The Telecommunications Industry Association “urged” Congress in a news release Thursday to renew Trade Promotion Authority this year. The Software & Information Industry Association, meanwhile, said in a news release that it sent a letter that day to 18 House Democrats, requesting their support for President Barack Obama’s call for TPA. “With 75 percent of the overall market for telecommunications equipment and related services located outside of the United States, a robust trade policy agenda is critical to enhancing market access and avoiding trade restrictive policies in the global marketplace,” TIA said. “TPA renewal will send a strong signal to other negotiating parties on the priority the United States places on high-standard trade agreements that enhance trade liberalization and market access for U.S. industry.” TIA sent letters to the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee Tuesday, asking for TPA’s passage. “SIIA shares President Obama’s view that TPA is necessary to set trade rules that will benefit American workers and companies for years to come,” Mark MacCarthy, SIIA vice president-public policy, said in the release. “TPA would encourage modern trade agreements that recognize this vital need, and that are crucial to our business and economic competitiveness.”
A coalition of pro-free speech organizations, trade groups and law professors asked Congress to prohibit proposed federal laws that could undermine liability protections for publishers, the Center for Democracy & Technology said in a news release Thursday. “With the passage of the Stop Advertising Victims of Exploitation (SAVE) Act [HR-285] in the House and counterpart bills anticipated in the Senate, lawmakers are considering major changes to the legal protections that support free expression online, with laws that would hold Internet intermediaries liable for third-party content hosted on their sites,” the release said. "When faced with potential federal criminal liability for their users' content, online platforms will censor as a self-defense mechanism," Emma Llanso, CDT Free Expression Project director, said. "Wholly innocent operators of smaller sites and publications could be driven out of business if they are hauled into court to defend themselves on federal criminal charges.” The Computer and Communications Industry Association, Electronic Frontier Foundation, NetChoice, TechFreedom and Derek Bambauer, University of Arizona law professor, were among the coalition’s signatories.
Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., again supported “strong net neutrality protections,” writing Thursday in a Facebook posting. “If we had the technology, if we had the internet during the [civil rights] movement, we could have done more, much more, to bring people together from all around the country, to organize and work together to build the beloved community,” the senior House Democrat and civil rights activist said. “That is why it is so important for us to protect the Internet. … I am deeply grateful that President Obama has called on the FCC to pass rules that will protect the internet for generations yet unborn.”
The Senate Appropriations Financial Services Subcommittee roster will include Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.; James Lankford, R-Okla.; and Jerry Moran, R-Kan., a subcommittee member in the last Congress, the Appropriations Committee said Thursday. That’s in addition to the subcommittee leadership, already announced: Chairman John Boozman, R-Ark., and ranking member Chris Coons, D-Del. The House Appropriations Financial Services Subcommittee announced its seven GOP members and four Democratic members earlier this month. The subcommittees oversee the budget process for the FCC and FTC.
Proposed GOP net neutrality legislation drew the ire of Susan Crawford, a former Obama administration adviser and now a Harvard Law School visiting professor. She tore into the draft bill, which Republicans have said they want to make a bipartisan compromise, and criticized the broader efforts from Republicans in both chambers to overhaul the Communications Act. “Although calculated to address concerns about online fairness, its real thrust is to remove or constrain the FCC’s authority in a host of areas,” Crawford wrote in a blog post Wednesday for Medium. “The bill will draw a swift presidential veto.” She said the legislation has a “host of problems” and said it “so transparently shackles” FCC authority. Crawford doesn’t think the bill is “real,” she said: “What’s actually going on is that the net neutrality issue is being thrown under the bus by the carriers and the GOP in favor of a much more important goal: getting rid of the existing Telecommunications Act entirely.” She praised the “sensible” current statute and doubted the public interest would fare well in any telecom rewrite. Industry heavyweights will “use the occasion of an Obama veto” of net neutrality legislation “and a hymn to bipartisanship to press as hard as they can to get an act they do like passed -- before there’s a risk of losing GOP control of Congress again,” Crawford said. “My prediction: Such an act will not require carriers to serve everyone in every community with world-class, reasonably priced Internet access. It will allow a flawed system to get even worse, all to make the rich carriers even richer.”
