BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for FRIDAY, MARCH 10, 2017
A Little Part of the First Amendment Dies at FCC Oversight Hearing
COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY
Media The Enemy? President Trump Can’t Get Enough
House Oversight Committee question White House on digital records
The common origins of science and democracy - Jonathan Sallet op-ed
Op-Ed: Bring back the party bosses: Media moguls replaced smoke-filled rooms [links to Hill, The]
Can you tell if this tweet was sent by Donald Trump or not? [links to Washington Post]
The White House is scrutinizing job candidates’ old social media posts for criticism of Trump [links to Benton summary]
White House Casts Pre-emptive Doubt on Congressional Budget Office [links to New York Times]
Fact Check: Spicer’s Pre-emptive Attack on the Nonpartisan CBO [links to New York Times]
New York Art Scene Anxiously Waits for Decision on NEA’s Fate [links to New York Times]
INTERNET/BROADBAND
2017: E-Rate’s make or break year - Brookings analysis
Rural broadband subsidy programs are a failure. We need to fix them. - Scott Wallsten op-ed
Bills Limiting Broadband Move Forward in MO and TN Legislatures [links to Benton summary]
EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai Announces Investigation Into March 8 911 Outage - press release
SECURITY/PRIVACY
WikiLeaks says it will work with tech firms to defeat CIA hacking
State Privacy and Security Coalition Pans FCC Data-Breach Deadlines [links to Benton summary]
States Unconcerned About 18F's Previous Disregard for Security Procedures [links to Government Technology]
WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
Verizon Wireless wades right back into the net neutrality debate with Fios deal
A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise [links to Benton summary]
CONTENT
Twitter is testing an anti-harassment feature that flags some accounts as ‘sensitive’ [links to Verge, The]
Social Media’s Silent Filter [links to Benton summary]
Fake News Undermines the Credibility of Popular Social Networks [links to AdWeek]
Will tech firms save us from fake news? - AEI op-ed [links to Benton summary]
OWNERSHIP
Fox Is Said to Settle With Former Contributor Over Sexual Assault Claims [links to Benton summary]
POLICYMAKERS
R. David Edelman Joins MIT’s Internet Policy Research Initiative (IPRI) - press release [links to Benton summary]
Redefining the role of federal CIO: The Enabler-in-Chief [links to nextgov]
COMPANY NEWS
Sprint Gigabit LTE is Born, First Commercial Launch in New Orleans [links to Benton summary]
STORIES FROM ABROAD
BT and Ofcom strike deal over future of Openreach
China to US: Stop hacking us [links to Benton summary]
ITU joins forces with The Digital Impact Alliance to speed progress on the Sustainable Development Goals [links to International Telecommunication Union]
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COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY
PRESIDENT TRUMP’S MEDIA DIET
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: Jonathan Lemire]
Before most people are out of bed, President Donald Trump is watching cable news. With Twitter app at the ready, the man who condemns the media as "the enemy of the people" may be the most voracious consumer of news in modern presidential history. President Trump usually rises before 6 a.m. and first watches TV in the residence before later moving to a small dining room in the West Wing. A short time later, he's given a stack of newspapers — including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, The Washington Post and, long his favorite, the New York Post — as well as pile of printed articles from other sources including conservative online outlets like Breitbart News. The TVs stay on all day. The President often checks in at lunch and again in the evening, when he retires to the residence, cellphone in hand. It is a central paradox of the Trump presidency. Despite his fervent media criticism, President Trump is a faithful newspaper reader who enjoys jousting with reporters, an avid cable TV news viewer who frequently live-tweets what he's watching, and a reader of websites that have been illuminated by his presidential spotlight, showcasing the at-times conspiratorial corners of the internet.
