BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for THURSDAY, MARCH 23, 2017
Today's Events
COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY
A President’s Credibility - WSJ editorial
"Deconstruction" - Michael Copps
House Intel Chairman: Trump Team Was Surveilled During Transition
Rep Schiff: I have 'grave concerns' over Chairman Nunes' surveillance claims [links to Hill, The]
Q&A: Garry Kasparov on the press and propaganda in Trump’s America - press release [links to Benton summary]
INTERNET/BROADBAND
Digital divide persists even as lower-income Americans make gains in tech adoption - Pew research
Lawmakers call for renewed national broadband map as President Trump funds NTIA
“Dig once” bill could bring fiber Internet to much of the US
AT&T broadband deployment skipped low-income Dayton (OH) neighborhoods - NDIA
How Mignon Clyburn, the FCC’s Lone Democrat, Is Fighting to Save Net Neutrality [links to Benton summary]
Community Broadband Ban Bill Ties the Hands of MO Communities [links to Benton summary]
Is This Data’s One-Rate Moment? - editorial [links to Benton summary]
Eying an Opening, CenturyLink and Frontier Seek Regulatory Relief for Business Data Services [links to Benton summary]
SECURITY/PRIVACY
House Oversight grills law enforcement on facial recognition tech
GAO Report: DOJ and FBI Need to Take Additional Action to Ensure Privacy and Accuracy - research [links to Benton summary]
What the Public Knows About Cybersecurity - research
Supporters Rallied Against Senate Broadband Privacy Regulation Rollback [links to Benton summary]
Google Maps will now let you share your location, creating a whole new set of privacy concerns [links to Vox]
NYPD sent video teams to record Occupy and Black Lives Matter protests over 400 times, documents reveal [links to Verge, The]
On Encryption Apps in the White House [links to Technology Academics Policy]
WIRELESS/SPECTRUM
Skin in the Game: Interference, Sunk Investment, and the Repurposing of Radio Spectrum - Phoenix Center analysis [links to Benton summary]
ADVERTISING
AT&T Pulling Ads From Google Over ‘Hate’ Videos [links to Wall Street Journal]
OWNERSHIP
Is a Civil War Brewing Inside of Fox News? [links to Vanity Fair]
LABOR
17,000 AT&T workers in California and Nevada go on strike [links to Benton summary]
DIVERSITY
Everyone Knows Tech Workers Are Mostly White Men—Except Tech Workers [links to Bloomberg]
Tech not diverse enough? That's news to workers [links to USAToday]
CHILDREN & MEDIA
Pope cautions youths about social media’s “false image of reality” [links to Ars Technica]
EDUCATION
How teachers use mobile phones as education tools in refugee camps [links to Brookings]
EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS
FCC Announces Rollout of Version 3.0 of the Network Outage Reporting System - public notice [links to Benton summary]
FCC REFORM
Improved Staff Openness & New Priorities - Commissioner O'Rielly blog
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
Will Donald Trump keep the White House petition site alive? [links to Verge, The]
POLICYMAKERS
Gorsuch’s Tech Law Record Raises Concerns - Yale Journal on Regulation blog [links to Benton summary]
STORIES FROM ABROAD
China Bets on Sensitive US Start-Ups, Worrying the Pentagon
Canadians Were Promised Internet For All, But the Budget Doesn't Deliver [links to Vice]
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COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY
A PRESIDENT'S CREDIBILITY
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] If President Donald Trump announces that North Korea launched a missile that landed within 100 miles of Hawaii, would most Americans believe him? Would the rest of the world? We’re not sure, which speaks to the damage that President Trump is doing to his Presidency with his seemingly endless stream of exaggerations, evidence-free accusations, implausible denials and other falsehoods. The latest example is President Trump’s refusal to back off his tweet of three weeks ago that he had “found out that [Barack] Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory” on Election Day. He has offered no evidence for his claim, and a parade of intelligence officials, senior Republicans and Democrats have since said they have seen no such evidence. Two months into his Presidency, Gallup has President Trump’s approval rating at 39%. No doubt President Trump considers that fake news, but if he doesn’t show more respect for the truth most Americans may conclude he’s a fake President.
benton.org/headlines/presidents-credibility | Wall Street Journal | CJR
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"DECONSTRUCTION"
[SOURCE: Benton Foundation, AUTHOR: Michael Copps]
[Commentary] It’s a challenge to pick the worst of the furnace-hot verbiage spewing forth from the new Administration; there is just so much to choose from. But to me, one completely frightening statement stands out. It is “deconstructing the administrative state” as the stated purpose of the Trump team. If this statement doesn’t motivate citizens to action, what will? Translated into everyday English, the President, Steve Bannon, and their billionaire cabinet of corporate minions are telling us that their goal is to axe as much government as possible—except, of course, for the already-bloated military-industrial complex which would receive $54 billion more to entrench itself. A seemingly soothing “deconstruction” bromide cannot mask that the destruction of government as we have known it for more than a century is their real objective.
