We cannot wait for the publication of [the full Mueller report] to begin taking necessary actions to protect the vote of the American people in 2020. First, we must minimize the use of online communication platforms by foreign governments to suppress and sway voters through divisive messaging to favor certain candidates. Second, in parallel, the US intelligence community must implement plans to assist these companies in thwarting disinformation and influence campaigns from foreign governments through rapid declassification of technical indicators and regular updates on potential threats. Third, Congress must debate, amend and pass the Honest Ads Act to set fair and reasonable guidelines for online advertising in political campaigns. Fourth, we should enact reforms and norms to help deter future “hack and leak” or doxing operations by foreign intelligence organizations. Fifth, we must act quickly and boldly to enhance the cybersecurity of our voting infrastructure. 

[Rep Ro Khanna's (D-CA) district includes much of Silicon Valley. Michael McFaul is the director of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford and a former US ambassador to Russia. Alex Stamos is the director of the Stanford Internet Observatory and the former chief security officer of Facebook.]

After spending the better part of the last decade fighting against more accurate broadband mapping data, the broadband industry recently proclaimed the sector was now “leading the charge” for better data. But industry experts are skeptical of the industry’s sudden about face, and worry the effort’s real goal is decreased broadband data transparency. The week of March 18, USTelecom, a lobbying organization representing AT&T, Verizon, and other Internet service providers, launched a PR campaign insisting the nation’s phone companies are now taking the lead on improving the country’s terrible broadband maps. The problem: USTelecom and the broadband industry have a very long history of lobbying to scuttle efforts to improve broadband mapping, raising more than a few eyebrows. While the US desperately needs better broadband mapping and availability data, that data’s not going to be useful if it can’t be independently verified. And given the industry’s long history of denying the nation’s broadband competition and availability problems, experts say skepticism about the industry’s real intentions is warranted.

As a broadband connection becomes more integrated into life in the 21st century — from working to studying to keeping in touch with loved ones — rural East Texas continues to lag the rest of the state. Forty percent of people living in 41 East Texas counties did not have broadband in 2016, compared with 11 percent of the population statewide. And East Texans accounted for nearly one-third of the state’s 3 million residents without access to broadband that year. Chris Pedersen, a vice president for Connected Nation, said his organization maps out broadband access by household nationwide and has done so in Texas. He said about one in four rural Texans does not have access to broadband, based on the Federal Communications Commission’s data, but the FCC’s data is likely understating the problem. “There is kind of an outcry, not just in Texas, but in rural communities, that they need broadband, increasingly so, because you need it to do just about anything,” said Pedersen. Pedersen said his organization has been going on listening tours around Texas to understand the needs. He said some people have internet connections but don’t realize what they’re missing because of the slow speed. “I say, ‘Well, do you have broadband,’ and they say ‘Yeah,’ and then I realize that they’re thinking about just having internet,” Pedersen said. “But they’re connecting at like one megabit per second. “I had a conversation with a city manager about it taking four hours to download a PDF,” he said. “That’s not broadband.”

In this series, the Benton Foundation and the National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA) explore the origins, strategies, challenges and funding mechanisms for successful digital inclusion organizations. In this article, we examine E2D, also known as Eliminate the Digital Divide -- a nonprofit in Charlotte (NC) that began with a focus on closing the homework gap. The mission of E2D is to ensure that all students have affordable access to essential at-home technology and digital literacy training to support academic success and prepare students for college, careers, and beyond. By the end of the 2019-20 school year, E2D’s goal is for 100% of Charlotte Mecklenburg School District families to have a computer and internet access in their homes. 

[Angela Siefer is the Director of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA). Matthew Kopel is program manager at NDIA].