Lauren Frayer

The European Commission requested that Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus alter their terms of service or face potential fines. The Commission — the executive arm of the European Union — noted that their demands came amid increasing complaints from consumers who have been targeted by frauds and scams and that they had “been subject to certain terms of services that do not respect EU consumer law.”

The companies mentioned met with the Commission on March 16 to discuss solutions to the rising consumer complaints regarding their social media platforms, and according to the Commission will offer solutions in one month. Should the Commission not find the solutions “satisfactory,” it noted, “consumer authorities could ultimately resort to enforcement action.”

In recent years, legacy IT has shaped up to be one of the government’s biggest tech challenges. There’s a reason the legacy tech challenge is so widespread across government: Modernizing is hard and can be expensive. Yet, some agencies, including the Federal Communications Commission, have done just that. In 2013, the year CIO David Bray took over as the agency’s top tech official, FCC was spending 85 percent of its $64 million IT budget on legacy systems. Less than four years later, FCC has reduced its legacy spend by 35 percent on the back of an ambitious modernization plan heavy on achieving small wins, moving to cloud computing and ultimately reducing contracted personnel.

Sens Ed Markey (D-MA) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) wrote President Donald Trump to register their opposition to defunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. “Any funding cuts to the CPB could create a content deficit where the public no longer has access to enriching educational, civic, and entertainment shows for all Americans, regardless of ethnic, racial or socio-economic background,” they wrote. “With its near universal footprint, CPB provides virtually all Americans with access to this educational content and top-caliber local, regional, and national news. Approximately 99% of all Americans can enjoy this public media, regardless of how much money they earn or where they live.” They made a point of supporting independent sources of news. They pledged to oppose any attempt to decrease funding, much less eliminate it.

The local PBS stations that would be hardest hit by President Trump’s proposed budget cuts are in states that voted for Trump. Public television receives about 15 percent of its funding from federal sources, according to PBS. But in rural parts of the country — most of which voted overwhelmingly for Trump — that federal funding represents a much larger portion of the budget. Federal taxes provide up to 50 percent of the money for some stations. Federal tax dollars for public TV are administered through the private Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which has a $445 million annual budget.

Among the PBS member stations that get roughly half their budgets from the CPB is KYUK in Bethel (AK). Bill Legere, the general manager of KTOO — a joint radio and TV station which serves the approximately 33,000 residents of Juneau (AK) and surrounding villages — said his station would be “devastated” by the proposed cuts. “If there was anything left of the service we provide, there would be very little local content,” Legere said. “Very little content that’s responsive to Alaskan interests and needs. If we could even stay in business.” Alaska voted overwhelmingly for Trump. But Legere said most residents would be “shocked to think about not having this service available here.” In fact, a study commissioned by PBS last year found that 70 percent of Trump voters would oppose cuts to public broadcasting.

[Commentary] Now that President Trump has unveiled his budget and put public broadcasters on notice that he plans to zero-out the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, alarm bells have gone off. But this defense ignores today’s dramatically changed media environment. Public media now rarely offers anything that Americans can’t get from for-profit media or that can’t be supported privately.

For-profit media produce programming that is racially and ideologically diverse. Audiences once considered underserved — whether that means children of color, political conservatives, devotees of independent film or science geeks — can find what they’re looking for on commercial radio and TV. After this budget cycle, if public broadcasters continue to receive federal support, they must start appealing to more than just blue-state America. They should revisit and expand the meaning of diversity to include more ideological and geographic perspectives, and be required to report regularly to Congress as to viewership and listenership in states and major metro areas across the country.

[Howard Husock is vice president of research and publications at the Manhattan Institute and a City Journal contributing editor. He serves on the board of directors of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.]

President Donald Trump's budget blueprint calls for eliminating dozens of government programs and zeroing out funding for 19 independent agencies. And that may only be a preview of things to come as the Trump administration seeks to reorganize the executive branch. On March 13, President Trump signed the "Presidential Executive Order on a Comprehensive Plan for Reorganizing the Executive Branch," which calls for the director of the Office of Management and Budget to consult with agency heads and within a year develop a plan for improving government efficiency.

A year from now, when President Trump is presented with a plan for reorganizing the government, perhaps even eliminating whole agencies, a major question will be how much political capital the president has to spare. And that will likely depend on whether Congress has passed the health care bill and his yet-to-be-unveiled tax-cut plan.

Sens Ed Markey (D-MA) and Dan Sullivan (R-AK) sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission calling on Chairman Ajit Pai to support the E-Rate program. The E-Rate program, a part of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, provides schools and libraries funding for internet access. Before passage of the law that created the E-Rate program barely 14 percent of classrooms had access to the internet, while today nearly all schools around the country are connected.

“The E-Rate ensures that students from working-class and rural neighborhoods can connect to and be afforded all of the opportunities given to students from more affluent communities,” write Sens Markey and Sullivan. “With technology expanding into nearly every facet of our lives, we need to ensure all Americans – whether urban or rural, rich or poor – remain connected and competitive in this global economy by continuing to support this essential program that millions of kids rely on across the nation.”

Network neutrality is in danger, and former Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler isn’t pleased. Republicans’ go-to argument against the order is that it gave the FCC the authority to regulate the internet. Wheeler, who stepped down as FCC chair on Inauguration Day in 2017, calls the idea “ridiculous.” “This is no more the regulation of the internet than the First Amendment is the regulation of free speech,” Wheeler said.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai will address the American Cable Association's annual policy summit in Washington (DC). Chairman Pai will speak on the morning of March 30, before the attendees fan out to the FCC and Hill to carry their message of keeping the needs of smaller and mid-sized operators top of mind.

The Competitive Carriers Association says the Federal Communications Commission has plenty of reason for undoing the October 2016 broadband privacy order, which Internet service providers, advertisers, congressional Republicans and others are pushing for. In reply comments this week on petitions for reconsideration and those opposing them, CCA said those opposing the rule rollback rely on arguments that "deny the reality of the broadband marketplace" and either "ignore or minimize" the authority the FCC will still have over privacy after the order is dispensed with. One of those realities, CCA says, is that the order is uniquely burdensome on smaller providers, who get "very limited relief" from the rules, and only those with 100,000 subs or fewer, which they argue is too narrow a definition.

The FCC under Chairman Ajit Pai in a separate proceeding expanded the carve-out from Open Internet enhanced transparency rules from systems with 100,000 subs or fewer to 250,000 or fewer to accommodate smaller carriers. CCA applauded the Pai FCC's vote to stay the data-security provisions of the broadband privacy order, saying it prevented them "from investing substantial and potentially unnecessary resources towards compliance."