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Executive Branch
Gonzales' 'Remarkable' Legacy Of Protecting Children
by Andrew Noyes
As Attorney General Alberto Gonzales closes his rocky tenure, the online child-protection efforts he addressed regularly and passionately risk taking a backseat to controversies surrounding the Justice Department's anti-terrorism surveillance and its firing of eight U.S. attorneys.
In Des Moines, Iowa, on Thursday, the Bush administration's top lawyer reflected on the accomplishments of Project Safe Childhood, an effort that brings together local, state and federal law enforcers. He launched the initiative in February 2006.
The campaign is "important to me both professionally and personally, as a dad," Gonzales told reporters. "I am pleased that, in one of my last events as attorney general, I am able to highlight this issue once again." His final day on the job is Monday.
In the first half of fiscal 2007, Justice's 46 regional task forces on Internet crimes against children made 1,139 arrests for online child exploitation -- an increase of nearly 20 percent over the same period a year ago, Gonzales said.
U.S. attorneys' offices also initiated 1,657 online child-exploitation prosecutions during 2006 and are poised to show a nearly 25 percent increase in 2007, he said. Meanwhile, nearly 60 percent of those convicted in federal court this year have been sentenced to at least five years in prison, and 11 were sentenced to life terms.
Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, told Technology Daily on Friday that Gonzales' efforts to safeguard kids on the Web were "truly remarkable." "It's an area that he seized upon, focused on, targeted and mobilized resources."
Gonzales "talked about it in very explicit terms" and immersed himself in an issue that is difficult to stomach, Allen said. The attorney general was "obviously very moved" when he visited the FBI's innocent images unit and NCMEC's command center, he recalled.
"He sat with the people doing the work, he looked at the images -- and while he was disgusted by them, he tried to learn," Allen said. "From our perspective this is a very strong, positive legacy."
But Tim Lordan, who runs the nonpartisan Internet Education Foundation, said Gonzales' tenure on child-protection issues was one "marked by missed opportunities." The attorney general became a lightning rod for other controversies and his effectiveness in this arena was "greatly diminished," Lordan said.
In recent years, the war on terror has been a top priority at the Justice Department, but Gonzales was still able to raise awareness about the problem of Internet crimes against children, said Frank Kardasz, project director of Arizona's unit on Internet crimes against children.
The challenges ahead for Gonzales' successor, who has not yet been named, will be immense, said Kardasz, a Phoenix police sergeant. "Children cannot dial a phone or write a letter to summon help. They cannot lobby their legislators; they are easily marginalized and forgotten."
He added: "Only a concerted effort that involves the cooperation of government, private industry and the citizenry can begin to stop Internet crimes against children."
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Lobbying
Bush Set To Sign Ethics Package Despite Misgivings
by Heather Greenfield
President Bush is expected to sign a comprehensive lobbying and ethics bill Friday. The measure would ban gifts to members of Congress and most travel paid for by lobbyists, and it might reduce the practice of earmarking federal money for lawmakers' pet projects.
The legislation, S. 1, aims to shed light on some practices by requiring online disclosure. Lobbyists who bundle campaign contributions for candidates and senators who request earmarks would be disclosed in an online database.
It was the first measure the Democrats debated when they took congressional power in January, and the Senate passed the final legislation 83-14 just before leaving town in August.
"A great day it is indeed," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. "Democrats in Washington are draining the swamp to make this the most honest Congress in history."
There was some concern that Bush might "pocket veto" the measure by simply not signing it during the August break because he wants stronger earmark reforms, so Congress delayed sending the bill to Bush. Congress passed the measure by wide margins and could have overridden a traditional veto. They sent the measure to the president Sept. 4.
Some observers, including Citizens Against Government Waste, complained that the bill was softened over the summer. The original Senate-passed version would have prevented the House and Senate from going to conference on bills without advance disclosure of all earmarks.
CAGW said the final version would require a searchable database of earmarks only "if practicable," and the Senate majority leader and certain committee chairmen would decide if the requirement has been met. The group further said lawmakers could benefit financially themselves from earmarks -- as long as they can show others in their districts would benefit, too.
Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., defended the bill, telling critics that the changes really would make it "landmark legislation."
"This is a very strong and very comprehensive bill," Feingold said. "It makes significant changes and will make a big difference."
Feingold and Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., co-sponsored legislation to require disclosure by bundlers who raise more than $10,000 for candidates. The bill Bush is set to sign would require the online disclosure of bundlers raising more than $15,000.
