Google will always use an encrypted HTTPS connection for its email service, Gmail, the company said in a Thursday blog post (http://bit.ly/1fKtG8Q). Gmail has always supported HTTPS since launching, and HTTPS has been the default since 2010, Google said. But now, the email service will default to encrypted HTTPS, according to the post. “Today’s change means that no one can listen in on your messages as they go back and forth between you and Gmail’s servers -- no matter if you're using public WiFi or logging in from your computer, phone or tablet.” The company said all messages sent or received will be encrypted while moving internally between Gmail servers and Google’s data centers, “something we made a top priority after last summer’s revelations.” In October, it was revealed that the National Security Agency is secretly tapping the links connecting Google and Yahoo’s data centers around the world ((CD Oct 31 p9).

Nine individuals were denied a motion to file a class-action lawsuit against Google for violating user privacy by scanning email messages on Gmail, in a decision by U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, Calif., Tuesday. In her decision, Koh cited the “individualized nature” of each individual’s case, which would involve whether a consumer had consented to the scanning of email. “A fact-finder would have to determine to what disclosures each Class member was exposed and whether such disclosures were sufficient to conclude, under the Wiretap Act, that Class members consented to the alleged Google interceptions of email,” Koh said. The plaintiffs had alleged Google’s actions violated federal wiretap laws, which regulate unauthorized access to private electronic communications. “The individualized questions with respect to consent, which will likely be Google’s principal affirmative defense, are likely to overwhelm any common issues,” Koh said. Parts of the decision were redacted, as parts of many case documents have been, a decision decried by a number of media organizations and consumer advocates (WID Feb 20 p19, Feb 27 p6). Koh had previously rejected Google’s claims that wiretapping laws don’t apply to Gmail (CD Sept 27 p23).

FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai said Congress should closely monitor the NTIA’s proposal to spin off oversight of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) to a global multistakeholder body. “The current multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance has been a tremendous success,” he said in a statement Tuesday (http://fcc.us/1iA2FtX). “Any proposal to change that model therefore demands rigorous scrutiny.” Pai said he was concerned foreign governments may use the proposal process to increase government control of the Internet, saying “if I am not convinced that a different governance structure would preserve Internet freedom, I will strongly oppose it.” Other Republicans have also said they were concerned about the possibility of foreign governments abusing the transition process, including House Commerce Committee Vice Chairwoman Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, who said in a statement Monday that she believes the transition “will allow countries like China and Russia that don’t place the same value in freedom of speech to better define how the Internet looks and operates.”

The European Commission will release its vision for a trusted European cloud later this week, said Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes Tuesday at the Future Internet Assembly in Athens. The future Internet will have four main characteristics, she said: The cloud, big data, the Internet of Things and fast networking. They're now converging, supporting and reinforcing one another, she said. Further into the future, there could be more innovations, such as advanced networking or 5G, she said. The most important ingredient for the next Internet isn’t gadgets or tools but the entrepreneurs, startups, businesses, researchers, engineers and academics in the audience, she said. The EC will support innovations with the “three Ps,” Kroes said: (1) A public-private partnership on the Future Internet with a lab that offers building blocks for inventors to use. (2) Platforms where ideas can be safely tested. (3) Prizes to spur innovation. The EC will put 100 million euros ($139 million) on the table to help about 1,000 small businesses and startups develop services and apps, she said. The EC talked up four user-driven projects on tomorrow’s Internet, in a memo (http://bit.ly/1l0sGoU). They include the FIcontent initiative to develop cutting-edge information and communication technology platforms devoted to applications and services in the areas of social connected TV, smart city services and pervasive games; and smart toys that will be able to connect computers and online games to deliver personalized content.

A four-year trend reveals that as time-shifted viewing grows, local live-plus-same-day ratings are within 1 percent of the national C3 standard for what’s viewed about three days after first shown on TV, TVB said of its latest analysis. The industry’s current standard for live-only local TV is “increasingly less accurate,” TVB said in a news release Monday (http://bit.ly/1iZvLWi). Live-only local TV dropped to below 26 percent C3 in January, it said. Season to date, that data stream is already 18 percent below C3, “its lowest index to C3 ... for that period since 2010,” it said. TVB also said Live + SD Primetime A25-54 Ratings were 9 percent below the C3 average across Nielsen’s Local Peoplemeter Markets,” in its analysis (http://bit.ly/1ifh6Tg). This is the lowest performance of that stream relative to C3, “and marks the 4th consecutive month in which the Live + SD data stream was at or below C3,” it said. This is another indicator that time-shifted local viewing is growing, TVB said.

