This Bill Could Stop Protectionist State Broadband Laws, But ISP Control Over Congress Means It Won't Pass

from the get-the-hell-out-of-the-way dept

We've noted for years that one way incumbent broadband providers protect their duopoly kingdoms is by quite literally buying state laws that protect the status quo. These laws, passed in roughly twenty different states, prevent towns and cities from building their own broadband networks or in some instances from partnering with a private company like Google Fiber. Usually misleadingly presented by incumbent lobbyists and lawmakers as grounded in altruistic concern for taxpayer welfare, the laws are little more than pure protectionism designed to maintain the current level of broadband dysfunction -- for financial gain.

Earlier this year, the FCC tried to use its Congressional mandate under the Communications Act to eliminate the restrictive portions of these laws in two states. But the FCC's effort was shot down as an overreach by the courts earlier this month, and the FCC has stated it has no intention of continuing the fight. That leaves the hope of ending these protectionist laws either in the hands of voters (most of whom don't have the slightest idea what's happening) or Congress (most of whom don't want the telecom campaign contributions to stop flowing).

Undaunted, Representative Anna Eshoo this week introduced the Community Broadband Act of 2016 in the House, which is intended to be a companion bill to the existing bill of the same name already introduced in the Senate by Senators Cory Booker and Ron Wyden. Both bills would ban states from passing any law that prohibits a city, municipality or public utility from providing "advanced telecommunications capabilities" to state communities. In a statement, Eshoo expressed her displeasure at the ongoing efforts to thwart alternative broadband options:

"I’m disappointed that a recent court ruling blocked the FCC’s efforts to allow local communities to decide for themselves how best to ensure that their residents have broadband access,” Eshoo said. “This legislation clears the way for local communities to make their own decisions instead of powerful special interests in state capitals."

"Rather than restricting local communities in need of broadband, we should be empowering them to make the decisions they determine are in the best interests of their constituents. Too many Americans still lack access to quality, affordable broadband and community broadband projects are an important way to bring this critical service to more citizens."

Which is all true, though both bills have virtually no chance at passing. Incumbent ISPs have been very successful in paying lawmakers to argue that any attempt to eliminate these protectionist laws is an "assault on states' rights," as argued by the likes of Marsha Blackburn. Of absolutely no concern to these critics is the fact that large companies are writing and buying the passage of state laws that ensure many states remain broadband backwaters solely to protect incumbent ISP revenues.

On the bright side, the rise of alternative (though limited) options like Google Fiber -- and the FCC's fight -- have shined a very bright spotlight on a practice that has been ongoing for fifteen years with little to no public and press attention. As such, ISPs (and the politicians that love them) are having a much harder time than ever convincing locals that laws keeping them on expensive, sluggish broadband are in their collective best self-interest.

Filed Under: competition, congress, fcc, municipal broadband

With Both Presidential Candidates Claiming To Be Against The TPP, President Obama Kicks Off Campaign To Ratify It

from the so-that'll-be-interesting dept

Even as the candidate that President Obama is supporting, Hillary Clinton, has been increasingly insisting that she really (no, really) is against the TPP (despite being for it prior to this campaign) -- and even as Donald Trump has been vehemently against it, despite trade agreements usually getting strong support from the GOP -- President Obama is making a big push to get the TPP ratified by Congress. It needs a majority vote in both houses of Congress to be ratified in the US. Last week, we noted the weird situation where everyone's position on the agreement appeared to be wishy-washy, though mostly for all the wrong reasons.

But that's not stopping Obama from having his cabinet make a big push to get it approved by Congress:

Among those who will hit the road will be Secretary of State John F. Kerry; Secretary of Defense Ashton B. Carter; retired Admiral Michael G. Mullen, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Presidents George W. Bush and Obama; Admiral Harry B. Harris Jr., commander of the United States Pacific Command; and William Cohen, a former Republican senator and defense secretary under President Bill Clinton.

