Tech Policy Leaders

The London Bridge terror attacks that occurred this past weekend are causing policymakers to once again re-evaluate the efficacy of their counterterrorism efforts against ISIS.

ISIS counterterrorism expert Audrey Alexander (@aud_alexander) is a Research Fellow at The George Washington University Program on Extremism. Before joining the Program on Extremism, she worked at King's College London's International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR). At ICSR, Audrey used open source intelligence to identify instances of Western women relocating to enemy-held territories. Previously, Audrey worked at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), where she studied online radicalization and "lone-actor" terrorism. She contributed to the widely acclaimed "Till Martyrdom Do Us Part: Gender and the ISIS Phenomenon" report published by ISD and ICSR. Alexander holds a Masters in Terrorism, Security & Society from the War Studies Department at King's College.

In this episode, we discussed:

• how American institutions have tried and failed to contain the ISIS threat online.
• alternatives to current technological approaches to containing the enemy's online recruitment efforts.
• how policymakers can identify warning signs pertaining to potential activity by non-ISIS groups.

Resources:

The George Washington University Program on Extremism

Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS by Joby Warrick

Deep Work by Cal Newport

NEWS ROUNDUP

Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers partner Mary Meeker released her annual Internet Trends report last week. Key findings include a slow down in smartphone growth, to just a 3% growth in shipments last year, down from 10% the year before. There's also an uptick in voice searches, which have reached about a 95% accuracy rate. The report found voice searches to be well on their way toward replacing text-based search inquiries. Meeker's report also reveals that some 60% of the most highly valued tech companies in the U.S. were founded by first- or second-generation Americans. These findings only scratch the surface. Here's a link to the slides.

Elon Musk announced in a tweet last week that he has decided to leave president Trump's advisory councils following the president's announcement last week that he would be pulling the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement. The Agreement is a multinational accord that brings together 195 countries in a commitment to fight climate change. The U.S. joined Nicaragua and Syria among the nations that will not participate if Trump has his way. However, the earliest possible date the U.S. would be able to make an effective withdrawal from the agreement is November 4, 2020, or one day after the 2020 presidential election.

Tech giants Apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook and hundreds of other businesses have also formed an initiative dubbed "We're Still In", which was organized by Michael Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Sierra Club, and the Center for American Progress, to express their commitment to the Paris Agreement and local and state authorities whom they see as being more influential than the federal government on climate change.

The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will hear a key case regarding law enforcement's ability to obtain cell phone data without a search warrant. The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Carpenter v. U.S. upheld the district court which sentenced defendant Timothy Carpenter to some 116 years in prison for committing a string of armed robberies of TMobile and Radio Shack stores in Michigan and Ohio back in 2010 and 2011. The evidence admitted at trial against Carpenter included cell phone records showing he was in close proximity to the stores when the robberies occurred. Lydia Wheeler has the story in The Hill.

Once again, Booz Allen, the same firm that employed Edward Snowden as an NSA contractor, is the subject of a data breach. Some sixty thousand sensitive documents related to a US military project were found unsecured on on a public Amazon server. Gizmodo reports the compromised files also contained the encrypted passwords of officials with top security clearance. Dell Cameron reports at Gizmodo.

Democratic leaders in Congress have asked Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe to probe the cyberattack that FCC Chairman Ajit Pai claims caused the agency's commenting site to go down. The site went down shortly after John Oliver directed his viewers to go to site domain gofccyourself.com, which redirected to the FCC's actual commenting page. But Chairman Pai said the site went down due to an external cyber attack. Senators Brian Schatz (Hawaii), Al Franken (Minn.), Patrick Leahy (Vt.), Ed Markey(Mass.), and Ron Wyden (Ore.) want answers from the FBI by June 23rd. Morgan Chalfant has the story in The Hill.

Finally, Uber fired the former Google engineer accused of stealing secrets from Alphabet self-driving car unit Waymo and bringing them with him when he started his own self-driving car company, Otto, which Uber then acquired. Anthony Levandowski apparently became too much of a liability for Uber, which is currently embroiled in litigation Google brought against it because of Levandowski's alleged actions. Daisuke Wakabayashi and Mike Isaac report in the New York Times. Greg Bensinger at the Wall Street Journal reports that Uber also posted a $708 million loss in the first quarter. This was on top of the $991 million the company lost in the 4th quarter of 2016. Uber Head of Finance Guatam Gupta will be leaving the company in July to work for an unnamed startup.

The London Bridge terror attacks that occurred this past weekend are causing policymakers to once again re-evaluate the efficacy of their counterterrorism efforts against ISIS.

ISIS counterterrorism expert Audrey Alexander (@aud_alexander) is a Research Fellow at The George Washington University Program on Extremism. Before joining the Program on Extremism, she worked at King’s College London’s International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR). At ICSR, Audrey used open source intelligence to identify instances of Western women relocating to enemy-held territories. Previously, Audrey worked at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), where she studied online radicalization and “lone-actor” terrorism. She contributed to the widely acclaimed “Till Martyrdom Do Us Part: Gender and the ISIS Phenomenon” report published by ISD and ICSR. Alexander holds a Masters in Terrorism, Security & Society from the War Studies Department at King's College.

In this episode, we discussed:

• how American institutions have tried and failed to contain the ISIS threat online.
• alternatives to current technological approaches to containing the enemy's online recruitment efforts.
• how policymakers can identify warning signs pertaining to potential activity by non-ISIS groups.

