The U.S. plans to build on and improve its export controls and investment screening measures to keep China from acquiring sensitive technologies, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said. Blinken, in a speech outlining the Biden administration’s China policy, also urged industry to reassess whether the price of doing business in China is worth the benefits and to work with the administration to push back against Beijing's unfair market practices.
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, criticized the Bureau of Industry and Security's decision to stop differentiating between emerging and foundational technologies for the purposes of export controls, saying the agency is trying to dodge its statutory responsibility. BIS said last week that the effort to categorize technologies as either emerging or foundational has sometimes delayed the controls, adding that it will instead refer to them as Section 1758 technologies (see 2205200017).
Congressional discussions about regulating or breaking up Big Tech are focused heavily around antitrust issues and wrongly ignore national security implications, former National Intelligence Director John Negroponte said Wednesday in a CCIA/Foreign Policy webinar Wednesday. Any such legislation needs a robust review of national security implications before it's adopted, said Klon Kitchen, American Enterprise Institute resident fellow. Those Big Tech discussions suffer from "a problem of process," with the Senate Judiciary Committee taking the lead with national security input being omitted from the discussion, said Negroponte, now vice chairman of international trade consultancy McLarty Associates. He was among former national security officials signatories last fall to a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., warning about national security implications of some antitrust bills aimed at Big Tech. Negroponte said talk of breaking up Big Tech ignores the utility of scale, with tech giants more able to put billions into research into developing capabilities like quantum computing, AI and robotics. Big Tech being big "is not ... ipso facto bad," and breaking up Big Tech would disadvantage U.S. companies versus their foreign company rivals, he said. Legislation that would bar self-preferencing by Big Tech could end up hurting consumers, Kitchen said, pointing to Google using user-base insights to help preempt phishing attacks on Gmail uses, Kitchen said. "That's precisely the type of unintended consequences that need to be considered," he said. The American Innovation and Choice Online Act (S-2992/HR-3816) would curb self-preferencing. The tech that drives both national economies and military capabilities is coming largely out of the private sector for commercial purposes, with the private sector disrupting the national security burden born by governments, Kitchen said. While the U.S. response is for government to work collaboratively with industry, nations like China have fused their private sector and government together, directing both at state aims, he said. He said breaking up companies puts limits on their ability to innovate. He said it's not coincidental the companies operating at the greatest scale are driving emerging tech like AI. He said startups are able to be agile because of underlying capabilities and datasets that come from big incumbents and pointed to Google's TensorFlow machine learning platform.
Bureau of Industry and Security Undersecretary Alan Estevez said his top long-term priority is building a new multilateral export control regime, and he urged industry to continue considering diversifying away from China and Russia. He also said BIS is working hard to control emerging and foundational technologies and welcomes more input from industry, academia and think tanks.
The U.S. and other techno-democracies should capitalize on their closely coordinated Russia sanctions work to create a new multilateral export control group, said two experts with Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. A new regime, which would include a range of technology-producing nations that share democratic values, would help those countries address technology proliferation issues that existing regimes can not.
The Bureau of Industry and Security is proposing new unilateral export controls on four dual-use biological toxins that can be weaponized to kill people or animals, “degrade equipment” or damage the environment, the agency said in a rule released May 20. Controls would apply to the marine toxins brevetoxin, gonyautoxin, nodularin and palytoxin, BIS said, all of which can be “exploited for biological weapons purposes.” The agency said it won’t categorize the toxins or their technologies as emerging or foundational technologies, and doesn't plan to continue to differentiate between the two categories going forward.
FCC Commissioners approved modernizing telecom service priority (TSP), wireless priority service (WPS) and government emergency telecommunications service (GETS) rules 4-0 Thursday, largely as circulated by Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, as expected (see 2205170068). The changes weren't controversial, with no ex parte filings when they were before commissioners. Public Safety Bureau Chief Debra Jordan confirmed on a call with reporters there were no substantial changes to the draft.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine may not be a game-changer for digital cybersecurity policy, but it holds lessons for Europe, speakers said at a Wednesday Centre for European Policy Studies webinar on Ukrainian digital resistance. Cybersecurity has become "a weapon in a war," forcing mobile operators to look at the issue in a broader context, said European Telecommunications Network Operators Association Director General Lise Fuhr. The aggression heightened cybersecurity concerns in EU countries, said Lorena Boix-Alonso, European Commission director-digital society, trust and cybersecurity.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine may not be a game-changer for digital cybersecurity policy, but it holds lessons for Europe, speakers said at a Wednesday Centre for European Policy Studies webinar on Ukrainian digital resistance. Cybersecurity has become "a weapon in a war," forcing mobile operators to look at the issue in a broader context, said European Telecommunications Network Operators Association Director General Lise Fuhr. The aggression heightened cybersecurity concerns in EU countries, said Lorena Boix-Alonso, European Commission director-digital society, trust and cybersecurity.
Healthcare organizations and state agencies backed the Health and Human Services Department's request for clarification that certain prerecorded calls and text messages are permissible under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (see 2205020059). Stakeholders said the planned calling and texting campaigns would help eligible individuals remain enrolled in Medicaid, the children's health insurance program (CHIP) and the basic health program (BHP), in comments posted Wednesday in docket 02-278.