Export
Dicks: Report Not Delayed Over Embassy Row
The controversial and much publicized "Cox Report," established to investigate technology transfers to China, may be unveiled during the coming week, according to a spokesman for the select committee's top Democrat, Rep. Norm Dicks, WA. However, the House Intelligence Committee has begun implementing some of the still-classified report's recommendations. Most of the provisions related to the Cox Report in H.R. 1555, which funds intelligence programs across the federal government, deals with counter-intelligence and analysis, but with a nod to the Cox Report, it also includes "significant" additional funding for efforts to bolster cyber-security at the Energy Department.

Y2K
It's Party-Line, And They'll Cry If They Want To
Decrying a partisan vote on Y2K liability in the House, a bipartisan band of senators said they hope to revive their liability bill, S. 96, on the floor next week. Meanwhile, a spokesman for Sen. John Kerry, D-MA, said this week that Kerry is working on his own Y2K liability proposal and hopes to introduce it soon. The House passed its Y2K liability legislation, H.R. 775, 236-190, splitting generally along party lines. Although a handful of moderate Democrats support the bill, the politics of the debate were clear when House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-MO, said the Republicans were trying to turn the vote into a campaign item. Rep. David Dreier, R-CA, one of the bill's original co-sponsors, maintained that issue of Y2K liability was not political. Democrats maintained that the bill was an attempt to make sweeping legal reforms, rather than to address problems companies may face with the 2000 date change. A handful of senators in both parties have been working to develop a more bipartisan effort in the Senate in order to survive a veto threat issued by the White House.

White House
Roses Are Red, Violence Are Few
President Clinton called for a renewed emphasis on the V-chip and more study on the effects of Internet and video game violence on children. He also tapped Surgeon General David Satcher to prepare a study on violence and media, which will include research on the Internet and video games. Additionally, Clinton announced that the Federal Communications Commission will establish a V-chip task force charged with promoting parental awareness of the television content filtering technology, ensuring that TV manufacturers meet V-chip requirements, and evaluating the effectiveness of the industry's rating system. FCC Commissioner Gloria Tristani will chair the taskforce. The only high-tech industry representatives present at the sparsely-attended Rose Garden event were America Online CEO Steve Case and Doug Lowenstein, president of the Interactive Digital Software Association.

Crime
On-line Guns Face A Test
Senate lawmakers outlined a series of initiatives aimed at addressing youth violence in the wake of the shootings last month at Columbine High School in Colorado. A group of Senate Republicans unveiled several of proposals they may offer to S. 254, the juvenile justice legislation that is on the Senate floor. Among the amendments outlined by the Senate GOP's Youth Violence Task Force, led by Sen. Wayne Allard, R-CO, that may be offered to S. 254 include a series of provisions aimed at addressing the "cultural decline" that may contribute to youth violence. They include a possible amendment to encourage Internet service providers to offer screening or filtering software and to prohibit the posting of bomb making instructions on the Internet. An amendment offered by Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-NY, mandates that Web site operators be licensed gun store owners. Meanwhile, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain, R-AZ, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-CT, and others also announced that they were introducing legislation that would create a national commission to study the causes of youth violence.

Civil Liberties
Filtering Through The Senate
Internet service providers would be required to provide software filters that allow residential customers to block children's access to the Web under the terms of a measure that passed the Senate unanimously Thursday. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-UT, offered the measure as an amendment to his juvenile justice bill, S. 254, and was joined by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-VT, who succeeded in ensuring that the amendment's definition of "Internet service providers" was limited to ISPs with more than 50,000 subscribers. In the wake of the school shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton, CO, Hatch's Violent and Repeat Juvenile Offender Accountability and Rehabilitation Act of 1999 has attracted slew of amendments on subjects ranging from gun control to encouraging the entertainment industry to clamp down on violence in films and video games.

E-commerce
DiFi Says Gambling Bill Dicey
Internet service providers that include advertising from online gambling Web sites should not be held criminally liable, according to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-CA. Feinstein said she would craft an amendment to S. 692, a prohibition of Internet gambling, when the full Senate Judiciary Committee takes up the bill. She also would like to set a 30-day limit in which ISPs would be required to remove online gambling sites from their networks, she proposed at a Technology, Terrorism and Government Information Subcommittee meeting. "The bill effectively deputizes Internet service providers and the service providers have accepted this burden, and I commend them for doing so." A subcommittee unanimously approved S. 692, sponsored by Subcommittee Chairman Jon Kyl, R-AZ. While Feinstein is a co-sponsor of the bill, she said lawmakers should be cautious before placing restrictions on the Internet. "We must be careful not to impede the growth of the Internet," she said, adding that ISPs "simply provide common-carrier type services" rather than content.

