On May 18, 2006, President Bush issued a notice continuing for one year beyond May 20, 2006 the national emergency with respect to Burma (Myanmar). This national emergency was originally declared in Executive Order (EO) 13047 on May 20, 1997. (FR Pub 05/19/06, available at http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/01jan20061800/edocket.access.gpo.gov/2006/pdf/06-4767.pdf)
Software piracy caused worldwide losses of $34 billion in 2005, up $1.6 billion from 2004, a Business Software Alliance-commissioned study said. About 35% of packaged software on PCs was illegal, the International Data Group said. Piracy was lowest in the U.S. (21%) but the U.S. had the biggest loss ($6.9 billion). Education, enforcement and policy are better in China, Russia, India and other emerging economies, said the study, which found piracy down in 51% of 97 nations covered. Russia’s rate of PC software piracy fell 4 percentage points. Indian piracy fell 2 points; Chinese, 4 points. Canadian software piracy fell 3 percentage points to 33%, for a loss of $943 million, down $166 million from 2004. Canada is among the 20 countries with the world’s lowest software piracy rates. Piracy also fell in the Middle East and Africa, with 12 countries dropping 2 or more percentage points. In Central and Eastern Europe, piracy fell in 15 of 18 countries studied. Vietnam (90%), Zimbabwe (90%), Indonesia (87%) and China and Pakistan (each 86%) had the highest piracy rates.
The govt. isn’t embracing private sector expertise or acknowledging great strides by business toward deploying IPv6 technologies in the U.S., the founder of last week’s IPv6 Summit told us Mon. The May 17-19 conference lacked meaningful participation by the govt., said IPv6 guru Alex Lightman, though the Bush Administration routinely reports success in readying agencies for IPv6 compliance.
In hopes of urging the Administration to prioritize civil liberty concerns, the House Judiciary Committee’s Commercial & Administrative Law Subcommittee voted to send a privacy bill to full Judiciary Committee, after a hearing Wed. The bill would require federal agencies to take into account the impact of their rules on the privacy of individuals. The action follows the release of a GAO study found that federal agencies’ practices for handling personal information were “uneven.”
In hopes of urging the Administration to prioritize civil liberty concerns, the House Judiciary Committee’s Commercial & Administrative Law Subcommittee voted to send a privacy bill to full Judiciary Committee, after a hearing Wed. The bill would require federal agencies to take into account the impact of their rules on the privacy of individuals. The action follows the release of a GAO study found that federal agencies’ practices for handling personal information were “uneven.”
A House committee passed a bill that would create the position of emergency communications chief, responsible for making public safety networks interoperable. The measure, passed unanimously by the House Homeland Security Committee Wed., would “elevate the importance of emergency communications” in the Homeland Security Dept. and require DHS, through the new Asst. Secy. for Emergency Communications, to set up a plan to achieve “redundant, sustainable and interoperable emergency communications systems.”
DoJ’s Project Safe Childhood program launched Wed. after Hill hearings saw lawmakers hammer DoJ for lagging on Net- born pedophiles. The effort aims to complement other agency moves to protect children, officials said.
The Cal. Energy Commission (CEC) rejected the CE industry’s charge it was engaged in “product development” by getting consultants to put together a digital converter box that meets the Commission’s energy savings and cost requirements. “What we are doing is following through with their [industry] suggestion that we do more economic and engineering analysis of what is feasible and cost effective,” a Commission spokesman said. The industry had called the Commission’s action of hiring people with “taxpayer money” to do product development “alarming and appalling” (CED May 15 p2).
The Cal. Energy Commission (CEC) rejected the CE industry’s charge it was engaged in “product development” by getting consultants to put together a digital converter box that meets the Commission’s energy savings and cost requirements. “What we are doing is following through with their [industry] suggestion that we do more economic and engineering analysis of what is feasible and cost effective,” a Commission spokesman said. The industry had called the Commission’s action of hiring people with “taxpayer money” to do product development “alarming and appalling” (CED May 15 p2).
The EU needs tougher data protection if member nations aim to share communications traffic data with U.S. police agencies, European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) Peter Hustinx said Fri. His comment followed a May 12 report that the U.S. wants bilateral pacts with EU nations giving it access to Internet and telephone traffic data held under a new EU data retention directive. That talks on this are underway isn’t surprising, given blurring of cross-border physical and data transfer barriers, observers said.