Of course, everyone knows that it won't be voted on until after the election.

Although the administration’s push will begin in September, no vote on the accord will occur before the election. Just as the White House and congressional Republican leaders mostly agree on the economic benefits of trade, they have parallel political interests in delaying debate.

Republicans do not want to provoke attacks from their presidential nominee, Donald J. Trump, who called the trade accord “a rape of our country,” or hurt other Republican candidates. Mr. Obama does not want to make trouble for the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, who has struggled to persuade voters of her sincerity in switching from support of the pact to opposition. This month, during an economic address in Michigan, she declared, “I oppose it now, I’ll oppose it after the election and I’ll oppose it as president.”

But, of course, that seems like it could also make a so-called "lame duck" vote pretty damn awkward as well. Yes, after the charade of the election is over, perhaps politicians will revert to their previous positions supporting the deal, but even at their most cynical, it seems a bit crass to do so right after the election. It would just underscore how absolutely full of shit they were during the campaign season. Maybe that doesn't have political consequences... but it should.

Filed Under: barack obama, congress, donald trump, hillary clinton, tpp, trade agreements

Botnet Bill Could Give FBI Permission To Take Warrantless Peeks At The Contents Of People's Computers

from the mind-if-we-take-a-look-around,-they-asked-never dept

In a recent ruling in a child porn investigation case, a judge declared that the FBI's Network Investigative Technique (NIT) -- which sent identifying user info from the suspect's computer to the FBI -- was the equivalent of a passing cop peering through broken blinds into a house.

[I]n Minnesota v. Carter, the Supreme Court considered whether a police officer who peered through a gap in a home's closed blinds conducted a search in violation of the Fourth Amendment. 525 U.S. 83, 85 (1998). Although the Court did not reach this question, id at 91, Justice Breyer in concurrence determined that the officer's observation did not violate the respondents' Fourth Amendment rights. Id at 103 (Breyer, J., concurring). Justice Breyer noted that the "precautions that the apartment's dwellers took to maintain their privacy would have failed in respect to an ordinary passerby standing" where the police officer stood.

What would normally be awarded an expectation of privacy under the Fourth Amendment becomes subject to the "plain view" warrant exception. If a passerby could see into the house via the broken blinds, there's nothing to prevent law enforcement from enjoying the same view -- and acting on it with a warrantless search.

Of course, in this analogy, the NIT -- sent from an FBI-controlled server to unsuspecting users' computers -- is the equivalent of a law enforcement officer first entering the house to break the blinds and then claiming he saw something through the busted slats.

The DOJ may be headed into the business of breaking blinds in bulk. Innocuous-sounding legislation that would allow the FBI to shut down botnets contains some serious privacy implications.

Senators Whitehouse (D-RI), Graham (R-SC), and Blumenthal (D-CT) introduced the Botnet Prevention Act in May, which (among other things) amends the portion of federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1345) that authorizes these injunctions. The bill would expand § 1345 by adding violations of a section of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (“CFAA”) that covers botnets (and more) to the list of offenses that trigger the DOJ’s ability to get an injunction.

More specifically, it would allow injunctions in all violations or attempted violations of subsection (a)(5) of the CFAA that result or could result in damage to 100 or more computers in a year, including any case involving the “impair[ment of] the availability or integrity of the protected computers without authorization,” or the “install[ation] or maintain[nance of] control over malicious software on the protected computers” that “caused or would cause damage” to the protected computers.

It only sounds like a good idea: the government riding to the rescue of unaware computer users whose devices have been pressed into service by malware purveyors and criminals. But, as Gabe Rottman of CDT points out, there's some vague wording in the existing law that would undercut important Fourth Amendment protections when used in conjunction with the DOJ's botnet-fighting powers.

Buried deep within § 1345(b) is a single phrase that could open up a number of thorny issues when this injunctive authority is applied to botnets. The section not only allows the government to obtain a restraining order that stops someone from doing something nefarious, but also an order that directs someone to “take such other action, as is warranted to prevent a continuing and substantial injury . . . .”'