Obama called it the "most sweeping reform since Watergate."
Fred Wertheimer, the president of Democracy 21, which calls attention to the role of money in politics, called the earmark disclosures an improvement and joined Democrats at a news conference Friday to celebrate the signing of the legislation.
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Courts
Lawsuit Over Indiana Ban On 'Robocalls' Is Dismissed
by Michael Martinez
A federal court on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit over an Indiana statute designed to protect consumers from unwanted, recorded telemarketing calls.
The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered a U.S. district court in Indiana to dismiss the case filed against the state by a Virginia-based telemarketer. The firm had challenged the authority of Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter to enforce the law in state court.
Carter sued the firm FreeEats.com after it placed automated calls to Hoosier State residents on behalf of a Republican U.S. House candidate last year. The Economic Freedom Fund, a conservative organization based in California, enlisted FreeEats to make the "robocalls."
FreeEats countersued Carter at the federal level, arguing that the state's "do not call" law, which was cited as grounds for the state's lawsuit, is unconstitutional. A judge last fall found that Indiana's anti-robocalling law did not violate the First Amendment, and the company appealed.
Rather than ruling on the merits of the case, the appellate court said the FreeEats suit should be tossed on procedural grounds. But Carter said the decision effectively gives his office the authority to enforce the telemarketing rules.
"It is unfortunate that a company would not want to comply with a state's law, or respect people's privacy," he said in a statement.
FreeEats also is pleased by the appellate ruling because it vacated the previous decision against the company and in support of the Indiana law. But company President Gabriel Joseph said in a statement that he wished the appellate court had ruled on the merits of the case.
"We operate under the political free-speech protection of federal interstate law," he said. "Therefore, we will continue to challenge any restrictions of political free speech until we actually obtain a ruling from the courts on the merits of our case."
Millions of Americans have registered their telephone numbers under various do-not-call lists. But those registries do not apply to political calls. According to a study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, roughly two-thirds of American voters received robocalls before last year's election.
More than 100 state bills to restrict such automated calls were filed this year. The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee last week approved a bill targeting deceptive campaign tactics. That measure, S. 453, would impose enhanced penalties against campaigns caught placing deceptive or intimidating robocalls.
An online grassroots movement aims to bypass constitutional complications of restricting political calls. Shaun Dakin of the group Citizens for Civil Discourse is trying to pool a list of telephone numbers belonging to voters who wish to be left alone. He is not advocating any legislative fix. But he wants to present the list to candidates so they know exactly who does not want to receive robocalls.
"I want enough people to get mad enough about this so that politicians are going to have to do something about it," he said. "There aren't going to be many politicians who are going to want to stand up and defend their right to place robocalls to voters."
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Domains
Tech Firms, Internet Group Tackle Cyber Mischief
by Andrew Noyes
Technology industry giants Dell, Microsoft, Time Warner, Wal-Mart and Yahoo announced this week that they are targeting cyber squatters whose Internet efforts reportedly have tarnished the firms' respective brands.
The companies, all members of the International Trademark Association, intend to pursue separate actions against 22 individuals or Web operations in an attempt create a more secure online experience and decrease trademark violations.
Cyber squatters routinely register Internet addresses -- like www.yahoomusic.com and www.microsoftcomputers.com -- that are confusingly similar to legally protected corporate names and internationally recognized trademarks. The firms warned that pay-per-click advertisements and illegal scams based on stolen consumer information, including Social Security and financial account numbers, can generate revenue for the Web squatters.
According to the World Intellectual Property Organization, cyber-squatting disputes increased 25 percent in the last year, and a recent poll by Harris Interactive found that 30 percent of consumer respondents to a survey were limiting online transactions due to potential fraud.
Microsoft attorney Aaron Kornblum said his company has filed a handful of federal lawsuits under a 1999 law against cyber squatting and lodged several complaints via a domain-name dispute process established by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, which administers the Web-addressing system.
The lawsuits involve hundreds of allegedly ominous Web addresses. Under the law, damages can range from $1 to $100,000 per infringed domain name, Kornblum said.
Microsoft has filed 15 similar actions in the past year, and most have been settled. The company took control of more than 2,000 Web addresses that were being misused and recovered more than $1.17 million in illegal profits, he said.
"These are valuable assets that must be protected," Kornblum said. It is crucial that companies like Microsoft mitigate any consumer confusion and "ensure that customers reach their genuine Web properties," he said.
