House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., worries about duplication among federal agencies and sees technology as the silver bullet to address that concern, he said Wednesday in a speech at the Chamber of Commerce. “Are we really in the 21st century when it comes to our government?” McCarthy asked: “Would we really have the agencies we had today if cast in that light? … It’s all top down.” McCarthy plans to “look at every single agency,” pursuing duplication and accountability, he said. He said tech industry stakeholders could help pick an agency to evaluate. “The first thing you want to do is, ‘Do they have correct accounting principles so you can evaluate everything?’” McCarthy said. “How many programs for each department? … Every single one dilutes where it’s going, and why it is in this agency and that.” The answer is not more money, he said. McCarthy favored government agencies embracing digital technology and apps to make their systems more effective, efficient and accountable.
The House Commerce Committee signed off on the FCC Consolidated Reporting Act (HR-734) Thursday by voice vote. “This good government legislation reduces the reporting workload and increases efficiency at the FCC by consolidating eight separate congressionally mandated reports on the communications industry into a single comprehensive report,” Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., said in his opening statement Wednesday. “This streamlined report will give us important information about competition among technology platforms and the deployment of communications technologies to unserved communities.” House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., Communications Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., and Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., backed the bill. Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., introduced the Senate companion (S-253) last month. The House passed the bill last Congress but it never advanced in the Senate.
It’s “time for a Republican-controlled Congress to “unleash the pent-up energy of pro-innovation policies,” and address tech priorities such as patent reform, data privacy, high-skilled immigration reform and Internet governance, Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said during a keynote speech at Lincoln Labs’ Reboot Congress event Thursday. As chairman of the Senate Republican High-Tech Task Force, Hatch said he has developed an innovation policy agenda for the 114th Congress to “protect legitimate intellectual property rights from abusive patent litigation.” Patent trolls “bring thousands of frivolous patent infringement lawsuits each year in attempts to extort settlements from conscientious, hard-working technology innovators,” costing the U.S. economy about $60 billion each year, Hatch said. Current law fails to combat patent trolls, he said. He said it’s time to reform the America Invents Act, which Hatch introduced in 2005 with Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. Patent reform legislation has been proposed, but Hatch said he will “oppose any bill that fails to prevent patent trolls from litigating-and-dashing.” Hatch encouraged continuing bipartisan support for updating U.S. privacy laws, encouraging action so “privacy laws correspond to present realities and keep up with technological advances.” The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) should be updated immediately “to safeguard data stored abroad from improper government access,” he said. “Congress has not adequately updated the law since its enactment, and technological developments have resulted in disparate treatment between online and offline communications.” Though Hatch said he agrees with the premise of the ECPA reform bills (see 1501280044) that were recently introduced in the House and Senate, they don’t establish a “framework for how the U.S. government can access data stored abroad,” he said. Americans' privacy would not be protected by foreign governments, he said. “If the federal officials can obtain emails stored outside the United States simply by serving a warrant on a provider subject to U.S. process, nothing stops governments in other countries -- including China and Russia -- from seeking e-mails of Americans stored in the U.S. from providers subject to Chinese and Russian process.” Hatch said he plans to reintroduce the Law Enforcement Access to Data Stored Abroad Act, or LEADS, in the coming weeks to ensure Americans' privacy is protected by all governments. “We must strengthen privacy in the digital age and promote trust in U.S. technologies worldwide by safeguarding data stored abroad,” Hatch said, “while still enabling law enforcement to fulfill its important public safety mission.”
One senior House Democrat planned to speak highly of the FCC Consolidated Reporting Act at the full House Commerce Committee markup for HR-734. Lawmakers were scheduled to deliver markup opening statements at 5 p.m. Wednesday and to reconvene to vote at 10 a.m. Thursday in 2123 Rayburn. The House Communications Subcommittee unanimously cleared the bill last week. “As amended during the Subcommittee’s recent markup, H.R. 734 would streamline Congressionally-mandated reporting requirements under a single, industry-wide report while providing two important clarifications,” said Communications Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., according to the written statement. “First, in our effort to consolidate reporting requirements, the legislation clarifies that the FCC’s [Telecommunications Act Section] ‘706’ Report does not in any way impact or alter the explicit grant of broadband authority that the court affirmed in the Verizon case last year. Second, the legislation preserves the FCC’s obligation to examine how retransmission consent fees impact a consumer’s monthly bill.” Eshoo, Communications Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., and Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., had introduced the bill together. The bill has passed the House before but never advanced in the Senate.
House Commerce Committee Vice Chairwoman Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., is “disturbed” at the White House influence allegedly hanging over the net neutrality proceeding, she said in prepared remarks for a speech at TechAmerica’s fly-in event Wednesday on Capitol Hill. “What was the point of having an open notice and comment period if the real rules were being written at the White House instead of the FCC? Chairman [Tom] Wheeler needs to delay the net neutrality vote and clear the air, which cannot be accomplished with a simple statement. Until he does so, there will be a cloud hanging over the FCC.” Blackburn expressed concern about hacking and said she's working with Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., on legislation to address it. They are “hopeful of reaching an agreement” on legislation involving data security and breach notification but can't say much yet, she said. The government must be proactive in sharing information to combat such threats, she said. Blackburn also emphasized the challenges of protecting consumer privacy: “Washington’s view of digital privacy is too subjective. It must be industry proactively and credibly ensuring that individuals know more about what data is being collected about them and how it is being used.”