Rottman points to the FBI's 2011 shutdown of the Coreflood botnet. After obtaining a restraining order under the federal rule, the FBI used its own server to issue commands to infected computers, halting further spread of the malware and shutting down the software on infected host devices. Again, this seems like a good use of the government's resources until you take a closer look at what's actually happening when the FBI does this sort of thing.

The court hearing the Coreflood case accepted the government’s argument that the “community caretaker” doctrine allowed the transmission of the shutdown order, as the action was “totally divorced from the detection, investigation, or acquisition of evidence relating to the violation of a criminal statute.” At the time, the government likened its actions to a police officer who, while responding to a break-in, finds the door to a house open or ajar and then closes it to secure the premises.

The "community caretaker" function is one exception to warrant requirements. Accessing peoples' computers without their permission under these auspices allows the FBI to avail itself of a second warrant exception.

In order to scrub private computers for malware, the government would, by necessity, have to search the computer and its contents for the malware. Once the door is ajar, rather than closing it, the police would actually “walk in” to the computer. And anything they find in “plain view” can be used as evidence of a crime. Nothing in the current version of the bill would prevent such a search or collection, giving the government the potential means to search countless computers of victims of the botnet (not the perpetrators) without a warrant.

While these are both valid exceptions to warrant requirements, they've never been deployed on this sort of scale. Officers can perform community caretaker functions that may result in contraband being discovered in plain view. When the FBI takes on a botnet, however, it will have access to potentially thousands of computers at a time and the legislated permission to not only "enter" these computers, but to take a look around at the contents.

The Fourth Amendment was put into place to end the practice of general warrants. The FBI's botnet-fighting efforts turn court-ordered injunctions into digital general warrants, only without the pesky "warrant" part of the phrase. And, unlike other warrants, the proposed legislation would do away with another Fourth Amendment nicety: notification.

As CDT noted in its comments on the Rule 41 change mentioned above, potentially as many as a third of computers in the United States are infected with some form of malware. And, botnets are extremely hard to clean up, especially when you depend on victims to voluntarily submit their computers for cleaning. Given this reality, unless notice is required by statute, law enforcement would have an incentive to dispense with notice in the much wider array of shutdowns permitted under the Graham-Whitehouse bill.

The bill has only been introduced and there's no forward motion as of yet. It's in need of serious repair before it heads further up the legislative chain. As it's written, there's nothing standing between people's personal files and a host of digital officers wandering through virtual houses in search of malware and searching/seizing anything else that catches their eye.

Filed Under: botnet, botnet prevention act, congress, fbi, hacking, lindsey graham, richard blumenthal, sheldon whitehouse, warrants

Kudos To Senator Leahy: Fighting To Keep Privacy & Civil Liberties Board From Being Hobbled

from the keep-at-it dept

While I think that Senator Patrick Leahy has been ridiculously and dangerously wrong on copyright issues for years, he's actually quite good on a number of other issues that are of interest to us here at Techdirt. In particular, he's been a strong supporter of civil liberties on the internet and protecting the 4th Amendment (it's unfortunate that he doesn't see how his desired copyright policies might undermine some of that, but that's another post for another day). Thankfully, his latest move is to push back against a plan by the Senate and House Intelligence Committees to strip the federal government's Privacy and Civil Liberties Board (PCLOB).

Back in May, we wrote about this effort, whereby Congress appeared to be deliberately stripping powers from the PCLOB in order to limit the board's ability to actually make sure that the intelligence community wasn't abusing its powers. Senator Leahy has now sent a fairly direct letter to Senate Intelligence chair Senator Richard Burr and vice chair Senator Dianne Feinstein calling out how terrible this plan is.