Resources:

The George Washington University Program on Extremism

Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS by Joby Warrick

Deep Work by Cal Newport

NEWS ROUNDUP

Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers partner Mary Meeker released her annual Internet Trends report last week. Key findings include a slow down in smartphone growth, to just a 3% growth in shipments last year, down from 10% the year before. There's also an uptick in voice searches, which have reached about a 95% accuracy rate. The report found voice searches to be well on their way toward replacing text-based search inquiries. Meeker's report also reveals that some 60% of the most highly valued tech companies in the U.S. were founded by first- or second-generation Americans. These findings only scratch the surface. Here's a link to the slides.

Elon Musk announced in a tweet last week that he has decided to leave president Trump's advisory councils following the president's announcement last week that he would be pulling the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement. The Agreement is a multinational accord that brings together 195 countries in a commitment to fight climate change. The U.S. joined Nicaragua and Syria among the nations that will not participate if Trump has his way. However, the earliest possible date the U.S. would be able to make an effective withdrawal from the agreement is November 4, 2020, or one day after the 2020 presidential election.

Tech giants Apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook and hundreds of other businesses have also formed an initiative dubbed "We're Still In", which was organized by Michael Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Sierra Club, and the Center for American Progress, to express their commitment to the Paris Agreement and local and state authorities whom they see as being more influential than the federal government on climate change.

The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will hear a key case regarding law enforcement's ability to obtain cell phone data without a search warrant. The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Carpenter v. U.S. upheld the district court which sentenced defendant Timothy Carpenter to some 116 years in prison for committing a string of armed robberies of TMobile and Radio Shack stores in Michigan and Ohio back in 2010 and 2011. The evidence admitted at trial against Carpenter included cell phone records showing he was in close proximity to the stores when the robberies occurred. Lydia Wheeler has the story in The Hill.

Once again, Booz Allen, the same firm that employed Edward Snowden as an NSA contractor, is the subject of a data breach. Some sixty thousand sensitive documents related to a US military project were found unsecured on on a public Amazon server.  Gizmodo reports the compromised files also contained the encrypted passwords of officials with top security clearance. Dell Cameron reports at Gizmodo.

Democratic leaders in Congress have asked Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe to probe the cyberattack that FCC Chairman Ajit Pai claims caused the agency's commenting site to go down. The site went down shortly after John Oliver directed his viewers to go to site domain gofccyourself.com, which redirected to the FCC's actual commenting page. But Chairman Pai said the site went down due to an external cyber attack. Senators Brian Schatz (Hawaii), Al Franken (Minn.), Patrick Leahy (Vt.), Ed Markey(Mass.), and Ron Wyden (Ore.) want answers from the FBI by June 23rd. Morgan Chalfant has the story in The Hill.

Finally, Uber fired the former Google engineer accused of stealing secrets from Alphabet self-driving car unit Waymo and bringing them with him when he started his own self-driving car company, Otto, which Uber then acquired. Anthony Levandowski apparently became too much of a liability for Uber, which is currently embroiled in litigation Google brought against it because of Levandowski's alleged actions. Daisuke Wakabayashi and  Mike Isaac report in the New York Times. Greg Bensinger at the Wall Street Journal reports that Uber also posted a $708 million loss in the first quarter. This was on top of the $991 million the company lost in the 4th quarter of 2016. Uber Head of Finance Guatam Gupta will be leaving the company in July to work for an unnamed startup.

How can policymakers balance consumers' need for targeted, relevant content against such consumers' desire for privacy? Anindya Ghose (@aghose) is a Professor of Information, Operations and Management Sciences and a Professor of Marketing at New York University's Leonard N. Stern School of Business. He is the Director of the Center for Business Analytics at NYU Stern, and the co-Chair of the NYU-AIG Partnership on Innovation for Global Resilience. He is the NEC Faculty Fellow and a Daniel P. Paduano Fellow of Business Ethics at NYU Stern. He has been a Visiting Associate Professor at the Wharton School of Business. He also serves as the main Scientific Advisor to 3TI China . He was recently named by Business Week as one of the "Top 40 Professors Under 40 Worldwide" and by Analytics Week as one the "Top 200 Thought Leaders in Big Data and Business Analytics". His rise from assistant to full professor in 8.5 years at NYU Stern is widely regarded as one of the fastest in the history of the entire Information Systems and Marketing academic disciplines in business schools globally.

He has consulted in various capacities for Berkeley Corporation, CBS, Dataxu, Facebook, NBC Universal, OneVest, Samsung, and 3TI China, and collaborated with Alibaba, China Mobile, Google, IBM, Indiegogo, Microsoft, Recobell, Travelocity and many other leading Fortune 500 firms on realizing business value from IT investments, internet marketing, business analytics, mobile marketing, digital analytics, social media, and other areas. He has published more than 75 papers in premier scientific journals and peer reviewed conferences, and has given more than 200 talks internationally. He is a frequent keynote speaker in executive gatherings and thought leading events globally. His research has received 12 best paper awards and nominations. He is a winner of the NSF CAREER award and has been awarded 14 grants from Google, Microsoft and several other corporations.