Josh Bourne, president of the Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse, said that while his group supports the latest wave of lawsuits, litigation is "very costly [and] can take years to reach judgments." Also, under existing law, legal actions may not sufficiently deter abuses, so his group is pursuing other solutions like ICANN policy changes and new legislation.
The Internet Commerce Association's Philip Corwin, who represents domain-name investors and the direct-search industry, said his organization also is taking a stand against cyber squatting and trademark infringement.
On Thursday, the group unveiled a member code of conduct designed to foster fair and ethical business practices in the domain industry. The rules cover several areas of conflict, including intellectual property protection, abusive domain "tasting" to identify addresses with the most revenue potential and adherence to Internet fraud laws.
The code also condemns domain "kiting," a process that involves returning a Web address before the standard five-day grace registration period expires and re-registering it again in order to avoid paying registration fees.
ICA Executive Director Michael Collins said he wants to work with Web stakeholders, including ICANN and Congress, to further establish "rules of the road that protect the rights of consumers, as well as all the companies that participate in Internet commerce."
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E-Government
EPA Mapping Work Aims For More Readable Data
by Aliya Sternstein
The Environmental Protection Agency, currently confronting criticism for withholding information from the public, says its data will be more readable and interactive when available through Microsoft's Virtual Earth 3-D service within the next six weeks.
"The performance of our servers for hosting visualization tools has always been lacking," acknowledged Pat Garvey, EPA manager of the facility registry system, a database that tracks locations the agency regulates.
When EPA's water office asked for a computer program that could overlay water-quality data on imagery of the Gulf Coast, EPA realized it needed to upgrade its mapping operations. "We obviously haven't been able to fly the country and capture satellite imagery," Garvey said. So the agency began considering 3-D mapping services like the popular Google Earth -- currently used by NASA and the Defense Department.
Microsoft offered EPA a package that best suited the agency's mission, Garvey said. For example, the license came with unlimited access.
"God forbid we had another [Hurricane] Katrina, [the package] wasn't bound by the number of hits," Garvey said. Virtual Earth also lets users easily retrieve latitude and longitude coordinates of locations if they enter street addresses -- or vice versa, he said. "One of the painful lessons of Katrina: not all signs withstand water and wind."
The EPA work marks Microsoft's first federal-level Virtual Earth contract, said Jerry Skaw, the company's marketing communications manager for the product.
Garvey said "one of his very first priorities" will be visualizing an EPA online, public database that lists the quantities of toxic chemicals produced annually by businesses and facilities. Congress created the program after the 1984 Bhopal, India, disaster, where a Union Carbide facility leaked toxins, killing thousands of people. Ever since industry was forced to submit reports, toxic releases have been curbed dramatically.
Garvey said he hopes to get the inventory on the Virtual Earth platform by mid-November.
Sean Moulton, OMB Watch's director for federal information policy, said he would hope that a tool like Virtual Earth helps communities gain better access to EPA information, including other EPA databases. But he said the EPA loosened its toxic-reporting requirements for companies last year.
"The public is going to get a lot less information about toxic releases in their neighborhoods," Moulton said. "Unfortunately, while [Virtual Earth] may make the information more understandable, with the Bush administration's policies the way they are, you're still not going to get the full picture."
Jeff Ruch, executive director at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, said: "In the past few months, EPA has shut much of its library system, denying citizens effective access to information. ... This appears to be more of a gimmick than a genuine advance in environmental education of the public."
"For EPA to invest in digital mapping claiming [in a press release] that it wants to expand 'citizen-facing applications around a geospatial core with the ultimate goal of better connecting Americans with their government' is hard to take seriously," he added.
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On The Hill
Senate Backers Of Journalistic 'Shield' File New Bill
by Theresa Poulson
Senators this week introduced a bill aimed at guarding journalists who protect confidential sources from federal prosecution, reviving the push for a federal "shield" law.
The bill, S. 2035, is a modified companion to earlier Senate and House measures, S.1267 and H.R. 2102. The House Judiciary Committee approved H.R. 2102 in August.
"There has been a growing consensus that we need to establish a federal journalists' privilege to protect the integrity of the newsgathering process -- a process that depends on the free flow of information between journalists and whistleblowers, as well as other confidential sources," said bill co-sponsor Arlen Specter, R-Pa.
Co-sponsor Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., added that "our courts already protect the privacy of many forms of communication, and this balanced bill recognizes that a reporter's relationship with a source deserves substantial protection, too." Richard Lugar, R-Ind., is the third lead sponsor.
