Privacy
Markey Sells Them A Bill
Rep. Ed Markey, D-MA, unveiled a broad Privacy Bill of Rights that would give individuals the right to protect their personal data and the ability to create monetary sanctions if those rights are violated. "Our national privacy policy must, and I believe inevitably will, include a governmental role," Markey said at the Computers, Freedom and Privacy conference in Washington, DC. "While we welcome what industry self-regulation can offer, I do not accept the notion that the Internet is too complex, and technology is changing so rapidly that we cannot develop enforceable privacy protections." Markey said that while he had intended to introduce the legislation previously, he has been incorporating concerns from Internet businesses, which have been privately supportive.

Privacy
Swindle Calls For Privacy Moratorium
Federal Trade Commissioner Orson Swindle proposed a three-year moratorium on Internet privacy regulation in a speech to a Washington-area business group populated with high-technology companies. Using the Internet Tax Freedom Act's three year hold on sales taxes as an example, the one-time Republican House candidate told the Reston, VA, Chamber of Commerce that government should not impose new laws until it can "determine the potential effects of regulation on electronic commerce."

Privacy
Progress, But More Meetings Ahead
European Union and U.S. officials said Wednesday that they made more progress in resolving differences over the European Union's privacy directive, but plan to meet again at the end of April in hopes of concluding talks. Commerce Department Undersecretary for International Trade David Aaron and EU negotiator John Mogg met for more than eight hours in Brussels but were unable to resolve differences over two key issues. The talks concern the European Union's directive that bans the flow of personal information about EU citizens to third countries without adequate privacy protections.

Privacy
GLAAD Warns Of PIII Outing Potential
One of the country's leading gay rights organizations has joined privacy and consumer advocates in protesting the electronic serial number embedded in Intel's new Pentium III chip. The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) said Thursday that the ID number will inhibit gay and lesbian youth from getting crucial information online, for fear they may be identified. The complaints are among those to be filed by the Center for Democracy and Technology in a supplement to its previous arguments before the Federal Trade Commission. CDT charges that the serial number will inhibit privacy for users and is different than all other identifiers, such as IP addresses, because Intel's chip is expected to reach 75 percent of consumers.

Export
White House Questions Own Controls
A key administration official said that the White House is questioning the effectiveness of its high-tech export controls, given the increasing globalization of technology. Export controls were a very valid tool in the 1980s for national security," said Jim Lewis, director of the Office of Strategic Trade at the Commerce Department's Bureau of Export Administration. "There is a perception growing that maybe there is less value now." Lewis said this does not necessarily apply to controls on the export of encryption. The Clinton Administration has been reluctant to liberalize export controls because of its potential impact on national security and law enforcement.

Telecom
Sidgmore: Step Aside, Uncle Sam
The technology revolution that spawned the Internet will continue to hum at an increasingly faster pace, as long as the government does not step in to regulate, MCI WorldCom Chief Operating Officer John Sidgmore said Thursday. "If they would just leave us alone for another two years, we'll be so big they can't hurt us," he told National Journal's Technology Daily. "I hope they stay on the sideline." His statements come nearly a week before Senate Commerce Chairman John McCain, R-AZ, plans to hold a hearing on legislation that would prohibit Internet regulation. Republican leaders have warned the FCC that they will not support Internet-related regulations. And FCC Chairman William Kennard often stresses that he, too, does not want to see any additional rules placed on the burgeoning industry.

Civil Liberties
ACLU, Barr Eye Spies
Civil libertarians are calling on Congress to investigate whether a global electronic communications surveillance system, reportedly developed by the National Security Agency with help from some U.S. allies, poses a threat to the privacy and civil liberties of Americans. The American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter Tuesday to the House Government Reform Committee, requesting a hearing on the alleged surveillance system known as ECHELON, which is reportedly led by the NSA in conjunction with the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Rep. Bob Barr, R-GA, also announced he was making a similar request to the committee to hold a hearing on the issue.

Civil Liberties
Access Denial As Censorship
A human rights activist said Thursday that access to the Internet in China is as significant an obstacle to its growth there as is direct censorship. "The thing about access is it is a very serious form of censorship," said Bobson Wong, executive director of the Digital Freedom Network, an organization that uses the Internet to promote free speech and human rights around the world. He said the government need not control access to certain sites on the Internet if its citizens do not have access to the Internet in the first place.

Piracy
China Lowers Pirate Flag
U.S. Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky announced that China's highest government authority has issued a directive ordering all government agencies to use only legal computer software. It is a move that industry and government officials hope will send a strong signal to the Chinese private sector, because the mainland government has long been considered by the United States to be one of the most notorious pirates of software. The State Council of the Chinese Government issued the decree to government ministries, commissions and agencies requiring them to implement in a "serious and thorough manner" a 1995 directive issued by China's State Copyright Administration that banned the use of computer software that was illegally copied. The State Council's declaration carries much more weight than the previous directive, a USTR official said.

Campaigns
Searching for Silicon Silver
The day before Vice President Al Gore, the strong frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, arrived in Silicon Valley for a fundraising event, television ads paid for by the Republican Leadership Council began airing that ridicule Gore's recent statement proclaiming that he invented the Internet. Gore countered these negatives on his Web site, which he unveiled the following day. Although Republicans tried to tame Gore's first presidential campaign fundraising effort in the Valley, about 330 supporters drowned out the criticism by offering a warm welcome — and $1,000 checks — at an event hosted by E-Loan Chief Executive Janina Pawlowski. Gore was introduced by venture capitalist/political activist John Doerr, who later that evening hosted another fund raising event at his home later Tuesday with the loftier price tags ranging from $10,000 to $25,000.

Campaigns
Goodlatte And Plenty
Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-VA, chairman of House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-IL's High-Tech Working Group, visited Silicon Valley companies to highlight that the Republican Congress has passed plenty of bills that support the high-tech industry. "It was the Republican Congress that passed a litany of bills — securities litigation reform, H1-B visas — that Al Gore was on the wrong side of... We are here to say that the Republican leadership gets it," Goodlatte told National Journal's Technology Daily.

Domains
NSI: Just A Misunderstanding?
Network Solutions said Thursday it plans to modify its controversial Web site, responding to consumer complaints and discussions with the Commerce Department over the sites recent swallowing of a site that provided domain name services to the public. NSI spokesman Brian O'Shaughnessy said the company would make changes to its Web site to provide more information about the connection between the InterNIC site and NSI's corporate site. NSI operated the InterNIC Web site separately from its corporate site until last month, when it merged the two, angering many Internet users.

Y2K
Around The World On Y2K
International officials announced a handful of high-tech initiatives, including the formation of a team of experts to assist nations in fixing the Year 2000 computer bug. In addition to the YES Corps volunteer program, the International Y2K Coordination Center also announced the creation of a new Web site to provide information on methods for attacking the Y2K bug and other information. The center, launched in February under the auspices of the United Nations with funding from the World Bank, also will begin work on a comprehensive, non-commercial international survey to get a better assessment of worldwide Y2K readiness.