This cooperative model could bring high quality Internet access to every farm in the country,” says Christopher Mitchell, director of ILSR’s Community Broadband Networks initiative. “It’s time we stop giving billions of dollars to the big telephone companies that have refused to meet local needs. There is a better way, there are better models emerging. We can do this. RS Fiber proves it.
benton.org/headlines/rs-fiber-fertile-fields-new-rural-internet-cooperative | Institute for Local Self-Reliance
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ICANN ON INTERNET GOVERNANCE
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Stephen Crocker]
[Commentary] The Internet has matured because it is free and open, led by the private economy and based on voluntary standards. It is built on the principles that define America: free enterprise and limited government. It is those same ideals of privatization that frame a proposal recently sent to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration that would transition stewardship of some key Internet technical functions away from the U.S. to a diverse and accountable global Internet community. Why is such a transition needed? Since the Internet’s inception, the U.S. Commerce Department and the California nonprofit corporation that I head, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, have been in charge of coordinating the global assignment of Internet addresses and domain names. In 2014 the U.S. government decided a more international stewardship was appropriate. Since then, the global Internet community has been working on a proposal that assures that such a transition will not threaten the openness and freedom of the Internet. First and foremost, this proposal guards against “capture” by any one group or government. This is the primary reason the Internet community—along with businesses, civil society and other interest groups—has given its blessing to the changes. This transition, maintaining the global Internet’s role as an incubator for innovation and a stimulator of domestic and international economic growth, merits broad support. We owe it to future generations to assure that the Internet of tomorrow is as free, open and resilient as the Internet of today.
[Crocker is the chairman of the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers]
benton.org/headlines/broadening-oversight-free-and-open-internet | Wall Street Journal
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WHAT WU MEANT
[SOURCE: American Enterprise Institute, AUTHOR: Bronwyn Howell]
[Commentary] Since Tim Wu’s seminal 2003 article proposing an anti-discrimination (or “neutrality”) principle, it has become an article of faith among pro-neutrality advocates that any action by Internet service providers (ISPs) that could be perceived as discriminating by user, content, site, platform, application, type of attached equipment, or mode of communication constitutes a harmful activity warranting a heavy-handed regulatory ban. Given the rapidly expanding reach and use of the net neutrality principle, it is instructive to revisit that original article and see what Professor Wu originally identified as the problem. The first point to note is that Wu’s primary concern in 2003 was with the physical elements of ISPs’ control over how end users (both consumers and content providers) used the Internet. He begins by stating that “the basic principle behind a network anti-discrimination regime is to give users the right to use non-harmful network attachments or applications, and give innovators the corresponding freedom to supply them.” Second, although framing his neutrality principle as an anti-discrimination tool, Wu does not say that all instances of ISP discrimination with regard to its customers should be banned. Neutrality as a concept, he says, “is finicky and depends entirely on what set of subjects you choose to be neutral among.” ISP neutrality is, he asserts, “a tradeoff between upward (application) and downward (connection) neutrality. If it is upward, or application, neutrality that consumers care about, principles of downward neutrality may be a necessary sacrifice.”
[Howell is general manager for the New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation]
benton.org/headlines/if-net-neutrality-advocates-only-knew-how-tim-wu-originally-defined-net-neutrality | American Enterprise Institute | read Wu’s paper
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SECURITY/PRIVACY

A FIRING OFFENSE
[SOURCE: Christian Science Monitor, AUTHOR: Sascha Meinrath, Sean Vitka]
[Commentary] The Burr-Feinstein antiencryption bill isn't just bad, it's evidence of a dangerous incompetence in congressional leadership that is undermining America’s security. In fact, the draft bill is compelling evidence that Senate leadership should strip – or at least not reappoint – Senators Burr (R-NC) and Feinstein (D-CA) of their positions on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. If Burr-Feinstein passes, it guarantees that Americans will have worse encryption than the rest of the world. This bill would make us all less safe by requiring that our data be stored in ways that dramatically increase its susceptibility to malicious hackers, identity thieves, and other malfeasance. But this bill doesn't just represent one security mistake or one attack on individual privacy – it's the culmination of a history of bad ideas from the committee's cochairs. Sens Burr and Feinstein have proven incapable of fulfilling some of their most important oversight duties time and again – even failing to hold the CIA to account when it was caught illegally spying on Senate staff. Given their history and this bill, there is now little doubt their removal is actually the best way to ensure that the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence stops endangering this country and gets back to doing its job: making sure American surveillance programs are keeping us safe and being conducted legally.
[Sascha Meinrath is the Director of X-Lab and the Palmer Chair in Telecommunication at Penn State University. Sean Vitka serves as counsel for Fight for the Future and is a fellow with X-Lab.]
benton.org/headlines/burr-feinstein-antiencryption-bill-firing-offense | Christian Science Monitor
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WALDEN: PEOPLE 'ASTONISHED' OVER MOBILE VULNERABILITIES
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: David McCabe]
House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) said the House should look into whether mobile phone networks are vulnerable to hackers. Chairman Walden said that a “60 Minutes” report on the vulnerability was worrisome. The “60 Minutes” segment, aired April 17, showed how hackers could listen in on phone calls and track other data from smartphones with only the number associated with the device. The hackers said they were exploiting a vulnerability in a mobile network called SS7, which helps connect calls. Chairman Walden called it “an issue of deep concern” and said he thinks "people will be astonished” by the existence of the vulnerability. He said he expected lawmakers associated with his committee to examine the issue in some form. “It’s something we’re looking at, yes, because it just went public here last night,” he said, before cautioning that it was possible lawmakers could do so in private sessions rather than an open hearing. “We’ll get briefed up on it first and then see where we go,” he said, adding later, "Some of these issues are better dealt with maybe even in a classified setting.” He is not the first lawmaker to call for lawmakers to examine the report. Rep Ted Lieu (D-CA) said that the House Oversight Committee should take a look at the vulnerability.
benton.org/headlines/chairman-walden-people-astonished-over-mobile-vulnerabilities | Hill, The | ars technica
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AGENDA