benton.org/headlines/media-enemy-president-trump-cant-get-enough | Associated Press
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HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE QUESTIONS WH ON DIGITAL RECORDS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Ali Breland]
The leaders of the House Oversight Committee raised concerns that President Donald Trump may be violating federal law by deleting his tweets. In a letter addressed to White House counsel Donald McGahn, committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) and Ranking Member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) expressed concern over the White House’s digital record-keeping practices. “Many of the messages sent from [Trump’s] Twitter account are likely to be presidential records and therefore must be preserved,” the two wrote. “It has been reported, however, that president Trump has deleted tweets, and if those tweets were not archived it could pose a violation of the Presidential Records Act.” Reps Chaffetz and Cummings also noted their unease with encrypted apps White House staffers have been using, which the lawmakers believe may pose a risk to record keeping and transparency.
benton.org/headlines/house-oversight-committee-question-white-house-digital-records | Hill, The
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COMMON ORIGINS OF SCIENCE AND DEMOCRACY
[SOURCE: Brookings, AUTHOR: Jonathan Sallet]
[Commentary] This is the Scientific Revolution, but part of its reawakening is the recognition that truth-finding forms the basis for technological innovation, for capitalism and for democratic rule. All rest on the single, and simple, concept that individuals matter and that the very ability of individuals to think for themselves creates scientific propositions to be tested, technological innovations to be imagined, market outcomes to be respected and democratic outcomes to be treated as legitimate – even outcomes that some voters may deeply regret. The March for Science on April 22 is not about partisan politics; it’s a time to stand on the shoulders of giants. And to remind ourselves to see what they foresaw.
[Jonathan B. Sallet is a visiting fellow in Governance Studies. Previously, he served as deputy assistant attorney general for Litigation at the US Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division from 2016-17. Prior to joining the Division in 2016, Sallet was general counsel at the Federal Communications Commission.]
benton.org/headlines/common-origins-science-and-democracy | Brookings
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INTERNET/BROADBAND
VERIZON AND NETWORK NEUTRALITY
[SOURCE: The Verge, AUTHOR: Nick Statt]
Verizon is taking a page out of AT&T’s book by zero rating its Fios cable TV service for all Verizon Wireless customers. That means that if you purchase your mobile data plan from Verizon Wireless and your cable TV plan from Fios, you can now use the Fios Mobile app to stream live channels and on-demand shows and not have it count against your monthly data cap. (Verizon Wireless and Fios are separate subsidiaries, but both are owned by Verizon Communications.) This builds on Verizon’s previous decision to zero rate its Go90 mobile app for customers of its own wireless service, which network neutrality advocates see as prioritizing its own products to the detriment of those from competitors and upstarts. (One notable exception is for customers with unlimited mobile data plans. Streaming Fios Mobile content will in fact count toward the unlimited plans’ 22GB a month limit, after which Verizon will throttle speeds. This caveat is not made clear in Verizon’s marketing language, and instead is found only in the App Store release notes.) With new FCC chairman Ajit Pai calling net neutrality a “mistake” and vowing to roll back regulations on telecoms and internet service providers, Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile may be given even more freedom to do as they please with traffic on their networks.
benton.org/headlines/verizon-wireless-wades-right-back-net-neutrality-debate-fios-deal | Verge, The
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2017: E-RATE'S MAKE OR BREAK YEAR
[SOURCE: Brookings, AUTHOR: Joshua Bleiberg]
The underappreciated but critically important E-Rate program faces a fork in the road in 2017. Created during the Clinton administration, E-Rate originally intended to make it easier for schools to purchase dial-up internet connections. However, the program languished for many years while internet and education technologies improved by leaps and bounds. In 2014, the Obama administration revamped the program by nearly doubling the available funding and incentivizing the adoption of 21st-century technologies. The funding mechanism and presumably better E-Rate results portend a positive year for the program, though political uncertainty under a new administration signals there may be some rough waters ahead. E-Rate does not receive funding from the standard congressional appropriations process. A 1996 law requires telecommunication companies to contribute to the Universal Services Fund, which in turn provides the funding for E-Rate and other programs. Overall, this arrangement is equivalent to a tax, but it’s insulated from the tumult of the congressional budgeting process. The unique funding mechanism decreases the likelihood that E-Rate would attract negative attention from congressional Republicans. However, the new Republican leadership at the Federal Communications Commission could choose to cut spending. Returning E-Rate funding to pre-Obama reform levels, but keeping most of the modernization reforms, would be compatible with the position of new FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, a Republican. Pai has explained that his 2014 vote against the Obama E-Rate reforms was due to concerns about financial waste in the program rather than questioning the overall usefulness of the program.
benton.org/headlines/2017-e-rates-make-or-break-year | Brookings
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RURAL BROADBAND SUBSIDY PROGRAMS ARE A FAILURE.
