Amazon Sidewalk goes live Tuesday, automatically enabling a feature on its hardware devices that will share a small slice of consumers’ Wi-Fi bandwidth with neighbors, unless they opt out. This raises privacy and competitive concerns, experts told us.
There's "strong urgency" to boost trans-Atlantic cooperation on issues such as AI, Rep. Jerry McNerney, D-Calif., told a DigitalEurope webinar Thursday. The two regions share a growing set of challenges on such issues as privacy, AI and content moderation, and they should look to how the other side is handling them, because rapidly developing technology needs guardrails and there's fierce competition from ideological rivals, he said. Identify where they differ to develop the right set of rules, said McNerney, who chairs the Artificial Intelligence Caucus. Panelists agreed interest is growing at higher levels in finding common ground.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology should tread lightly defining “critical software” and avoid disincentivizing innovation, officials from Microsoft, Linux, BSA|The Software Alliance and cloud providers told NIST Wednesday. President Joe Biden’s cybersecurity executive order directs NIST to publish a definition by June 26 (see 2105240072).
Congress should enact federal privacy legislation that would give internet users the right to access and delete personal information, FTC acting Chairwoman Rebecca Kelly Slaughter wrote in a recent letter to Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. An aide for Klobuchar, who supports access and deletion rights, said Tuesday the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee chair will continue pushing for such legislation.
President Joe Biden proposed substantial budget increases Friday for the FCC, FTC and most tech-focused agencies within the Commerce and Justice departments for FY 2022, in documents released Friday. The administration proposed a smaller increase for the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and would keep CPB's funding at $475 million.
The Senate voted 68-30 Thursday to end debate on a substitute amendment for the Endless Frontier Act (S.1260) (see 2105130069), moving one step closer to final passage. Senators agreed to a defense spending amendment and appeared to be nearing agreement on a trade policy provision in a package that could far exceed the original $100 billion.
Internet industry groups sued Florida over its social media law that makes it unlawful for sites to deplatform political candidates and requires sites be transparent about policing. NetChoice and the Computer and Communications Industry Association sued Thursday in U.S. District Court in Tallahassee. “The Act is so rife with fundamental infirmities that it appears to have been enacted without any regard for the Constitution,” they wrote. Our earlier news bulletin is here.
Federal regulators are likely looking closely at possible antitrust action against Amazon, but the company's $8.45 billion buy of MGM announced Wednesday isn't expected to face federal or state antitrust challenges, experts told us. Lawmakers we interviewed questioned the potential monopoly power of Amazon while wanting the deal scrutinized.
Regulators should immediately break up Facebook and act against its entities, protesters said outside the company’s lobbying headquarters in Washington on Tuesday. Participants told us the company hasn’t been responsive to specific demands, is incapable of self-correcting and has built a large U.S. corporate lobbying operation.
President Joe Biden’s cybersecurity executive order (see 2105130065) will boost the federal government’s reliance on cloud services and information sharing, experts told us. The EO directs federal civilian agencies to “accelerate movement to secure cloud services,” including software as a service (SaaS), infrastructure as a service (IaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS). Within 90 days, the OMB director will develop a federal cloud-security strategy with guidance to agencies, in consultation with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the General Services administrator through the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRamp).