Stanford University pushed back Wednesday in a blog post against reports it had decided to stop using Google funding for privacy research at the Center for Internet and Society (CIS) (http://stanford.io/Y47dBR). ProPublica said Tuesday that a document filed in a Stanford legal proceeding (http://bit.ly/1rngkJU) contained this sentence: “Since 2013, Google funding is specifically designated not be used for CIS’s privacy work.” In the blog post, CIS Director-Civil Liberties Jennifer Granick said the sentence meant CIS had other funding sources for its privacy work that year, and its decision not to use Google’s funding on privacy was not a comment on Google. “Funding sources impose no restrictions on CIS researchers. Period,” Granick said. “All donors to the Center -- and to Stanford more generally -- agree to give their funds as unrestricted gifts, for which there is no contractual agreement and no promised products, results, or deliverables.” Stanford could in the future designate Google money for privacy research, she said. In 2012, Jonathan Mayer, a Ph.D. candidate at CIS, found Google was circumventing the Apple Safari browser’s cookie blocking feature, which led to a $22.5 million settlement with the FTC (http://1.usa.gov/19VRGcD).
The Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General’s (OIG) structure, policies and procedures are consistent with standards in the Inspector General Act of 1978, but there are areas for improvement, said the GAO Wednesday. It recommended that the DHS OIG establish additional automated and supervisory controls to protect the identities of DHS employees who file complaints, having found that existing procedures involve manual recording and are thus subject to “human error.” GAO recommended the OIG develop a policy for obtaining legal advice from counsel, having found that OIG doesn’t have such a policy in place. Twenty-eight reports dealt with IT management, while two dealt with infrastructure protection, GAO said (http://1.usa.gov/1ruR8RV). OIG told GAO it’s revising its online complaint forms to protect employee confidentiality.
Facebook is “unlikely” to renew its membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and Yelp withdrew, said spokespeople for the companies Wednesday. A Yelp spokesperson said the online review website pulled its membership several months ago. Facebook is evaluating whether to renew its membership and hasn’t made a final decision, said its spokesperson. “While we have tried to work within ALEC to bring that organization closer to our view on some key issues, it seems unlikely that we will make sufficient progress so we are not likely to renew our membership in 2015.” Earlier this week, Google said it was pulling its financial support from ALEC because of the organization’s denial of climate change (WID Sept 23 p10).
The Patent and Trademark Office invalidated a patent on smartphone screen rotation held by Rotatable Technologies, said Rackspace Vice President-Intellectual Property Van Lindberg in a Monday blog post (http://bit.ly/1wFYe6h). Rotatable Technologies had sued Rackspace for infringement of the patent, Lindberg said. Instead of settling, Rackspace challenged the patent in an inter partes review at the PTO, a feature recently created after the 2011 passage of the America Invents Act (WID July 31 p7). “This means that Rackspace will not pay one penny to this troll, nor will Apple, Netflix, Electronic Arts, Target, Whole Foods or any of the other companies sued by Rotatable for how they use screen rotation technology in their apps,” Lindberg said. “Without changes in the law we believe that the only way to end the plague of patent trolls is by fighting every troll that comes at us -- and we encourage all others to do the same.” Patent law revamp efforts stalled in 2013 (WID May 23 p4). Neither the PTO nor Rotatable commented.
There’s no evidence of foreign influence over Pandora and the FCC can’t find that it’s in the public interest to deny its application to acquire a KXMZ(FM) Box Elder, South Dakota, said the company in meetings with aides to all FCC members and staff from the Office of General Counsel, according to an ex parte filing posted Monday in docket 14-109 (http://bit.ly/1qqhZJh). Because it’s a widely held public company, Pandora is “unable to establish the identity, let alone the nationality of the majority of its shareholders” who have chosen to take advantage of SEC privacy rules, Pandora said. The company had asked the FCC to permit it to buy the station even if it’s up to 100 percent foreign owned (WID Sept 3 p8). The company’s leadership is almost entirely U.S. citizens, and the only shareholder that owns more than 5 percent of Pandora’s stock is a U.S. entity, the filing said. It said Pandora believes its foreign ownership is “likely in the 15-17 percent range."
Mobile Future warned the White House against subjecting wireless carriers to the same net neutrality rules imposed on wireline providers, in comments submitted Tuesday to the Obama administration’s Office of Science and Technology Policy and National Economic Council’s request for information on an administration innovation strategy. “Subjecting wireless broadband networks to rules that dictate how wired networks are designed and operated would be a mistake,” Mobile Future said (http://bit.ly/1mqZlWL). “It is imperative that the FCC keep this urgent demand-versus-capacity challenge in mind as it considers adding new net neutrality rules to the books. Everyone supports an open Internet. That’s why -- despite the call for more regulation -- not a single formal net neutrality complaint has been filed with the [FCC] since the adoption of its 2010 Open Internet Order.” Mobile Future blasted the possibility of subjecting “the entire mobile ecosystem to Title II regulations written to micromanage the businesses of local telephone monopolies. One can hardly envision a more anti-innovation approach, and the Administration should flatly and publicly reject these extreme calls.” Mobile Future urged the administration to focus on freeing up more spectrum for an expansion of mobile broadband. The Partnership for American Innovation, with Apple, IBM and Microsoft among members, also commented, highlighting the importance of a strong intellectual property system and a properly functioning patent system. “Heated rhetoric often based on the bad behavior of a few patent assertion entities has fueled an environment where a company is demonized for good faith enforcement of its hard-earned, legitimate property rights,” said the partnership (http://bit.ly/Y2AMEn). “The corresponding policy discussions lead our country away from a balanced IP system that enables collaboration and innovation. If this lopsided model of innovation is adopted, we risk creating a system where foreign competitors gain a competitive advantage by patenting their ideas while copying American IP without consequence.”
Don’t use USF money to build out service where providers already are providing broadband and phone service, the American Cable Association recommended to Congress. ACA also recommended that broadband service not be assessed for USF contributions but that USF should support broadband service. Distribute the support “efficiently” and “on a competitively neutral basis,” with “fiscally responsible” USF programs, it said. ACA submitted its comments to the House Commerce Committee in response to questions about overhauling USF policy. Those comments were due Friday but have not been released online by the committee (WID Sept 22 p7). It’s fine for states and state regulators to create USF programs as long as they don’t give money to regions already served and as long as “any eligible telecom carrier [ETC] can compete to obtain support on a competitively neutral basis,” it said. “For federal universal service programs, the role of the states and state commissions should be more circumscribed” and “largely to examine whether a provider is a ‘bad actor,'” ACA said. “ACA suggests that the FCC take over the ETC designation process for its programs, which it does already in select instances, and permit states to participate in that process if they have material information about the qualifications of the potential ETC.”
Representatives of Google and Microsoft urged the FCC to adopt technical rules permitting the use of three 801.11af channels in the 600 MHz band following the TV incentive auction, in a series of meetings with commission officials. The companies elaborated on their arguments in an ex parte filing in docket 12-268. The companies urged that the rules allow the operation of Mode 1 and 2 personal/portable unlicensed devices in the duplex gap, the lower guard band and Channel 37, the filing said (http://bit.ly/1uEzbyS). They argued that a database should be allowed to determine unlicensed device operation based on the device’s location-accuracy capabilities so devices with better accuracy can operate in appropriate locations, rather than preserving the current rule, which mandates that all devices establish location within +/- 50 meters. Unlicensed systems should be allowed to determine areas where devices can operate in the broadcast band using both the database and sensing, Google and Microsoft said.
The FCC should allow Wilkes Telephone Membership Corp. to include $147,149 owed by Halo in 2011 as part of its base period revenue for that year, NTCA said in an emergency petition (http://bit.ly/XWgnAf) posted Monday in docket 10-90 on behalf of the member company. It requests a waiver from a commission rule that requires that funds included as 2011 revenue be collected by March 31, 2012. The rural North Carolina company, which relies on Universal Service Fund support, has not been able to collect the money from Halo, which declared bankruptcy in 2012, the petition said. Not being able to count the funds “would not only create a one-time impact, but would continue to cause a financial impact to Wilkes every year” that the base period revenue is used to calculate USF support, the petition said.
Sixty-six percent of Florida respondents oppose the Marketplace Fairness Act (MFA) (HR-684), according to polling released by the R Street Institute and the National Taxpayers Union Monday (http://bit.ly/1r4chmD). Respondents were asked if they supported “enforcement agents from one state to collect taxes from online retailers based in a different state,” among other questions, it said. NTU and R Street, which oppose the MFA, polled 400 “likely” voters in Florida by phone in early June, it said. The organizations have incrementally released polling for 17 states since June 30 (http://bit.ly/1kHv0Cf) (WID Aug 18 p1). Senate supporters of the MFA are expected to try to force the House to pass the MFA by attaching it to an extension of the Internet Tax Fairness Act (S-2609) in the lame-duck session after the November elections (WID Sept 23 p1). The pollsters said the margin of error was plus or minus 4.9 percent.