His research analyzes the economic consequences of the Internet on industries and markets transformed by its shared technology infrastructure. He has worked on product reviews, reputation and rating systems, digital marketing, sponsored search advertising, wearable technologies, mobile commerce, mobile advertising, crowdfunding, and online markets. He also plays a senior advisory role to several start-ups in the Internet space. He has been interviewed and his research has been profiled numerous times in the BBC, Bloomberg TV, CNBC, China Daily, The Economist, Financial Times, Fox News, Forbes, Knowledge@Wharton, Korean Broadcasting News Company, Los Angeles Times, Marketplace Radio, MSNBC, National Public Radio, NBC, Newsweek, New York Times, New York Daily, NHK Japan Broadcasting, Reuters, Time Magazine, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Xinhua,and elsewhere. He teaches courses on social media, digital marketing, business analytics and IT strategy at the undergraduate, MBA, EMBA, MSBA, and Executive Education level in various parts of the world including the US, India, China, and South Korea.

He is on the Research Council of the Wharton Customer Analytics Institute, a faculty affiliate with the Marketing Science Institute and the Sloan Center for Internet Retailing at the University of California, Riverside. He serves as an Associate Editor of Management Science and a Senior Editor of Information Systems Research. Before joining NYU Stern, Dr. Ghose worked in GlaxoSmithKline, as a Product Manager in HCL-Hewlett Packard, and as a Senior E-Business Consultant with IBM. He has a B. Tech in Engineering from the Regional Engineering College (NIT) in Jalandhar, and an M.B.A in Finance, Marketing and Systems from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School of Business.

In this episode, we discussed:

• the 9 key forces shaping the mobile economy that entrepreneurs and policymakers alike need to know.
• the future of mobile technology as a key driver of marketing.
• how policymakers should balance privacy policy against consumers' desire for targeted and relevant content.

Resources

Tap: Unlocking the Mobile Economy by Anindya Ghose (MIT Press: 2017)

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future by Ashlee Vance (Ecco: 2017)

NEWS ROUNDUP

The Federal Communications Commission released the text of its proposal to undo the Obama-era net neutrality rules. The rules classify internet service providers as "common carriers", thus bringing ISPs within the FCC's jurisdiction. The rules also outlaw blocking, throttling and paid prioritization of site traffic.

Comments are due to the Commission by August 17th--they even seek comment on whether such rules are necessary--which, of course, the Commission settled on two years ago when it pulled together countless comments from members of the public who said, "yes--they are necessary"--So it's like we're just going around and around--net neutrality is the gift that keeps on giving--for lobbyists, that is.

President Trump released his fiscal year 2018 budget request last week, which calls for numerous cuts to entitlement programs, as well as education. However, the budget calls for $228 million to modernize the federal government's IT--or phase out clunkier technologies in favor of technologies that are more secure and efficient. That $228 million amount is significantly less than the $3.1 billion called for by the Obama administration. Billy Mitchell covers this story in FedScoop.

Apple reported last week that the federal government's requests for user data skyrocketed in the second half of 2016 to almost double what it was in the first half of the year. Apple reports on the number of requests using ranges instead of revealing the exact number of data requests. In the first half of 2016, the federal government made between 2,750 and 2,999 data requests. However, during the second half of 2016 the number of requests jumped to between 5,750 and 5,999. Joe Uchill reports in the Hill.

Private drone users will no longer need to register their drones with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). This is following a DC Circuit Court of Appeals decision to overturn the rules. The court held that the rules violated another statute that precluded the FAA from promulgating rules pertaining to model aircraft. Tim Wright covers this in Air & Space.

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the American Civil Liberties Union and Wikimedia Foundation can indeed pursue a lawsuit the two parties brought against the National Security Agency. They argue that the NSA violated Wikimedia's First and Fourth Amendment rights when the agency tapped into Wikimedia's backbone network because Wikimedia has such a large footprint, tapping into just a part of it can have constitutional implications. Adi Robertson has the story in The Verge.

Finally, big box retailer Target has settled with 47 states in connection with a widespread data breach in 2015 in which hackers obtained the credit card information of millions of customers. The settlement amount was $18.5 million and is being distributed based on each state's size.Wyoming, Wisconsin and Alabama don't appear to be part of the settlement. The terms of the settlement also require Target to separate cardholder data from the rest of its computer network, as well as undergo an independent assessment of its data security practices. Rachel Abrams has the story in The New York Times.

How can policymakers balance consumers' need for targeted, relevant content against such consumers' desire for privacy? Anindya Ghose (@aghose) is a Professor of Information, Operations and Management Sciences and a Professor of Marketing at New York University's Leonard N. Stern School of Business. He is the Director of the Center for Business Analytics at NYU Stern, and the co-Chair of the NYU-AIG Partnership on Innovation for Global Resilience. He is the NEC Faculty Fellow and a Daniel P. Paduano Fellow of Business Ethics at NYU Stern. He has been a Visiting Associate Professor at the Wharton School of Business. He also serves as the main Scientific Advisor to 3TI China . He was recently named by Business Week as one of the "Top 40 Professors Under 40 Worldwide" and by Analytics Week as one the "Top 200 Thought Leaders in Big Data and Business Analytics". His rise from assistant to full professor in 8.5 years at NYU Stern is widely regarded as one of the fastest in the history of the entire Information Systems and Marketing academic disciplines in business schools globally.

He has consulted in various capacities for Berkeley Corporation, CBS, Dataxu, Facebook, NBC Universal, OneVest, Samsung, and 3TI China, and collaborated with Alibaba, China Mobile, Google, IBM, Indiegogo, Microsoft, Recobell, Travelocity and many other leading Fortune 500 firms on realizing business value from IT investments, internet marketing, business analytics, mobile marketing, digital analytics, social media, and other areas. He has published more than 75 papers in premier scientific journals and peer reviewed conferences, and has given more than 200 talks internationally. He is a frequent keynote speaker in executive gatherings and thought leading events globally. His research has received 12 best paper awards and nominations. He is a winner of the NSF CAREER award and has been awarded 14 grants from Google, Microsoft and several other corporations.

