Google pressed for more disclosures of government data requests and updates to different laws in Congress. Google has posted transparency reports for years and seen government requests for its user data skyrocket -- they doubled over the course of three years, the company said in a blog post Thursday (http://bit.ly/19niZpp). Google received 10,918 requests from the U.S. government from January to June 2013, according to its latest data. Of the requests, 68 percent were subpoenas, 22 percent warrants, 6 percent “other court orders,” 2 percent pen register orders and 1 percent emergency disclosure requests, it said. It included a chart titled Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act requests, completely blacked out with a parenthetical message saying, “The U.S. government contends that we cannot share this information.” Google also included a chart comparing the number of U.S. requests to other countries over that same timeframe, with U.S. taking the lead by more than 8,000 requests. The U.S. is also the government yielding the highest percentage of data produced from its requests. Google produced some data in 83 percent of U.S. government requests, it said. “We want to go even further,” said Legal Director-Law Enforcement and Information Security Richard Salgado. “The U.S. Department of Justice contends that U.S. law does not allow us to share information about some national security requests that we might receive. .... But you deserve to know.” Salgado testified to that effect Wednesday before Congress (CD Nov 14 p8). Salgado wrote of Google’s federal case and letters of support for legislation in order to be more transparent about the government requests. Google also wants the Electronic Communications Privacy Act updated in this session of Congress, and “we urge Congress to expeditiously enact a bright-line, warrant-for-content rule,” Salgado said. “Governmental entities should be required to obtain a warrant -— issued based on a showing of probable cause -- before requiring companies like Google to disclose the content of users’ electronic communications.” Google’s latest transparency report “illustrates the government’s steadily growing appetite for more data from more users,” said Center for Democracy & Technology President Leslie Harris, in a statement. Laws to prevent warrantless searches should be updated, she said. “Reforming ECPA is an important step Congress can take to restore the checks and balances that are supposed to prevent government overreach into our private lives.”
Slacker digital music service is now available to over 11 million Time Warner Cable Internet subscribers, said the operator in a news release Thursday. It said Time Warner Cable’s new web portal, TWC Central, allows subscribers to access Slacker’s songs and radio stations (http://bit.ly/1a8kITY).
Airline passengers will have access to 3G and 4G services during flights over the EU, said the European Commission Thursday. Under the new rules (http://bit.ly/17sgjHs), spectrum for 3G (UMTS) and 4G (LTE) communications will be able to be used above an altitude of 3,000 meters, it said. Until now, only 2G (GSM) services have been allowed on board, the EC said. Airlines will now be able to develop new in-flight Internet services, it said.
CTIA filed a paper at the FCC arguing that the U.S. wireless industry leads the world in “Investment, Value, Innovation, and Competition.” The paper was timed to the arrival of new Chairman Ton Wheeler, who formerly headed the group, and Commissioner Michael O'Rielly. “Last year, U.S. wireless carriers invested more than $30 billion in their networks, accounting for a quarter of the world’s wireless capital investment,” CTIA said (http://bit.ly/1ds0UuA). “And the U.S. invested six times more per subscriber than its global counterparts: $94 per subscriber versus $16 per subscriber.” While only 5 percent of the world’s wireless connections are in the U.S, the U.S. has half world’s LTE connections, CTIA said. Wireless service is also cheap here, the group said. “U.S. consumers pay less per unit of usage -- and use mobile far more extensively -- than their foreign counterparts: The average voice revenue per minute in the U.S. is three cents, while the European average is ten cents."
The FCC established a pleading schedule Wednesday on Verizon Wireless’s proposed buy of AWS-1 licenses from Stelera Wireless, which filed for Chapter 11 bamkruptcy relief in July. The deal would give Verizon 10-40 megahertz of spectrum in 114 counties covering parts or all of 19 cellular market areas in Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico and Texas, the Wireless Bureau said. “Post- transaction, Verizon Wireless would hold 87-132 megahertz of spectrum in these CMAs, 20-50 megahertz of which is AWS-1 spectrum,” said a public notice (http://bit.ly/1aq6QDH). “According to the Applicants, the proposed assignments will serve the public interest because they will provide Verizon Wireless with additional spectrum capacity, which will enable it to meet the demands of its customers for Long-Term Evolution in the markets.” Petitions to deny are due Nov. 27, oppositions Dec. 9 and replies Dec. 16.
