U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has issued a press release announcing that an Iranian national, Davoud Baniameri, has been sentenced to 51 months in prison for trying to illegally export missile components and radio test sets from the U.S. to Iran, via the United Arab Emirates.
In July 2011, the Bureau of Industry and Security issued a proposed rule, seeking comments by September 13, 2011, that would implement a control structure under the Export Administration Regulations in order to transfer less significant items that no longer warrant control on the U.S. Munitions List to control under the Commerce Control List.
Government officials and industry executives are seeking technical and coordination improvements to the emergency alert system so that the first-ever nationwide test of EAS is smooth. Officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FCC and state emergency agencies spoke on a webinar Monday organized by FEMA. “Are You Ready for the Nationwide Emergency Alert System Test” was its title. Government officials and executives from the broadcasting and cable industries said they're making progress on improvements from earlier smaller-scale tests, and that some issues remain. And Chief Jamie Barnett of the FCC Public Safety Bureau said in a separate message to broadcasters that there will be more, “periodic” nationwide EAS tests.
On August 12, 2011, the President announced he was continuing for one year the national emergency regarding export control regulations declared in Executive Order 13222. The President states that because the Export Administration Act has not been renewed by the Congress, the national emergency declared on August 17, 2001, must continue in effect beyond August 17, 2011. (In EO 13222, a national emergency was declared with respect to the unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the U.S. in light of the expiration of the Export Administration Act of 1979, as amended (50 U.S.C. App. 2401 et seq.).) 08/16/11 Federal Register notice available here.
All proposed interim solutions for sending text messages to 911 call centers have “issues and limitations” that restrict their usefulness, 4G Americas warned in a white paper it presented to the FCC’s Emergency Access Advisory Committee Friday. President Chris Pearson of 4G Americas presented the findings at an EAAC meeting.
The World Customs Organization states that it welcomes the decision by Bhutan to finalize the Model Customs Facilitation Agreement with the United Nations, a bilateral agreement concerning measures to expedite the import, export and transit of relief consignments and possessions belonging to relief operations personnel, in the event of disasters and emergencies
PHILADELPHIA -- Seattle Chief Technology Office Bill Schrier warned Wednesday at the Association for Public-Safety Communication Official’s meeting that all seven of the jurisdictions that received Broadband Technology Opportunities Program grants to build out early public safety networks in the 700 MHz band may be hard pressed to do so in the two years they have left under BTOP rules. Meanwhile, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski closed the conference with a speech promising the agency would move forward on an ambitious program of improving 911 communications.
There’s no reason to expand telecom outage reporting mandates from traditional phone service to VoIP, broadband and backbone service providers, said all corporate filings to the FCC. There are major differences between outages on public switched telephone networks (PSTN) and on broadband and other newer networks, associations and companies said. But states said such outage reporting is needed, given increasing reliance on VoIP to make calls instead of circuit-switched phone networks, and because Internet networks carry calls to 911. The FCC proposed (http://goo.gl/09KYY), amid concerns of Commissioner Robert McDowell, to extend Part 4 rules to ISPs, backbone services and VoIP for outages of at least a half-hour. Comments were posted Monday and Tuesday in docket 11-82 (http://goo.gl/boqUK).
There’s no reason to expand telecom outage reporting mandates from traditional phone service to VoIP, broadband and backbone service providers, said all corporate filings to the FCC. There are major differences between outages on public switched telephone networks (PSTN) and on broadband and other newer networks, associations and companies said. But states said such outage reporting is needed, given increasing reliance on VoIP to make calls instead of circuit-switched phone networks, and because Internet networks carry calls to 911. The FCC proposed (http://goo.gl/09KYY), amid concerns of Commissioner Robert McDowell, to extend Part 4 rules to ISPs, backbone services and VoIP for outages of at least a half-hour (CD May 13 p9). Comments were posted Monday and Tuesday in docket 11-82 (http://goo.gl/boqUK).
PHILADELPHIA -- Hope remains that Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., will manage to bring his version of public safety legislation to the Senate floor after the body returns to Washington Sept. 6 and before the tenth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington. That’s according to public safety officials at the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials’ annual meeting, which got underway over the weekend. Hill officials who spoke Monday held out some hope that legislation could move in the few days Congress meets before Sept. 11.