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Scott Wallsten]
[Commentary] A cost-effective subsidy program should provide funds first where they will yield the largest bang for the buck and last where they yield the smallest. In this case, the government would define the network services it believes everyone should have (hopefully based on a careful analysis of both supply and demand information) and geographic areas it wants covered, and ask companies to say the size of the subsidy they would need to build out in those areas. A group of 71 economists signed a letter in 2009 encouraging this type of approach. It would then be possible to make an objective choice about which projects receive subsidies and which do not. We should take this opportunity to rethink universal service and implement new ways of promoting coverage where it does not exist so that it benefits consumers, not just rural Internet service providers.
[Scott Wallsten is president and senior fellow at the Technology Policy Institute]
benton.org/headlines/rural-broadband-subsidy-programs-are-failure-we-need-fix-them | Hill, The
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EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS
PAI ANNOUNCES INVESTIGATION INTO 911 OUTAGE
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: FCC Chairman Ajit Pai]
March 8, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced that he has launched an investigation into the 911 outage that impacted AT&T wireless subscribers across the United States. “Every call to 911 must go through,” said Chairman Pai. “So when I first learned of yesterday’s outage, I immediately directed FCC staff to contact AT&T about it and the company’s efforts to restore access to emergency services to the American public. I also spoke with Randall Stephenson, AT&T’s chief executive officer, and stressed the urgent need to restore service and to communicate with first responders, as well as AT&T customers, about the status of operations. Additionally, I announced last night that I have directed Commission staff to track down the root cause of this outage." "The FCC’s public safety professionals are on the case,” said Lisa Fowlkes, Acting Chief of the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau. “Access to 911 emergency services is essential for all Americans, especially the most vulnerable. We will fully investigate this outage and determine the root cause and its impact.”
benton.org/headlines/fcc-chairman-ajit-pai-announces-investigation-march-8-911-outage | Federal Communications Commission | B&C
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SECURITY/PRIVACY
WIKILEAKS SAYS IT WILL WORK WITH TECH FIRMS TO DEFEAT CIA HACKING
[SOURCE: Associated Press, AUTHOR: ]
WikiLeaks will work with technology companies to help defend them against the CIA's hacking tools, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said. The approach sets up a potential conflict between Silicon Valley firms eager to protect their products and an agency stung by the radical transparency group's disclosures. In an online news conference, Assange acknowledged that some companies had asked for more details about the CIA cyberespionage toolkit whose existence he purportedly revealed in a massive leak published March 7. “We have decided to work with them, to give them some exclusive access to some of the technical details we have, so that fixes can be pushed out,” Assange said. Once tech firms had patched their products, he said, he would release the full data of the hacking tools to the public.
benton.org/headlines/wikileaks-says-it-will-work-tech-firms-defeat-cia-hacking | Associated Press | The Hill
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STORIES FROM ABROAD
OFCOM’S BT AGREEMENT
[SOURCE: Financial Times, AUTHOR: Nic Fildes]
British Telecom and Ofcom have struck a deal about the future of the company’s Openreach broadband division after it agreed to transfer 32,000 staff into a legally separate company. The agreement ends two gruelling years of debate between the telecoms regulator and BT over the future governance of Openreach, which owns the fibres and wires that provide homes and businesses with broadband. It is the biggest shake-up in the regulation of British telecoms in a decade. The deal finally removes the lingering threat of a full break up of BT and Openreach that rivals Sky, TalkTalk and Vodafone had pushed for. The compromise to legally separate the network business and put in its own board is designed to give it more power to set its own strategy and invest in faster broadband services. But critics have questioned whether the move will lead to greater investment in ‘full fibre’ networks.
benton.org/headlines/bt-and-ofcom-strike-deal-over-future-openreach | Financial Times
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