March 2016

Cable Operators Offer Up Privacy Framework

The National Cable & Telecommunications Association and American Cable Association have joined with other trade and tech groups to offer up what is being billed as a consensus privacy framework outlining guiding privacy principles. In essence, the framework is an articulation of NCTA's argument that rather than come up with new rules and regulations, the Federal Communications Commission should, as the new proposal says, "[pursue] reasonable enforcement actions against telecommunications service providers that have clearly violated these principles." That is the Federal Trade Commission model.

The FTC has enforcement authority but very limited authority to promulgate new regulations. The proposal, which was offered up in a letter to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler comes as the FCC prepares a proposal on how to oversee broadband subscriber privacy—a new authority under its Title II reclassification—as it currently does traditional video customer network proprietary information (CPNI). A vote on that proposal could come as early as this month's public meeting. NCTA and ACA, joined by USTelecom, CTIA and the Competitive Carriers Association, said the FCC should focus on four things: "(1) transparency; (2) respect for context and consumer choice; (3) data security; and (4) data breach notification."

AT&T: OTT Video Plan Obviates Need for Set-Top Rules

AT&T said its planned rollout of a set of DirecTV-branded over-the-top (OTT)services that will rely on a variety of connected retail devices shows how off-base the Federal Communications Commission’s effort to unlock the set-top box is. “This confirms that the FCC’s proposed new rules on set-top boxes are wholly unnecessary, backward looking and would impose significant costs with no corresponding benefits,” the company said in a statement. “Our new services will demonstrate that we and the market generally are moving beyond set-top boxes, and providing consumers more choices than ever to watch what they want, when they want and on the device of their choosing anywhere they happen to be." "Rather than imposing a government technology mandate that will never keep pace with the vibrantly competitive video marketplace, the Commission should allow competition to work.”

AT&T, which has long objected to the FCC’s set-top rules proposal, said its new OTT services, set for a Q4 2016 launch, will support an array of smartphones, tablets, smart TVs, streaming players, and Web browsers. However, it has not announced which connected-TV platforms it will support out of the chute, and whether that will include platforms such as the Apple TV, Roku players, Amazon’s Fire TV and products that run on Google’s new Android TV operating system.

Idea to Retire: Old methods of policy education

[Commentary] Public policy and public affairs schools aim to train competent creators and implementers of government policy. While drawing on the principles that gird our economic and political systems to provide a well-rounded education, like law schools and business schools, policy schools provide professional training. They are quite distinct from graduate programs in political science or economics which aim to train the next generation of academics. As professional training programs, they add value by imparting both the skills which are relevant to current employers, and skills which we know will be relevant as organizations and societies evolve.

Information technology-based platforms provisioned by private providers such as Facebook, Google, Uber, and Lyft maintain information about millions of citizens and enable services such as transportation that were mediated in the past solely by the public sector. Surveillance for purposes of public safety via large-scale deployment of sensors also raises fundamental questions about information privacy. From technology-enabled global delivery of work to displacement and replacement of categories of work, some studies estimate that up to 47 percent of US employment might be at risk of computerization with an attendant rise in income inequality. These technology-induced changes will affect every policy domain. How should policy programs best prepare students to address societal challenges in this world that is being transformed by technology? We believe the answer lies in educating students to be “men and women of intelligent action."

[Ramayya Krishnan is the dean and Jon Nehlsen is senior director of external relations of the H. John Heinz III College of Information Systems and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University.]