Two House Democrats are preparing a letter to send to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler next week to press the agency to reclassify broadband as a Communications Act Title II telecom service, a House staffer told us. The two frame it as important for closing the digital divide. “Only 64 percent of African American households have adopted broadband services at home. Adoption is even lower in Hispanic households where only slightly more than half (53 percent) have broadband,” said the letter still being circulated this week, led by Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chairman Keith Ellison, D-Minn., and Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., ex-Congressional Black Caucus chairwoman. “In contrast, the national average is 70 percent, with broadband in 74 percent of White households.” They said wireless is an important way of closing the divide and urge strong rules applied to wired and wireless. “Strong rules that guarantee an Open Internet are important to minority-owned businesses,” the unreleased circulating draft of the letter said. “An Open Internet lowers barriers to entry and allows businesses of all sizes to compete on a global scale. Major mobile broadband providers have already blocked or hindered popular business tools such as mobile payments, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services, and streaming video. ISP providers set up tolls and slower lanes.” The FCC is expected to circulate a net neutrality order Feb. 5 and vote on it Feb. 26. House Democrats are in Philadelphia for a retreat.
Questions on telecom and tech policy were raised at the confirmation hearing of Loretta Lynch, nominee to be U.S. attorney general, Wednesday. Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., pressed Lynch about the parts of surveillance law set to expire June 1. Leahy called the next A.G. an “essential” part of his quest to overhaul surveillance law, as in his bill from the last Congress known as the USA Freedom Act. Intelligence Committee ranking member Feinstein asked Lynch to talk about the importance of the expiring provisions. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, cited the Electronic Communications Privacy Act and said he intends to reintroduce the Law Enforcement Access to Data Stored Abroad (Leads) Act. Lynch committed to working with Hatch on this “important” legislation and called electronic privacy “central” in an era of changing technology. Lynch also touted her cybersecurity goals, in an opening statement. “If confirmed, I intend to expand and enhance our capabilities in order to effectively prevent ever-evolving attacks in cyberspace, expose wrongdoers, and bring perpetrators to justice,” said Lynch, now the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York. “In my current position, I am proud to lead an office that has significant experience prosecuting complex, international cybercrime, including high-tech intrusions at key financial and public sector institutions. If I am confirmed, I will continue to use the combined skills and experience of our law enforcement partners, the Department’s Criminal and National Security Divisions, and the United States Attorney community to defeat and to hold accountable those who would imperil the safety and security of our citizens through cybercrime.”
With an FCC vote on wireless indoor 911 location accuracy rules expected Thursday, the top Republican and Democrat on the House Commerce Committee sent a letter to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Wednesday saying the rules adopted must be technologically neutral. “We have concerns that the FCC is considering rules that will lock public safety into using a single, proprietary technology for providing indoor locations,” said the letter from Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., and ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J. If this is true, the agency should instead “consider solutions that can operate across multiple technologies and platforms” that are “not tethered to a single technology," they said. Wireless carriers led by CTIA have made similar arguments at the FCC. Agency officials said Wheeler already had changed his proposal on the rules to an approach closer to the road map proposed by the four national carriers, APCO and the National Emergency Number Association (see 1501270052). The rules should be “robust, enforceable and measurable,” House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., told Wheeler in a second letter Wednesday. There should be a vertical accuracy requirement, she said, and the rules also should be “technology neutral” and carriers shouldn't have to be “limited to one technology solution.”
The FCC shouldn't allow any weakening of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, Senate Democrats told FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler in a Wednesday letter led by Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. “Unfortunately, today there are efforts to weaken this important law,” it said. “In response to industry requests, the [FCC] is seeking comment on proposals that would provide exemptions and questionable safe harbors for businesses that utilize auto-dialers to call consumers’ mobile devices. We have deep concerns about these proposed changes that undermine the intent and spirit of the TCPA.” The letter’s 13 signatories include Sens. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.; Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.; Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.; Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; and Ron Wyden, D-Ore.
House Commerce Committee member John Shimkus, R-Ill., is soliciting co-sponsors for his Domain Openness Through Continued Oversight Matters Act, said a spokesman Wednesday. Shimkus expects to reintroduce DOTCOM in early February (see 1501200028), he said. The bill would let GAO study the IANA transition proposal for up to one year before approval by NTIA. Some of the committee members who are skeptical of the transition have been pleased by the ICANN community's efforts to include "stress tests" in their proposals, said David Redl, House Communications Subcommittee chief counsel, Tuesday (see 1501270042).