Domains
Report, Rebuttals, And Responses
Francis Gurry, assistant director general for the World Intellectual Property Organization, defended the organization's controversial report on Internet domain names. He said his group's recommendations are a balanced attempt to address the nuisance of cybersquatting, the practice of individuals or renegade companies registering famous trademarks of other firms in hopes of selling it to the trademark's owner for a handsome profit. The report, released April 30 after nearly a year of study, was done for the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers. That group was tapped by the federal government to take over administration of most aspects of the Internet. The most controversial WIPO recommendation is that the most famous trademarked names in the physical world be set aside for the exclusive use of their owners in cyberspace. The report calls for creating a panel of experts administered by WIPO to decide which names should be set aside.

Domains
Domain Strain Prompts Change
Responding to concerns that his bill could hamper the National Science Foundation, Rep. Lee Terry, R-NE, sponsor of legislation that would repeal fees on Internet domain names plans changes in the measure.H.R. 749 has been slowed by concerns over how to cover part of the refunds required by the bill. The bill would eliminate a 30 percent fee, added to the $35 registration cost charged when a new domain name is purchased. That fee established to support a fund to help maintain and improve the Internet, generated more than $60 million before the NSF stopped collecting it last year. A group of domain name holders has sued the NSF over the fee, charging it was an unconstitutional tax. A federal judge agreed in April 1998 but said the fee would be legal if Congress passed legislation ratifying it. Congress did just that in adding language to the 1998 supplemental spending bill. H.R. 749 would repeal that language and require the federal government to refund the money collected from the fee to domain holders. However, $23 million of it has been appropriated for other items. As a result, Terry's bill would require NSF to cover that money from its FY1999 budget.

Export
Tiers For Fears
Some high-tech industry representatives are expressing concern over a congressional move to place Hong Kong under the same tier of restrictive export rules as the rest of China. The provision is aimed at ensuring that the U.S. commercial relationship with Hong Kong is "not fueling China's military programs, or the programs of any other nation," according to the committee report on S. 886, the legislation authorizing funding for the State Department and foreign affairs operations. The measure also would cover the Portuguese enclave of Macau, which will revert to Chinese rule in December. The provision added to S. 886 requires U.S. officials to seek pre-license and post-shipment checks of sensitive technology to Hong Kong and Macau.

E-commerce
Commerce Conflict
The Computer and Communications Industry Association is calling on the Clinton Administration to push the European Union to modify language the EU approved last week that would weaken liability protection for Internet service providers. The legislation is now before the EU's European Commission. After the commission takes up the measure, it must return to Parliament before it can become law. Prior to Parliament's action, the e-commerce legislation called for providing ISPs with protection from liability for copyright infringement, pornography traffic on their networks, or other illegal activities, as long as they did not have actual knowledge of the illegal activity. The new language also shifts the burden of proof to ISPs, which would be required to prove they were "not in a position to know" about the activity.

Education
Four On The Gore
Four Republican lawmakers offered a measure to re-wire the budgeting system for the e-rate discount, attacking the current funding system as unconstitutional and deriding it as a "Gore tax." The Schools and Libraries Internet Access Act would cut the telephone excise tax by two-thirds and allow the Department of Education, not the FCC, to administer the remaining $1.9 billion in funds to the e-rate system, which subsidizes Internet hook-ups at schools and libraries. That's the same rate as this year's funding, but below the $2.25 billion the FCC has said it wants for full funding of the program. The bill is sponsored in the House by Reps. Tom Tancredo, CO, Billy Tauzin, LA, and Jerry Weller, IL, and across the corridor by Sen. Conrad Burns, MT.

Privacy
A Peek At Privacy
The number of online businesses posting privacy policies increased dramatically in the past year, but still constitute only two-thirds of the sites that collect at least one type of personal information from users, according to a long-awaited study supported by the Federal Trade Commission. Representatives of Internet-based business were exuberant that the latest Federal Trade Commission-supported Web sweep appeared to show a substantial increase in the number of sites posting privacy policies. The survey's finding that two-thirds of commercial Web sites post privacy policies was "even better than we expected," said Pat Faley, vice president of ethics and consumers affairs for the Direct Marketing Association. "It shows us that the administration did take the right approach when it said, 'let industry regulate itself." Online Privacy Alliance Chairwoman Christine Varney, a former FTC commissioner, said she was "beyond ecstasy" at the results.

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