The legislation includes exceptions to the shield for criminal investigations pertaining to national security. Similar provisions were added in the House after the Bush administration expressed concerns about the broad-reaching protections under the bill.
The definition of "journalist" also was a point of contention during the House committee debate.
The new Senate measure is absent language specifically mentioning bloggers, which was present in the House Judiciary-backed bill. Instead, it defines journalism as "the regular gathering, preparing, collecting, photographing, recording, writing, editing, reporting, or publishing of news or information that concerns local, national, or international events or other matters of public interest for dissemination to the public."
The Senate bill, however, does include language specifying that all protections for journalists extend to information kept by communications providers that journalists use.
Earlier this month, the Federal Election Commission reconfirmed its decision that blogs and bloggers are classified as media under campaign finance law.
Two other new technology-related bills were filed this week.
A House measure, H.R. 3514, would authorize workshops to eliminate gender bias for women in careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. And a Senate bill, S. 2039, would require an assessment of plans to modernize the land-based Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic-missile program.
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Today's Feature:
Executive Summary
The FCC elicited praise from the cable and broadcast industries for new rules mandating the availability of television signals via cable in multiple formats beginning in early 2009
Every Friday, read the Executive Summary by K. Daniel Glover.
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E-briefs
E-Government: Federal and state laws targeting sex offenders are doing more to threaten the rights of ex-criminals than they are to protect children, according to a report released this week by Human Rights Watch. The report found that state online sex-offender registries are particularly invasive. Human Rights Watch said that poor administration of such databases by states has led to murders and suicides of several individuals listed in them. The report recommended eliminating publicly accessible databases, as well as residency restrictions and the implementation of more narrow registration rules. "Politicians didn't do their homework before enacting these sex-offender laws," Human Rights Watch said in a release. "Instead they have perpetuated myths about sex offenders and failed to deal with the complex realities of sexual violence against children."
Nanotechnology: The Semiconductor Research Corporation, a university-research consortium for semiconductors, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology announced Thursday a public-private partnership to support research and innovation in an emerging area in electronics known as nanoelectronics. "The goal is to develop a radical, yet practical, successor to the basic electronic building block in today's computers and to demonstrate its feasibility in computer circuits during the next five to 10 years," according to NIST. The agency plans to contribute $2.76 million to the partnership, which will look to replace the world's most commonly used electronic component, the complementary metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor.
Politics: Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani ran a full-page New York Timesadvertisement Friday to counter one that the netroots group MoveOn.org ran Monday under the headline "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?" Giuliani spokeswoman Maria Comella said the former New York mayor was frustrated with the "erroneous language" in the MoveOn ad and wanted to set the record straight and defend Gen. David Petraeus, who is leading the troops in Iraq and was grilled by Congress this week. Giuliani's ad also criticized Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, a Democratic rival for the presidency, for telling Petraeus in a hearing that his progress report required "the willing suspension of disbelief." Giuliani took a page out of MoveOn's playbook by showing a preview of the ad on his Web site and seeking donations to fund its cost. The RedState blog also took a poke at MoveOn with a mock ad.
Campaigns: The National Republican Congressional Committee on Friday posted the first in a series of online videos that it plans to run throughout the fall about how the party can regain its majority status in Congress.
The "Rediscovering Your Party" video series will be syndicated on the NRCC-TV site, the social networks Facebook and MySpace, and the YouTube video-sharing site. In the opening video, Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio and Minority Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri discuss the party's commitment to the war in Iraq and how important that military effort is to the country's fight against global terrorism. Reps. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Jeb Hensarling of Texas, Kevin McCarthy of California, Patrick McHenry of North Carolina, Candace Miller of Michigan and Mike Pence of Indiana also appear in the video.
Culture: User-driven news Web sites highlight more diverse stories than traditional media outlets, according to a report released this week by the Project for Excellence in Journalism. The study compared a week's worth of top news stories covered in mainstream media with those emphasized on the sites Del.icio.us, Digg, Reddit and Yahoo News' "most recommended," "most viewed" and "most e-mailed" features. The study found that the sources linked to on the user-driven news sites were more diverse and included blogs, Web sites and the YouTube video-sharing. The topics of coverage also differed. "In a week when the mainstream press was focused on Iraq and the debate over immigration, the three leading user-news sites ... were more focused on stories like the release of Apple's new iPhone," according to the summary. Top stories on the traditional media's agenda were rarely the same as those on user-driven sites, the study found.
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