Lobbying

Earlier in Jan it was reported how T-Mobile, AT&T, and Sprint were selling cell phone users’ location data that ultimately ended up in the hands of bounty hunters and people unauthorized to handle it. That data trickled down from the telecommunications giants through a complex network of middlemen and data brokers. One of those third parties was Zumigo, a company that gets location data access directly from the telecom companies and then sells it for a profit.

For several years it has made sense, in some quarters, to lump together the tech giants — chiefly Google, Facebook, Apple, and Amazon, sometimes also including Netflix or Microsoft. But talking about "big tech" is beginning to offer diminishing returns. Many of these companies banded together in 2012 for lobbying purposes as the Internet Association, and they have long shared a set of common regulatory interests in managing their platforms and services with little government oversight. But as privacy regulation of some kind looks more inevitable, their interests are more likely to diverge.

A pair of telecommunications industry trade organizations gave more than $3 million to nonprofit organizations that helped secure the repeal of network neutrality policies in 2017, according to tax returns reviewed by MapLight.

Federal prosecutors are examining whether foreigners illegally funneled donations to President Trump’s inaugural committee and a pro-Trump super PAC in hopes of buying influence over American policy. The inquiry focuses on whether people from Middle Eastern nations — including Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — used straw donors to disguise their donations to the two funds. Federal prosecutors in Manhattan are investigating whether President Trump’s 2017 inaugural committee misspent some of the record $107 million it raised from donations. The criminal probe by the Manhattan

Google, Amazon, and Snap wasted little time in 2018 in trying to cultivate the new crop of enforcers at the Federal Trade Commission, an agency that will play a key role in any Washington crackdown on the tech industry. The companies reached out to schmooze the four FTC commissioners appointed by President Donald Trump soon after they they were sworn into office in May, according to 73 pages of email communications obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.

In response to a request from Representative Frank Pallone, Jr.

The Democratic Reps staying mum on network neutrality have all taken campaign contributions from major telecommunication companies, according to Federal Election Commission filings. Democratic Reps have until Dec 10 to get 218 signatures for the Congressional Review Act that would overturn Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai's Restoring Internet Freedom order. This would require every Democratic Rep and a few Republican Reps.

On Nov 14, the New York Times detailed Facebook’s multi-pronged campaign to “delay, deny and deflect” efforts to hold the company accountable. This is far from the first time we’ve read disturbing accounts of Facebook’s unethical behavior, but this week the Times peeled back the curtain on the company’s crisis management techniques, public relations tactics, efforts to influence lawmakers, and aggressive lobbying. The peak at these practices helps explain why the social media giant has been so successful at avoiding meaningful regulation.

Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) led a letter with Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Chris Coons (D-DE), and Mazie Hirono (D-HI) to the Department of Justice urging Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to expand any investigation into Facebook and Cambridge Analytica to include whether Facebook—or any other entity affiliated with or hired by Facebook—hid information and retaliated against critics or public officials seeking to regulate the platform.

US customers pay some of the highest prices for broadband in the developed world, and broadband availability is sketchy at best for millions of Americans. But instead of tackling that problem head on, the Federal Communications Commission is increasingly looking the other way, relying on Internet service provider (ISP) data that paints an inaccurately rosy picture of Americans’ internet access. And as long as regulators are relying on a false picture of US broadband access, actually solving the problem may be impossible.