Rep. John Shimkus’ Domain Openness Through Continued Oversight Matters Act (HR-805) is “misguided and hurts the cause he claims to support,” Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Pa., said in an email Tuesday. “Delaying this [IANA] transition allows anti-democratic nations to continue to use the IANA contract as a red herring to falsely claim ‘the U.S. government controls the Internet’ and call for a greater role for governmental entities like the United Nations and the ITU,” he said. “Further delaying NTIA’s transition process only strengthens these arguments.” Shimkus, R-Ill., told us Monday that the lack of clarity about the term “multistakeholder community” is one of the primary reasons some lawmakers are skeptical of the transition (see 1502100049). Doyle's comments "suggest we ought to have a greater concern for what Russia and China think than what is in the best interest of the American people and the future of our free and open Internet,” Shimkus emailed Wednesday. “Even now, the fact is that this transition will not move forward until NTIA is satisfied with the multistakeholder proposal," he said. "All my bill asks is that Congress also have an opportunity to review the proposal, through our non-partisan investigative arm, before a final, irreversible decision is made," Shimkus said. "That’s not dilatory, that’s due diligence.”
Rep. David Schweikert, R-Ariz., introduced legislation “to provide for additional technical and procedural standards for artificial or prerecorded voice telephone messages and the establishment of such standards for live telephone solicitations,” its longer title said. HR-852 has no co-sponsors and was referred to the Commerce Committee. Schweikert isn't a member of Commerce. The bill text wasn't available Wednesday.
Congress needs to take the reins from the FCC, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., planned to tell an audience at the Chamber of Commerce Wednesday night. “Congress has deferred to the FCC for too long,” Thune was to say at the Reboot Congress event, according to his prepared remarks. “If we continue to be bystanders while the FCC moves forward, we will be guaranteeing years of legal and regulatory uncertainty that will chill both innovation and investment. Congress must reassert our constitutional prerogative to make policy, because the only way to protect the open Internet while preserving the bipartisan light touch regime is to find a bipartisan legislative solution.” Thune has proposed legislation codifying net neutrality protections that would limit FCC reliance on Communications Act Title II and Telecom Act Section 706. Thune predicted courts would likely strike down FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s net neutrality “overreach,” but said it’s a “fool’s errand” to predict court rulings. He pointed to the court decision that granted the FCC “far more power than anyone ever expected” in the “unbridled authority” of Section 706. He judged Wheeler’s order to be likely weak on legal grounds: “My understanding is that Chairman Wheeler is relying on all sorts of legal contortions and clever lawyer tricks in order to pound the square peg of the Internet into the round hole of Title II. In particular, the apparent legal rationale for applying Title II to wireless data seems quite weak.” The unpredictability of courts is why Congress must act, because “conservatives should know by now that we cannot rely on the courts to rein in this administration,” he said. Several other GOP lawmakers were to speak at the Reboot Congress event Wednesday and Thursday, including House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., following Thune.
House Republicans received a record number of responses to their sixth Communications Act overhaul white paper -- 220. The white paper that received the next highest number of responses was the very first one a year ago, with 116. The 220 stakeholders weighed in on several video policy overhaul questions in the latest white paper (see 1501230062, 1501260045, 1501270041 and 1502040038). The House Communications Subcommittee had set a January deadline for responses and posted them all Wednesday. They included many community TV stations plus bigger stakeholders such as the American Cable Association, the American Television Alliance, Cox Enterprises, Dish Network, Public Knowledge, TVFreedom and Verizon. The American Television Alliance, which includes many pay-TV industry stakeholders, used its response to press for enactment of Local Choice, a broadcast a la carte proposal: “No price regulation, no blackouts, no threats, and most importantly, no drama for consumers,” the group said. Congress shouldn't have to wait for a comprehensive telecom rewrite to engage in retransmission overhaul, it said. Aereo, which has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, urged Congress to consider several changes. “Even though Aereo itself has permanently ceased all business operations and will no longer exist, we believe that the lessons we learned have helped further the conversation around video reform,” leading to a robust future market, Senior Vice President Virginia Lam wrote. Aereo backed “a regulatory framework that is technology-neutral and allows linear online video providers to compete in parity with incumbent providers.” The multichannel video programming distributor definition doesn’t need to apply to online video services offering “an on-demand or nonlinear channel format,” Aereo said.
Legislation directing the FTC and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to establish a federal standard for vehicles that have “fully adopted wireless technologies,” to “secure our cars and protect drivers’ privacy,” was introduced Wednesday by Sens. Edward Markey, D-Mass., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., during a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on the Internet of Things (see 1502110035). Introduction of the legislation came days after Markey released a report (see 1502090026) outlining privacy and security issues for vehicle-to-vehicle communication. The legislation also would require new cars to be evaluated and rated based on how well the drivers’ privacy and security were protected. The information would be displayed in a manner similar to how fuel economy is currently displayed. “We need the electronic equivalent of seat belts and airbags to keep drivers and their information safe in the 21st century,” Markey said. “There are currently no rules of the road for how to protect driver and passenger data, and most customers don’t even know that their information is being collected and sent to third parties.” Connected cars "represent tremendous social and economic promise, but in the rush to roll out the next big thing automakers have left the doors unlocked to would-be cybercriminals,” Blumenthal said. The FTC and NHTSA didn't comment.