Politico

US defeats Russia to head UN telecoms agency in fight for internet’s future

Doreen Bogdan-Martin won a massive majority to lead the International Telecommunication Union, the United Nations agency that sets global standards for telecommunications and technology infrastructure. Doreen Bogdan-Martin received 139 of the 172 votes. The election pitted Western democracies' vision of a more open version of the internet against authoritarian countries' government-controlled approach. 

President Biden’s antitrust adviser Tim Wu is leaving the White House

Tim Wu, the White House adviser helping to drive the administration’s push to rein in corporate giants with tougher antitrust enforcement is planning to leave his position in the coming months. Wu is expected to return to teaching at Columbia Law School after a roughly year-and-a-half as special assistant to President Biden for technology and competition policy. Wu was part of a trio of antitrust hawks President Joe Biden installed in 2021 as part of a push to curb the power of sprawling companies — a fight that has focused in particular on tech titans like Amazon and Google.

Why suspected Chinese spy gear remains in America’s telecom networks

The US is still struggling to complete the break up with Chinese telecom companies that Donald Trump started four years ago. The problem: Small communications networks, largely in rural areas, are saddled with old Chinese equipment they can’t afford to remove and which they can’t repair if it breaks. The companies say they want to ditch the Chinese tech, but promised funds from Congress aren’t coming quickly enough and aren’t enough to cover the cost.