August 2017

The Federal Communications Commission wants recommendations on how to improve its data collection process for phone and internet access after becoming aware the agency was basing policies on increasingly flawed information. On Aug 4, the FCC announced its plan to revise the filing process for Form 477, a data set the agency uses to analyze broadband coverage in different areas of the country and show the public what providers they could access.

Internet and phone providers submit data on their coverage in different regions every six months. Many have called the data set inaccurate and unreliable, reporting a number of instances when the FCC says broadband providers are available in areas they don’t cover. The agency aims not only to refine the data set and purge incorrect information but also to reassess what data it needs to paint an accurate picture of nationwide coverage. According to Pai, the FCC may be asking for too much data—some of which it may not need for analysis—and that could overburden companies and discourage them from filing properly.

Lawyers representing a man convicted of six robberies in the Detroit area have now filed their opening brief at the Supreme Court in one of the most important digital privacy cases in recent years. This case, Carpenter v. United States, asks a simple question: is it OK for police to seize and search 127 days of cell-site location information (CSLI) without a warrant? Previously, lower courts have said that such practices are compatible with current law. But the fact that the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case suggests that at least four justices feel that perhaps the law should be changed.

In Carpenter, as is the case in countless modern criminal cases, law enforcement was able to obtain the relevant records directly from the mobile phone provider with a court order that has less stringent requirements than a warrant. This is not a trivial distinction. A so-called "d-order" can be circumspect with how information is obtained by authorities. It does not, as the Fourth Amendment demands, require as much particularity. A warrant, unlike a d-order application, also mandates a signed and sworn affidavit ("on oath or affirmation"), as the Constitution requires, which describes the "places to be searched and the things to be seized." Carpenter's attorneys, many of whom are from the American Civil Liberties Union, argue in their filing that the current legal standard gives the government too much leeway. "If the Court were to accept this argument, the government could use this tool to monitor the minute-by-minute whereabouts of anyone—from ordinary citizens to prominent businesspersons to leaders of social movements," they wrote in their August 7 brief.

[Commentary] The mainstream media has suddenly discovered Sinclair. Oh no! cry the media watchdogs -- this company known formally as Sinclair Broadcast Group has a conservative slant to its newscasts. That's a no-no, say the watchdogs, even though many sources of news on TV seem to have a slant these days. But the problem isn't the slant, of course. It's the conservative slant.

Sinclair is in the media watchdogs’ crosshairs because it is the largest single owner of local TV stations in the United States in terms of the number of properties the company owns. Many of the stations have local news. I have seen these “too-powerful” arguments arise time and time again over the course of my 34-year career covering television. As a result, I have come to the conclusion that a company such as Sinclair could own a million stations and the commentaries of Boris Epshteyn would not be any more influential or watched by a bigger audience than any number of other commentators from MSNBC to Fox News Channel.