[In 2012, former FCC Commissioner Michael Copps joined Common Cause to lead its Media and Democracy Reform Initiative.]
benton.org/headlines/deconstruction | Benton Foundation
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HOUSE INTEL CHAIRMAN: TRUMP TEAM WAS SURVEILLED DURING TRANSITION
[SOURCE: Morning Consult, AUTHOR: Amir Nasr]
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) said he’s received dozens of reports showing that communications from President Donald Trump’s transition team — and possibly Trump himself — were intercepted during the transition period between Election Day and Inauguration Day. “I want to be clear, none of this surveillance was related to Russia or the investigation of Russian activities or the Trump team,” Chairman Nunes said. He said his panel will “thoroughly investigate” the surveillance and dissemination of that information. While the reports show surveillance of Trump officials unrelated to the Russia investigation, Chairman Nunes said it doesn’t mean those surveillance orders don’t exist. He declined to disclose his sources for the surveillance reports. The announcement comes two days after Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey told the House Intelligence Committee that he had seen no information that supports President Trump’s allegations that Trump Tower was wiretapped in 2016 under orders from President Barack Obama.
benton.org/headlines/house-intel-chairman-trump-team-was-surveilled-during-transition | Morning Consult | Washington Post
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INTERNET/BROADBAND
DIGITAL DIVIDE PERSISTS EVEN AS LOWER-INCOME AMERICANS MAKE GAINS IN TECH ADOPTION
[SOURCE: Pew Research Center, AUTHOR: Monica Anderson]
This is the first in a series of posts about how different demographic groups in the US have fared in the digital age.
Roughly three-in-ten adults with household incomes below $30,000 a year don’t own a smartphone. Nearly half don’t have home broadband services or a traditional computer. And a majority of lower-income Americans are not tablet owners. By comparison, many of these devices are nearly ubiquitous among adults from households earning $100,000 or more a year. Higher-income Americans are also more likely to have multiple devices that enable them to go online. Two-thirds of adults living in high-earning households have home broadband services, a smartphone, a desktop or laptop computer and a tablet, compared with 17% of those living in low-income households. And with fewer options for online access at their disposal, many lower-income Americans are relying more on smartphones. In 2016, one-fifth of adults living in households earning less than $30,000 a year were “smartphone-only” internet users – meaning they owned a smartphone but did not have broadband internet at home. This represents an increase from 12% in 2013. In contrast, only 4% of those living in households earning $100,000 or more fell into this category in either year.
benton.org/headlines/digital-divide-persists-even-lower-income-americans-make-gains-tech-adoption | Pew Research Center
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LAWMAKERS CALL FOR RENEWED NATIONAL BROADBAND MAP AS TRUMP FUNDS NTIA
[SOURCE: Fierce, AUTHOR: Mike Dano]
Reps from both sides of the aisle renewed calls to update the National Broadband Map, which was initially created by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration and the Federal Communications Commission but has languished since 2014 due to lack of funding. "We must accurately collect and aggregate data to update the National Broadband Map," said House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) druing a hearing. The hearing covered legislation tied to President Trump’s plans to increase spending on the nation’s core infrastructure, and legislators generally argued that broadband networks should be expanded to unserved and underserved areas in the United States as part of that effort. NTIA first released its national broadband map and broadband adoption survey results in 2011. Version 1.0 of the map, designed by Computech, showed broadband availability across the country, including the relative dearth of broadband access in rural areas. However, as noted on the map’s website, updates to the map stopped on June 30, 2014. “The Commission sought funding for FY 2016 to maintain and update the National Broadband Map, but this request was not granted,” the site stated. The map was updated with data from the NTIA’s State Broadband Initiative, and was created by the NTIA and the FCC. Interestingly, the NTIA largely managed to avoid the cost-cutting knife of President Trump’s federal budget.
benton.org/headlines/lawmakers-call-renewed-national-broadband-map-trump-funds-ntia | Fierce
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'DIG ONCE' BILL COULD BRING FIBER INTERNET TO MUCH OF THE US
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Jon Brodkin]
Years in the making, a proposal to mandate the installation of fiber conduits during federally funded highway projects might be gaining some new momentum. If the US adopts a "dig once" policy, construction workers would install conduits just about any time they build new roads and sidewalks or upgrade existing ones. These conduits are plastic pipes that can house fiber cables. The conduits might be empty when installed, but their presence makes it a lot cheaper and easier to install fiber later, after the road construction is finished. Dig once legislation received specific support from House Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR), who said that he is "glad to see [Rep Anna] Eshoo’s (D-CA) 'Dig Once' bill has made a return this Congress. I think that this is smart policy and will help spur broadband deployment across the country." At the Federal Communications Commission, dig once has support from Democrats and Republicans. Former Chairman Tom Wheeler, a Democrat, endorsed the policy, and so has the current FCC chairman, Republican Ajit Pai. Pai said in 2016 that "government officials should adopt 'dig once' policies so that broadband conduit is deployed as part of every road and highway construction project."