His research analyzes the economic consequences of the Internet on industries and markets transformed by its shared technology infrastructure. He has worked on product reviews, reputation and rating systems, digital marketing, sponsored search advertising, wearable technologies, mobile commerce, mobile advertising, crowdfunding, and online markets. He also plays a senior advisory role to several start-ups in the Internet space. He has been interviewed and his research has been profiled numerous times in the BBC, Bloomberg TV, CNBC, China Daily, The Economist, Financial Times, Fox News, Forbes, Knowledge@Wharton, Korean Broadcasting News Company, Los Angeles Times, Marketplace Radio, MSNBC, National Public Radio, NBC, Newsweek, New York Times, New York Daily, NHK Japan Broadcasting, Reuters, Time Magazine, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Xinhua,and elsewhere. He teaches courses on social media, digital marketing, business analytics and IT strategy at the undergraduate, MBA, EMBA, MSBA, and Executive Education level in various parts of the world including the US, India, China, and South Korea.

He is on the Research Council of the Wharton Customer Analytics Institute, a faculty affiliate with the Marketing Science Institute and the Sloan Center for Internet Retailing at the University of California, Riverside. He serves as an Associate Editor of Management Science and a Senior Editor of Information Systems Research. Before joining NYU Stern, Dr. Ghose worked in GlaxoSmithKline, as a Product Manager in HCL-Hewlett Packard, and as a Senior E-Business Consultant with IBM. He has a B. Tech in Engineering from the Regional Engineering College (NIT) in Jalandhar, and an M.B.A in Finance, Marketing and Systems from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University's Tepper School of Business.

In this episode, we discussed:

• the 9 key forces shaping the mobile economy that entrepreneurs and policymakers alike need to know.
• the future of mobile technology as a key driver of marketing.
• how policymakers should balance privacy policy against consumers' desire for targeted and relevant content.

Resources

Tap: Unlocking the Mobile Economy by Anindya Ghose (MIT Press: 2017)

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future by Ashlee Vance (Ecco: 2017)

 

NEWS ROUNDUP

The Federal Communications Commission released the text of its proposal to undo the Obama-era net neutrality rules. The rules classify internet service providers as "common carriers", thus bringing ISPs within the FCC's jurisdiction. The rules also outlaw blocking, throttling and paid prioritization of site traffic.

Comments are due to the Commission by August 17th--they even seek comment on whether such rules are necessary--which, of course, the Commission settled on two years ago when it pulled together countless comments from members of the public who said, "yes--they are necessary"--So it's like we're just going around and around--net neutrality is the gift that keeps on giving--for lobbyists, that is.

President Trump released his fiscal year 2018 budget request last week, which calls for numerous cuts to entitlement programs, as well as education. However, the budget calls for $228 million to modernize the federal government's IT--or phase out clunkier technologies in favor of technologies that are more secure and efficient. That $228 million amount is significantly less than the $3.1 billion called for by the Obama administration. Billy Mitchell covers this story in FedScoop.

Apple reported last week that the federal government's requests for user data skyrocketed in the second half of 2016 to almost double what it was in the first half of the year. Apple reports on the number of requests using ranges instead of revealing the exact number of data requests.  In the first half of 2016, the federal government made between 2,750 and 2,999 data requests. However, during the second half of 2016 the number of requests jumped to between 5,750 and 5,999. Joe Uchill reports in the Hill.

Private drone users will no longer need to register their drones with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). This is following a DC Circuit Court of Appeals decision to overturn the rules. The court held that the rules violated another statute that precluded the FAA from promulgating rules pertaining to model aircraft. Tim Wright covers this in Air & Space.

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the American Civil Liberties Union and Wikimedia Foundation can indeed pursue a lawsuit the two parties brought against the National Security Agency. They argue that the NSA violated Wikimedia's First and Fourth Amendment rights when the agency tapped into Wikimedia's backbone network because Wikimedia has such a large footprint, tapping into just a part of it can have constitutional implications. Adi Robertson has the story in The Verge.

Finally, big box retailer Target has settled with 47 states in connection with a widespread data breach in 2015 in which hackers obtained the credit card information of millions of customers. The settlement amount was $18.5 million and is being distributed based on each state's size.Wyoming, Wisconsin and Alabama don't appear to be part of the settlement.  The terms of the settlement also require Target to separate cardholder data from the rest of its computer network, as well as undergo an independent assessment of its data security practices.  Rachel Abrams has the story in The New York Times.

Yosef Getachew (@getachew2) is a Policy Fellow at Public Knowledge where he works on a variety of technology and communications issues. Prior to joining Public Knowledge, Yosef worked as a law clerk for several technology and communications organizations including the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast, Facebook, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Yosef has also served as a Project Coordinator and Research Assistant for the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

Yosef received his J.D. from the George Washington University Law School. In law school, he was an Articles Editor for the Federal Communications Law Journal. Yosef was born and raised in Washington D.C. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, watching basketball, and spending time with friends.

In this episode, we discussed:

• what 5G is and what it will mean for consumers.
• the potential of 5G for job creation, particularly for communities with disproportionately high unemployment rates.
• how to ensure underserved communities have access to 5G technology when it is deployed.