FCC TO FOCUS ON USF ENFORCEMENT, PAY TV CUSTOMER PROTECTION
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Lydia Beyoud]
A recent $51 million proposed fine is a sign of more to come in Universal Service Fund integrity and fraud enforcement, Federal Communications Commission Enforcement Bureau Chief Travis LeBlanc said April 11. Pay TV consumer protection work is another of the Enforcement Bureau's highest priorities, LeBlanc said. The bureau hasn't focused much on consumer protections for cable and satellite subscribers in recent years, but views it as important to do so now, said LeBlanc. “The complaints that we are seeing from subscribers of cable and satellite services really are high,” he said. Consumer complaints relate to unclear bills, debt collection practices, and quality of service. Those complaints raise concerns for the bureau, “especially given that the rules that we have on the books that apply to consumer protection in the cable context are pretty strong,” he said. LeBlanc pointed to existing rules on prompt cancelation of service and requirements to protect customers' personally identifiable information. LeBlanc said fines have gotten larger under his tenure as bureau chief. “However, it's not just because we're looking for the maximum fines,” he said. “It's because we're targeting the most egregious cases” where the most consumers are harmed, he said.
benton.org/headlines/fcc-focus-usf-enforcement-pay-tv-customer-protection | Bloomberg
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FEC COMMISSIONER WARNS OF CREEPING THREAT OF MEDIA REGULATION AT FEC
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Mario Trujillo]
Publishers and filmmakers should be wary of Democrats at the Federal Election Commission trying to squeeze them out of an exemption created for the press, according to FEC Republican Commissioner Lee Goodman. Goodman used a five-page statement to scold Democrats on the commission for trying to continue an investigation into a company that created and distributed a conspiracy theory film ahead of the 2012 election that claimed that President Barack Obama's real father was Franklin Marshall Davis, described as "an American Communist." The FEC ultimately voted in February to close the case without taking any action — an increasingly common occurrence with the 3-3 deadlock at the commission that is divided between the two parties. Though no action was taken, Goodman said the implication of the Democrats' position could have been much broader than a fringe film. "Imagine the specter of a government investigation and punishment of a filmmaker for showing a political film in over 500 theaters nationally," Goodman wrote. A complaint filed in 2014 alleged that Highway 61 Entertainment owner Joel Gilbert should have reported the cost of distributing the film and included a disclaimer along with it. The film "Dreams from my Real Father: The Story of Reds and Deception" is described as a play on President Obama's actual autobiography with a narrator impersonating the president. The FEC requires many organizations to report the donations they receive and any expenses used when attempting to sway federal elections. However, there is a broad press exemption for news or commentary released through newspapers, magazines and other media as long as they are not owned by a political committee or a candidate.
benton.org/headlines/fec-commissioner-warns-creeping-threat-media-regulation-fec | Hill, The | Read the statement
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STORIES FROM ABROAD

BATTLE WITH GOOGLE
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Christian Oliver]
The European Union widened its landmark antitrust battle against Google, accusing the company of abusing its dominance of the smartphone operating system Android. The new charge sheet will deepen US accusations that EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager is disproportionately targeting US technology companies with her antitrust and tax avoidance cases against Apple, Google, Amazon and Qualcomm. The EU said it had come to the “preliminary view” that Google was abusing its dominance of smartphone operating systems to pre-install its own search engine and browser as a default on smartphones. Commissioner Vestager complained that this would stifle competition by closing off the market for smaller, innovative app makers and service providers. Brussels also accused the company of preventing the installation of Google apps on smartphones that used modified versions of Android, called “Android forks”. In an unexpected third charge, Commissioner Vestager said Google was giving financial incentives to manufacturers and mobile network operators on condition that they exclusively pre-install Google Search on their devices.
benton.org/headlines/eu-widens-battle-google | Financial Times | WSJ | NYTimes | CSM | CNN
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