benton.org/headlines/dig-once-bill-could-bring-fiber-internet-much-us | Ars Technica
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ATT BROADBAND DEPLOYMENT SKIPPED LOW-INCOME DAYTON NEIGHBORHOODS
[SOURCE: National Digital Inclusion Alliance, AUTHOR: Bill Callahan]
Earlier in Feb the National Digital Inclusion Alliance and Connect Your Community, a Cleveland (OH) based organization, published a report indicating that AT&T had “systematically discriminated against lower income Cleveland neighborhoods in its deployment of home internet and video technologies over the last decade.” The analysis shows that AT&T has failed to upgrade its network in low income neighborhoods, including most of the City of Dayton, while deploying a high-speed fiber based network in wealthier suburban areas. “The company has upgraded areas around the City to its mainstream technology (Fiber to the Node, VDSL) but has failed to do that in Dayton, leaving those neighborhoods with an older, much slower technology (ADSL-2),” said Ellis Jacobs, senior attorney with Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc. According to Jacobs, “this has all the appearances of ‘digital redlining,’ discrimination against residents of lower income urban neighborhoods in the type of infrastructure AT&T installs and the type of broadband service it offers. High-speed internet is a critical modern day utility. Without it, residents and businesses are at a distinct disadvantage.”
benton.org/headlines/att-broadband-deployment-skipped-low-income-dayton-oh-neighborhoods | National Digital Inclusion Alliance
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SECURITY/PRIVACY
HOUSE OVERSIGHT ON FACIAL RECOGNITION TECH
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Aida Chavez]
Lawmakers grilled law enforcement officials in a tense hearing March 22 over their use of facial recognition programs. Democrats and Republicans raised concerns about the FBI’s use of facial recognition technology during a House Oversight Committee hearing, pressing a bureau official about the ability to access photos of hundreds of millions of citizens and the technology’s accuracy. “This is really Nazi Germany here that we’re talking about,” Rep Stephen Lynch (D-MA), said of the facial recognition databases. “They had meticulous files on individuals, most of them of Jewish faith and that’s how they tracked their people. I see little difference in the way people are being tracked under this.” Over 117 million American adults can be found in a law enforcement facial recognition database, which draws in part from drivers license data, according to an October report from the Center on Privacy and Technology at Georgetown Law.
benton.org/headlines/house-oversight-grills-law-enforcement-facial-recognition-tech | Hill, The | hearing page
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WHAT THE PUBLIC KNOWS ABOUT CYBERSECURITY
[SOURCE: Pew Research Center, AUTHOR: Kenneth Olmstead, Aaron Smith]
A Pew Research Center survey finds that many Americans are unclear about some key cybersecurity topics, terms and concepts. A majority of online adults can identify a strong password when they see one and recognize the dangers of using public Wi-Fi. However, many struggle with more technical cybersecurity concepts, such as how to identify true two-factor authentication or determine if a webpage they are using is encrypted. Those with higher levels of education and younger internet users are more likely to answer cybersecurity questions correctly.
benton.org/headlines/what-public-knows-about-cybersecurity | Pew Research Center | B&C
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FCC REFORM
IMPROVED STAFF OPENNESS & NEW PRIORITIES
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: FCC Commissioner Michael O'Rielly]
One of Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai’s most welcomed, yet least noted, process reforms has been his unequivocal direction that staff should be completely up front with all Commissioners, not just the Chairman. The message from the Chairman was that all staff will not withhold information requested by Commissioners or fail to share information that is pertinent to the many matters before us. This should be very liberating for staff as they don’t have to worry about being sent to the proverbial doghouse for helping Commissioners do their jobs. At a time when Commission leadership has changed and is reconsidering and reconstructing its approach to many issues across the agency, there needs to be a realization from everyone that those priorities of the past Commission – not directly required by statute – should not necessarily be the focus of staff time. With resources at such a relative premium, staff attention shouldn’t be spent pursuing outdated goals.For instance, it wouldn’t make sense to have staff still focus their valuable time on those cybersecurity and privacy issues over which the Commission lacks statutory authority. Moreover, our enforcement staff should move away from headline grabbing and eye popping penalties that will never be collected. Let’s refocus our attention on our statutory responsibilities and realize a new Chairman gets to set the Commission’s agenda.
benton.org/headlines/improved-staff-openness-new-priorities | Federal Communications Commission | B&C
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STORIES FROM ABROAD
CHINA BETS ON SENSITIVE US START-UPS
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Paul Mozur, Jane Perlez]
Chinese firms have become significant investors in American start-ups working on cutting-edge technologies with potential military applications. The start-ups include companies that make rocket engines for spacecraft, sensors for autonomous navy ships, and printers that make flexible screens that could be used in fighter-plane cockpits. Many of the Chinese firms are owned by state-owned companies or have connections to Chinese leaders. The deals are ringing alarm bells in Washington. According to a new white paper commissioned by the Department of Defense, Beijing is encouraging Chinese companies with close government ties to invest in American start-ups specializing in critical technologies like artificial intelligence and robots to advance China’s military capacity as well as its economy. The white paper, which was distributed to the senior levels of the Trump administration this week, concludes that United States government controls that are supposed to protect potentially critical technologies are falling short, according to three people knowledgeable about its contents, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
benton.org/headlines/china-bets-sensitive-us-start-ups-worrying-pentagon | New York Times
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