Resources

Public Knowledge

Federal Trade Commission Privacy Law & Policy by Chris Jay Hoofnagle

NEWS ROUNDUP

The Republican-controlled FCC -- which is, by the way, still sitting with only 3 of its 5 Commission seats filled -- moved to roll back the Obama-era net neutrality rules last week. The new NPRM released Thursday is ostensibly designed to solicit comments it will actually be considering. But policy experts see this as just an administrative formality FCC Chair Ajit Pai needs to adhere to before doing what he has already made clear he is going to do anyway: eviscerate the net neutrality rules. FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, a Democrat, called the NPRM a "political rush job". Mariam Baksh has additional coverage in Morning Consult.

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that plaintiffs can no longer "forum shop" -- a practice by which plaintiffs look to pursue their case in a venue that will be most favorable to them -- which, for patent trolls, is a jurisdiction like the Eastern District of Texas which often rules in favor of patent trolls. In TC Heartland v. Kraft, the decision the Supreme Court reversed on Monday, the lower court had ruled that plaintiffs could bring a lawsuit anywhere the companies conduct business. Now, as a result of the Supreme Court's reversal of the lower court's decision, the standard will now limit plaintiffs to bringing suit where the company is incorporated. The outcome of this case has significant implications for so-called patent trolls that bring often frivolous lawsuits against companies for violating patents they hold but don't use to produce anything--they just profit from suing companies that violate them. Ali Breland covers this for the Hill.

Tennessee Republican Representative Marsha Blackburn introduced a bill Friday that would require both broadband providers as well as internet companies to obtain consent from consumers before selling their internet data. In a set of FCC privacy rules President Trump nullified last month, only broadband providers were required to obtain such consent. Ali Breland has this story as well in the Hill.

Last week, Democratic members of the House Science committee wrote a letter to president Trump urging him to appoint a Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). The lawmakers weighted in after Politico published an article revealing the fact that Trump's staffers occasionally pass fake science news to the president to sway him on certain issues -- it's all part of these little games they like to play jockeying for position within the White House. "We are concerned about the process by which you receive information," the letter begins. "Disseminating stories from dubious sources has been a recurring issue with your administration ... Until the OSTP is adequately staffed and the director position filled by a qualified, objective scientist who understands the difference between alternative news peddled on alt-right websites and legitimate well-vetted scientific facts, we fear that you will continue to be vulnerable to misinformation and fake news." Next.gov has the full story.

Congress has responded to the recent ransomware attack that affected computers around the world with a new bill that would require the federal government to report security flaws much sooner so that companies like Microsoft will have a chance to fix them before they are exploited. Jeremy Kirk outlines the the bipartisan PATCH Act at Bankinfosecurity.com.

Finally, The European Union has slapped Facebook with a $122 million fine over the social media company's purchase of WhatsApp. Back in 2014, Facebook indicated in its filing that it wouldn't be able to reliably link WhatsApp and Facebook accounts--and then last year it did just that. So the European Commission cried foul. Ali Breland reports in the Hill.

Yosef Getachew (@getachew2) is a Policy Fellow at Public Knowledge where he works on a variety of technology and communications issues. Prior to joining Public Knowledge, Yosef worked as a law clerk for several technology and communications organizations including the Federal Communications Commission, Comcast, Facebook, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Yosef has also served as a Project Coordinator and Research Assistant for the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

Yosef received his J.D. from the George Washington University Law School. In law school, he was an Articles Editor for the Federal Communications Law Journal. Yosef was born and raised in Washington D.C. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, watching basketball, and spending time with friends.

In this episode, we discussed:

• what 5G is and what it will mean for consumers.
• the potential of 5G for job creation, particularly for communities with disproportionately high unemployment rates.
• how to ensure underserved communities have access to 5G technology when it is deployed.

Resources

Public Knowledge

Federal Trade Commission Privacy Law & Policy by Chris Jay Hoofnagle

NEWS ROUNDUP

The Republican-controlled FCC -- which is, by the way, still sitting with only 3 of its 5 Commission seats filled -- moved to roll back the Obama-era net neutrality rules last week. The new NPRM released Thursday is ostensibly designed to solicit comments it will actually be considering. But policy experts see this as just an administrative formality FCC Chair Ajit Pai needs to adhere to before doing what he has already made clear he is going to do anyway: eviscerate the net neutrality rules. FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, a Democrat, called the NPRM a "political rush job". Mariam Baksh has additional coverage in Morning Consult. 

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that plaintiffs can no longer "forum shop" -- a practice by which plaintiffs look to pursue their case in a venue that will be most favorable to them -- which, for patent trolls, is a jurisdiction like the Eastern District of Texas which often rules in favor of patent trolls. In TC Heartland v. Kraft, the decision the Supreme Court reversed on Monday, the lower court had ruled that plaintiffs could bring a lawsuit anywhere the companies conduct business. Now, as a result of the Supreme Court's reversal of the lower court's decision, the standard will now limit plaintiffs to bringing suit where the company is incorporated. The outcome of this case has significant implications for so-called patent trolls that bring often frivolous lawsuits against companies for violating patents they hold but don't use to produce anything--they just profit from suing companies that violate them. Ali Breland covers this for the Hill.

Tennessee Republican Representative Marsha Blackburn introduced a bill Friday that would require both broadband providers as well as internet companies to obtain consent from consumers before selling their internet data. In a set of FCC privacy rules President Trump nullified last month, only broadband providers were required to obtain such consent. Ali Breland has this story as well in the Hill.