An FCC Public Safety Bureau workshop on 911 location accuracy issues Nov. 18 in the Commission Meeting Room kicks off at 9:30 a.m. with remarks by Bureau Chief David Turetsky and includes remarks from speakers providing both wireless carrier and public safety perspectives, according to an agenda released by the agency Wednesday (http://fcc.us/19l57fo). It concludes with a discussion of technical issues.
The FTC denied AssertID’s proposal for a verifiable parental consent (VPC) method under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act rule, said the commission in a Wednesday news release (http://1.usa.gov/1bv8qp2). The company “failed to provide sufficient evidence that its proposed VPC method is ‘reasonably calculated, in light of available technology, to ensure that the person providing consent is the child’s parent’ as required by” COPPA, the agency wrote the company (http://1.usa.gov/1iazsVP). The agency’s letter also cited the company’s “limited” beta testing, which failed to demonstrate the verification method would work “in a live environment or that the method is reasonably calculated to ensure the person providing consent is the child’s parent.” For instance, Facebook profiles can be easily faked, the letter said. The commission voted unanimously to deny the proposal. Some privacy groups and companies participating in other COPPA FTC safe-harbor programs objected to AssertID’s request (CD Sept 24 p11). The companies had said AssertID’s proposal to check a parent’s social network on Facebook to confirm the parent’s identity covers uncharted territory. A representative for AssertID told us the company had not yet prepared a statement.
The National Alliance of State Broadcasters Associations warned Congress against removing advertising deductibility as part of any tax overhaul. The group sent a letter Wednesday to the leaders of the House Ways and Means Committee. They called advertising “the life blood for local radio and television.”
EchoStar is finalizing a joint venture with Vivendi’s GVT to launch a direct-to-home (DTH) service in Brazil, as testing on the EchoStar-15 satellite that will provide it nears conclusion and a more powerful version is readied for potential 2016 launch, EchoStar Satellite Services President Anders Johnson told us Wednesday at the Content & Communications World show in New York. EchoStar moved the three-year-old EchoStar-15 to 45 degrees west in May and began testing the high-power broadcast service satellite (BSS) to establish a network in Brazil’s various regions. EchoStar bought the orbital slot from the Brazilian telecommunications agency Anatel in 2011 and, with Vivendi’s GVT, must gain license and antitrust approvals to form a joint venture that’s still being finalized, Johnson said. “We are working with GVT on optimizing the pointing of the satellite for service introduction so as to maximize the markets that will be targeted on a primary basis,” Johnson said. They have a presence in certain parts of the country and “have aspirations beyond that.” GVT has about 530,000 subscribers and uses a combination of IP-based and fixed satellite service (FSS), the latter operating at a lower power than BSS and typically requiring a three- to eight-foot receiving dish for Ku band. Intelsat delivers the FSS portion of the video service. Meanwhile, the Space System Loral-built EchoStar-18 will likely launch in Q4 2015 as a Dish Network-owned satellite, EchoStar officials have said. That will be followed by EchoStar-19 multi-spotbeam Ku-band satellite in 2016 that will add capacity for EchoStar subsidiary Hughes Communications’ HughesNet Gen4 broadband service, providing national coverage in North America, Johnson said. EchoStar-19 will deliver 160 Gbps of throughput, providing 60 percent more capacity than EchoStar-17, which currently delivers the HughesNet service. HughesNet added a net 72,000 subscribers in Q3 to end the quarter with 807,000. About 440,000 subscribers were getting service from EchoStar-17 with a large portion of the remainder getting it from the Spaceway-3 satellite.
AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega said at a Wells Fargo conference Wednesday that the carrier will be an active participant in spectrum auctions set for 2014 “and beyond,” Wells Fargo analyst Jennifer Fritzsche said in an email to investors. De la Vega said AT&T is comfortable with its current spectrum position, but he believes it’s “absolutely necessary to acquire more spectrum,” Frizsche said. AT&T currently predicts its own LTE network will be completed in summer 2014.