The top U.S. cable providers and telcos added more than 2.6 million net broadband subscribers in 2013, said Leichtman Research Group Monday. Gains at those 17 companies, which collectively have 93 percent of the U.S. broadband market, were about 95 percent of all net broadband subscriber gains for the year, Leichtman said. Top cable companies continued to dominate the U.S. broadband market, ending 2013 with 49.3 million broadband subscribers, compared with 35 million broadband subscribers through top telcos. Comcast added 1.3 million net subscribers in 2013 -- 49 percent of the net adds from top companies, Leichtman said. Top cable companies saw their share of subscriber additions shrink to 82 percent in 2013 from 88 percent in 2012. Top telcos added 480,000 net broadband subscribers in 2013, 146 percent of their total net additions in 2012, Leichtman said (http://bit.ly/1iWcbdo).

Government officials, lawyers, and privacy advocates will debate the legal and policy issues of the government’s Internet surveillance program during a Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) all-day hearing Wednesday, said a PCLOB Thursday evening news release. General counsels from the FBI, NSA and Office of the Director of National Intelligence will start with the administration’s position on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which authorizes Internet surveillance actions. Civil society group representatives -- American Civil Liberties Union Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer and Brennan Center for Justice’s Liberty and National Security Program Counsel Rachel Levinson-Waldman -- will join law professors from Georgetown University Law School and Hofstra University to discuss Section 702’s legal issues. An international panel of lawyers, academics and researchers will conclude by weighing in on the transnational policy issues Section 702 raises. PCLOB is preparing a report that will focus on Internet surveillance, which it expects to release in a couple months (CD Jan 31 p15). The board’s previous report recommended eliminating the government’s phone metadata collection program, suggesting seeking that metadata from communications providers instead while imposing data retention mandates (CD Jan 24 p5).

Europe’s digital technology industry cheered a European Parliament vote on a network and information security directive Thursday (CD March 13 p15). The final text wasn’t available, but DigitalEurope and BSA/The Software Alliance said legislative changes made the measure more palatable. Parliament mitigated several “troubling provisions” in the original draft and the current version could potentially improve cybersecurity protection, BSA said. Lawmakers focused on protecting critical infrastructure, both organizations said. The measure will succeed if it’s based on clear, future-proof definitions and a proportional, risk-based approach that gives the private sector room to innovate in response to fast-changing cyberthreats, BSA said. The parliamentary text supports coordination at the European level, recognizes the global nature of cybersecurity and takes a targeted line, said DigitalEurope. BSA said it now wants the Council to add more harmonization of cyberattack reporting requirements for market operators to avoid a patchwork of potentially conflicting legal requirements across the EU.

Senior Cybersecurity Director Andy Ozment will leave the White House to become assistant secretary of homeland security for cybersecurity and communications, DHS officials said Wednesday in a blog post. Ozment will head the National Protection and Programs Directorate’s (NPPD) Office of Cybersecurity and Communications, which will be leading DHS work on implementation of President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity executive order, including industry use of the National Institute of Standards and Technology-created Cybersecurity Framework, DHS said. Retired Air Force Brig. Gen. Gregory Touhill will become DHS deputy assistant secretary-cybersecurity operations and programs, said Phyllis Schneck, DHS deputy undersecretary-cybersecurity and communications, and Suzanne Spaulding, DHS deputy undersecretary-NPPD. Roberta Stempfley, who was acting DHS assistant secretary-cybersecurity and communications, will become deputy assistant secretary-cybersecurity strategy and emergency communications (http://xrl.us/bqppcc). Ozment will join DHS April 7. Former FCC Public Safety Bureau Chief Jamie Barnett, now co-chairman of Venable’s telecom and cybersecurity practice, said in a statement that Ozment “has done a superb job” leading development and implementation of Obama’s cybersecurity executive order, which mandated creation of the Cybersecurity Framework. Ozment’s work on the implementation has “has dramatically strengthened the public-private partnership on cybersecurity,” Barnett said.

"The NSA is acting like a spambot,” said Center for Democracy & Technology Senior Counsel Harley Geiger, responding in a statement to a report on The Intercept that details the National Security Agency’s (NSA) expansion of a program to covertly hack into computers using malware “on a mass scale,” (http://bit.ly/PsPfFL). Geiger said, “The use of malware implants should be targeted against specific threats in tightly controlled situations, but this kind of mass automated surveillance would put countless Internet users at risk.” The report -- by Glenn Greenwald and Ryan Gallagher and based on documents provided by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden -- said the NSA has posed as a fake Facebook server and sent out spam emails with malware to infiltrate computers, take snapshots, make audio records and exfiltrate files from hard drives. “By deploying malware on systems broadly, especially in such an automated fashion, the NSA could potentially introduce new vulnerabilities and make the systems even more susceptible to attacks by third parties and other governments, a problem the agency itself acknowledges is occurring,” Geiger said.