Last week, Democratic members of the House Science committee wrote a letter to president Trump urging him to appoint a Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). The lawmakers weighted in after Politico published an article revealing the fact that Trump's staffers occasionally pass fake science news to the president to sway him on certain issues -- it's all part of these little games they like to play jockeying for position within the White House. "We are concerned about the process by which you receive information," the letter begins. "Disseminating stories from dubious sources has been a recurring issue with your administration ... Until the OSTP is adequately staffed and the director position filled by a qualified, objective scientist who understands the difference between alternative news peddled on alt-right websites and legitimate well-vetted scientific facts, we fear that you will continue to be vulnerable to misinformation and fake news." Next.gov has the full story.

Congress has responded to the recent ransomware attack that affected computers around the world with a new bill that would require the federal government to report security flaws much sooner so that companies like Microsoft will have a chance to fix them before they are exploited.  Jeremy Kirk outlines the the bipartisan PATCH Act at Bankinfosecurity.com.

Finally, The European Union has slapped Facebook with a $122 million fine over the social media company's purchase of WhatsApp. Back in 2014, Facebook indicated  in its filing that it wouldn't be able to reliably link WhatsApp and Facebook accounts--and then last year it did just that. So the European Commission cried foul. Ali Breland reports in the Hill.

Matt Cagle is a Policy Attorney for Technology and Civil Liberties at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Matt attended law school at Stanford and has a BA in Latin American Studies and Political Science from the University of Arizona. Before joining the ACLU as a Policy Attorney, Matt worked as an associate with BlurryEdge Strategies, a San Francisco-based law practice advising startups on privacy issues.

In this episode, we discussed:

• how the police use social media to track American citizens.

Resources:

ACLU of Northern California

The Philipp K. Dick Collection by Phillip K. Dick

NEWS ROUNDUP

A massive hack infected hundreds of thousands Microsoft Windows-based computers, disabling several large hospitals in the UK, requiring them to turn away some patients, as well as Fedex, Telefonica, and several other institutions. The ransomware, which is a program called "WannaCry", encrypts files so users can't access them and then demands payment, in the form of the digital currency known as Bitcoin, from victims to decrypt their files. WannaCry spread around the world beginning on Friday, although it did so to a lesser degree in other countries than it was felt in the UK. An engineer that goes by the screen name "Malware Tech" found a kill switch in the ransomware. The ransomware relies on infected computers not being able to access a particular domain name. Since the domain name wasn't registered, no computers could access it. Therefore Malware simply registered the domain, stopping it from spreading to additional computers.

The U.S. was barely affected by the cyberattack, but researchers are on the lookout for copycats. Microsoft issued a statement saying the cyberattack should be a wake up call for governments as the hack was executed using stolen government data. U.S. Cyber Command head Admiral Mike Rodgers told the Senate Armed Services Committee just last Tuesday that Congress needed to provide clearer guidance as to how his agency should fight cyberattacks. Rogers also told the Senate panel that his agency witnessed Russian intrusions into French systems in the midst of the French election last week. On Thursday, President Trump had signed an executive order authorizing a sweeping review of all federal agencies to identify the holes that hackers have been exploiting. The ransomware hack happened on Friday.

The Hill reports the ransomware attack has made the perpetrators over $57,000 worth of bitcoins thus far.

A federal judge on Monday of this week ordered Uber to turn over some 14,000 documents to Waymo--the self-driving company owned by Google--which Waymo says were stolen by a former Google engineer by the name of Anthony Levandowski. The Waymo lawsuit alleges that Levandowski left Google to start a self-driving truck company called Otto, taking the documents with him. Then Uber subsequently acquired Otto, taking the documents with it. Waymo also announced a new collaboration with Lyft on Monday of this week. Ali Breland has the story in The Hill.

Finally, A number of policymakers are concerned about the ways in which Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) might begin to surveil immigrants or develop a database to track immigrants for deportation. But in an exclusive report for NPR, George Joseph outlined specific ways in which ICE is already using databases maintained by local law enforcement to accomplish the same ends.

Remember last week's John Oliver bit criticizing FCC Chairman Ajit Pai's plan to scale back the net neutrality rules? The one where Oliver urged viewers to go to a site the show created called gofccyourself.com, which redirected to the FCC's comments section, and then the comments section crashed? Well the incident left FCC Chairman Pai scrambling to contain his agency's embarrassment, and there was some confusion as to whether the site crashed because of the influx of comments provoked by the show, or by some kind of contemporaneous hack designed to prevent comments from being submitted. Well, the FCC maintains that it was indeed a hack and that the crash wasn't caused by John Oliver's segment. Democrats are saying, "yeah right"-- Senators Ron Wyden and Brian Schatz wrote Chairman Pai saying cyberattacks are a very serious matter and urging the agency to turn over any evidence of a cyberattack happening a few minutes after Oliver's segment. No word yet. But Oliver again this past Sunday rallied his viewers to submit comments. Harper Neidig has more in The Hill.

Matt Cagle is a Policy Attorney for Technology and Civil Liberties at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Matt attended law school at Stanford and has a BA in Latin American Studies and Political Science from the University of Arizona. Before joining the ACLU as a Policy Attorney, Matt worked as an associate with BlurryEdge Strategies, a San Francisco-based law practice advising startups on privacy issues.

In this episode, we discussed:

• how the police use social media to track American citizens. 

Resources:

ACLU of Northern California

The Philipp K. Dick Collection by Phillip K. Dick

 

NEWS ROUNDUP

A massive hack infected hundreds of thousands Microsoft Windows-based computers, disabling several large hospitals in the UK, requiring them to turn away some patients, as well as Fedex, Telefonica, and several other institutions. The ransomware, which is a program called "WannaCry", encrypts files so users can't access them and then demands payment, in the form of the digital currency known as Bitcoin, from victims to decrypt their files. WannaCry spread around the world beginning on Friday, although it did so to a lesser degree in other countries than it was felt in the UK. An engineer that goes by the screen name "Malware Tech" found a kill switch in the ransomware. The ransomware relies on infected computers not being able to access a particular domain name. Since the domain name wasn't registered, no computers could access it. Therefore Malware simply registered the domain, stopping it from spreading to additional computers.

The U.S. was barely affected by the cyberattack, but researchers are on the lookout for copycats. Microsoft issued a statement saying the cyberattack should be a wake up call for governments as the hack was executed using stolen government data. U.S. Cyber Command head Admiral Mike Rodgers told the Senate Armed Services Committee just last Tuesday that Congress needed to provide clearer guidance as to how his agency should fight cyberattacks. Rogers also told the Senate panel that his agency witnessed Russian intrusions into French systems in the midst of the French election last week.  On Thursday, President Trump had signed an executive order authorizing a sweeping review of all federal agencies to identify the holes that hackers have been exploiting. The ransomware hack happened on Friday.  

The Hill reports the ransomware attack has made the perpetrators over $57,000 worth of bitcoins thus far.

A federal judge on Monday of this week ordered Uber to turn over some 14,000 documents to Waymo--the self-driving company owned by Google--which Waymo says were stolen by a former Google engineer by the name of Anthony Levandowski. The Waymo lawsuit alleges that Levandowski left Google to start a self-driving truck company called Otto, taking the documents with him. Then Uber subsequently acquired Otto, taking the documents with it.  Waymo also announced a new collaboration with Lyft on Monday of this week. Ali Breland has the story in The Hill.

Finally, A number of policymakers are concerned about the ways in which Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) might begin to surveil immigrants or develop a database to track immigrants for deportation. But in an exclusive report for NPR, George Joseph outlined specific ways in which ICE is already using databases maintained by local law enforcement to accomplish the same ends. 

Remember last week's John Oliver bit criticizing FCC Chairman Ajit Pai's plan to scale back the net neutrality rules? The one where Oliver urged viewers to go to a site the show created called gofccyourself.com, which redirected to the FCC's comments section, and then the comments section crashed? Well the incident left FCC Chairman Pai scrambling to contain his agency's embarrassment, and there was some confusion as to whether the site crashed because of the influx of comments provoked by the show, or by some kind of contemporaneous hack designed to prevent comments from being submitted. Well, the FCC maintains that it was indeed a hack and that the crash wasn't caused by John Oliver's segment. Democrats are saying, "yeah right"-- Senators Ron Wyden and Brian Schatz wrote Chairman Pai saying cyberattacks are a very serious matter and urging the agency to turn over any evidence of a cyberattack happening a few minutes after Oliver's segment. No word yet. But Oliver again this past Sunday rallied his viewers to submit comments.  Harper Neidig has more in The Hill.

Shayna Cook (cook_shayna) is a policy analyst with the Education Policy program at New America. She is a member of the Learning Technologies project.

Shayna researches and reports on innovation, new technologies, and digital equity issues concerning children from birth through third grade. She is a former teacher who graduated from American University with a master's degree in education, focusing on policy and leadership. She holds a bachelor's degree in classics from Howard University.

In this episode, we discussed:

• how states can use federal funding to promote family engagement.
• how schools can more effectively incorporate technology to promote family engagement.
• how to evaluate engagement programs to determine how they improve learning outcomes.

Resources:

New America's Education Policy Program

New Guidance on Using the Every Student Succeeds Act to Support Early Learning by Shayna Cook (New America, 2016)

Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy by Tressie McMillan Cottom

NEWS ROUNDUP

Sinclair is acquiring Tribune broadcasting, the companies announced on Monday, for a cool $3.9 billion. Tribune owns 42 tv stations in 33 markets, WGN, digital multicast network Antenna TV, minority stakes in the TV Food Network and CareerBuilder, and a variety of real estate assets, according to the companies' press release. Even after the Republican controlled FCC threw it a bone at its last open meeting by reinstating the UHF discount, which lets broadcasters half the size of the audience their UHF stations reach, thereby enabling broadcast companies to own more stations, Sinclair may still need to divest some its stations to fall under the 39 percent cap on the national audience. Sinclair is Chaired by David Smith--a key supporter of Donald Trump.

----

President Trump signed an executive order establishing a new American Technology Council which will be tasked with coming up with ways to transform and modernize the federal government. It's not clear yet which companies will participate, but Tony Romm at Recode notes that Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft have huddled with the administration in the past. Mike Allen at Axios reported the creation of the Council was spearheaded by Trump advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner and that the council will hold a summit in June to map out a plan for the duration of the Trump administration.

Two lawmakers also created a bi-partisan Digital Trade Caucus last week which is aimed at protecting cross-border digital trade from protectionism. Minnesota Republican Erik Paulsen and Washington Democrat Suzan DelBene made the announcement last week.

The Department of Justice has announced a criminal investigation into Uber. The New York Times reported in March that the company was using a software called Greyball to circumvent local authorities in areas where Uber hasn't been approved yet. Now a grand jury in Northern California has subpoenaed documents from Uber related to the matter. Dan Levine has the story in Reuters.

The State Department wants to intensify its scrutiny of visa applicants. The agency published a document last week, in line with the Trump administration's efforts to subject visa applicants to "extreme vetting", which outlines plans to require visa applicants to provide five years worth of their social media handles, phone numbers and email addresses. The public will have a chance to comment on the new proposed rules until May 18th. Yaganeh Torbati and Mica Rosenberg report in Reuters.

The reined-in National Security Agency still collected 151 million phone records in 2016. Charlie Savage reports in the New York Times that the NSA previously collected billions of phone records per day, according to a transparency report released last week.

The Department of Homeland Security warned of an emerging espionage campaign led by Chinese hackers. The hacker group APT10 or MenuPass group has targeted construction, aerospace, engineering and telecom companies in the past, but security analysts are now saying they found evidence that the group could now be working in tandem with the Chinese government to collect military secrets from the United States. Chris Bing has the story in CyberScoop.

Elon Musk's SpaceX boosted a classified U.S. Spy Satellite into orbit on Monday May 1st at 7:14AM. The payload is a National Reconnaissance Office satellite. SpaceX is trying to ramp up its commercial space flight program following an explosion last September that halted it. However, last week's launch was SpaceX's 4th successful launch since January, and it was flawless. Andy Pasztor reports in the Wall Street Journal.

Finally, a report by an engineer at Facebook found the company rejects code submitted by female engineers at a rate that is 35% higher than their male counterparts. Facebook's most recent diversity report shows women comprise just 17% of Facebook's technical workforce. Deepa Seetharaman reports in the Wall Street Journal.

Shayna Cook (cook_shayna) is a policy analyst with the Education Policy program at New America. She is a member of the Learning Technologies project.

Shayna researches and reports on innovation, new technologies, and digital equity issues concerning children from birth through third grade. She is a former teacher who graduated from American University with a master’s degree in education, focusing on policy and leadership. She holds a bachelor’s degree in classics from Howard University.

In this episode, we discussed:

• how states can use federal funding to promote family engagement.
• how schools can more effectively incorporate technology to promote family engagement.
• how to evaluate engagement programs to determine how they improve learning outcomes.

Resources:

New America's Education Policy Program

New Guidance on Using the Every Student Succeeds Act to Support Early Learning by Shayna Cook (New America, 2016)

Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy by Tressie McMillan Cottom

NEWS ROUNDUP

Sinclair is acquiring Tribune broadcasting, the companies announced on Monday, for a cool $3.9 billion. Tribune owns 42 tv stations in 33 markets, WGN, digital multicast network Antenna TV, minority stakes in the TV Food Network and CareerBuilder, and a variety of real estate assets, according to the companies' press release. Even after the Republican controlled FCC threw it a bone at its last open meeting by reinstating the UHF discount, which lets broadcasters half the size of the audience their UHF stations reach, thereby enabling broadcast companies to own more stations, Sinclair may still need to divest some its stations to fall under the 39 percent cap on the national audience. Sinclair is Chaired by David Smith--a key supporter of Donald Trump.

----

President Trump signed an executive order establishing a new American Technology Council which will be tasked with coming up with ways to transform and modernize the federal government. It's not clear yet which companies will participate, but Tony Romm at Recode notes that Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft have huddled with the administration in the past.  Mike Allen at Axios reported the creation of the Council was spearheaded by Trump advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner and that the council will hold a summit in June to map out a plan for the duration of the Trump administration.

Two lawmakers also created a bi-partisan Digital Trade Caucus last week which is aimed at protecting cross-border digital trade from protectionism. Minnesota Republican Erik Paulsen and Washington Democrat Suzan DelBene made the announcement last week.

The Department of Justice has announced a criminal investigation into Uber.  The New York Times reported in March that the company was using a software called Greyball to circumvent local authorities in areas where Uber hasn't been approved yet. Now a grand jury in Northern California has subpoenaed documents from Uber related to the matter. Dan Levine has the story in Reuters.

The State Department wants to intensify its scrutiny of visa applicants. The agency published a document last week, in line with the Trump administration's efforts to subject visa applicants to "extreme vetting", which outlines plans to require visa applicants to provide five years worth of their social media handles, phone numbers and email addresses. The public will have a chance to comment on the new proposed rules until May 18th. Yaganeh Torbati and Mica Rosenberg report in Reuters.

The reined-in National Security Agency still collected 151 million phone records in 2016. Charlie Savage reports in the New York Times that the NSA previously collected billions of phone records per day, according to a transparency report released last week.

The Department of Homeland Security warned of an emerging espionage campaign led by Chinese hackers. The hacker group APT10 or MenuPass group has targeted construction, aerospace, engineering and telecom companies in the past, but security analysts are now saying they found evidence that the group could now be working in tandem with the Chinese government to collect military secrets from the United States.  Chris Bing has the story in CyberScoop.

Elon Musk's SpaceX boosted a classified U.S. Spy Satellite into orbit on Monday May 1st at 7:14AM. The payload is a National Reconnaissance Office satellite. SpaceX is trying to ramp up its commercial space flight program following an explosion last September that halted it. However, last week's launch was SpaceX's 4th successful launch since January, and it was flawless. Andy Pasztor reports in the Wall Street Journal.

Finally, a report by an engineer at Facebook found the company rejects code submitted by female engineers at a rate that is 35% higher than their male counterparts. Facebook's most recent diversity report shows women comprise just 17% of Facebook's technical workforce. Deepa Seetharaman reports in the Wall Street Journal.