The letter calls out the "pattern" that has been put in place by both the House and Senate Intelligence Committees to one by one by one strip powers from the PCLOB. After giving a bunch of examples of this playing out, with the language stripping the powers being agreed upon in secret (of course), Leahy notes:

The PCLOB has served a valuable role in reviewing government surveillance programs and recommending reforms that have largely been implemented by the executive branch. It is particularly inappropriate to debate and report legislation in a closed markup that is designed to diminish the authority of a public, independent oversight board. Congress should b enhancing its role, not undercutting it.

It then asks them to remove these PCLOB-undermining provisions from the intel re-authorization bill. Of course, Feinstein and Burr want to hobble the PCLOB because they've long been cheerleaders for widespread surveillance, and have actively fought against any real or significant oversight. There's a reason why these riders undermining the PCLOB keep showing up, and it's because Senators like Feinstein and Burr are deliberately trying to protect the intelligence community from oversight. So unless some bigger force comes along, it's doubtful this letter will have much of a direct impact. But, even so, kudos to Leahy for sending the letter as a starting point. Hopefully he follows through and continues to keep the pressure up.

Filed Under: congress, dianne feinstein, oversight, patrick leahy, pclob, richard burr

Good News: Carla Hayden Easily Approved As The New Librarian Of Congress

from the yippee dept

Here's some good news. After decades of ridiculously bad management, it appears that the Library of Congress has a real leader. Dr. Carla Hayden has been approved by the Senate as our new Librarian of Congress by a wide margin, 74 to 18. And that's despite a last minute push by the ridiculous Heritage Foundation to argue that the Librarian of Congress should not be a librarian (and one with tremendous administrative experience). Heritage Foundation's alerts can often sway Republican Senators, so the fact that only 18 still voted against her is quite something. Hayden was also able to get past ridiculous claims that she was pro-obscenity or pro-piracy based on people who just didn't like the idea of an actually qualified person in the position.

She's an exceptionally qualified librarian with administrative and leadership experience. And while I'm sure I won't agree with everything she does, it seems like a massive improvement on the previous librarian, James Billington, who famously resisted any kind of modernization efforts, and who the Government Accountability Office had to call out multiple times for his leadership failings. Billington was so bad that when he resigned, the Washington Post was able to get people to go on the record celebrating.

The reaction inside the library was almost gleeful, as one employee joked that some workers were thinking of organizing a conga line down Pennsylvania Avenue. Another said it felt like someone opened a window.

“There is a general sense of relief, hope and renewal, all rolled into one feeling,” said one staffer who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal. “Like a great weight has been lifted from our shoulders.”

Maureen Moore, who retired in 2005 but volunteers at the library, said she and her friends were thrilled.

“It’s a great day for the library. The man has had 27 years to do good things, and he hasn’t,” she said.

It's a low bar, but Hayden will almost certainly be better than that -- and hopefully a lot better as well. She's shown in the past a willingness to stand up and fight against government surveillance and for freedom of speech and access to information. Her positions on copyright are less clear, but as she's now in charge of the Copyright Office, hopefully she'll bring some much needed balance to that office, and a greater recognition, as a librarian, of the importance of access to information, rather than locking up all info.

Of course, given all that, I can pretty much guarantee that Hollywood and other legacy copyright industries are going to pump up their fight to move the Copyright Office out of the Library of Congress, and either set it up as its own agency, or dump it into the Dept. of Commerce, perhaps as part of the Patent and Trademark Office. Expect to see a big push on that very soon, including all sorts of bullshit arguments in favor of it. But remember, copyright was designed to benefit the public, and not as some sort of commercial tool that belongs in the Dept. of Commerce.

Filed Under: carla hayden, congress, copyright office, librarian of congress, senate

Homeland Security Committee Thinks Backdoors Are Bad, But Encryption Still A Problem The Government Needs To Fix

from the one-half-logic,-one-half-Comey dept

The House Homeland Security Committee has decided to weigh in on the encryption debate with the release of a report [PDF] entitled "Going Dark, Going Forward." Despite the use of Comey's pet term for the increasing deployment of encryption by service providers and device makers, the committee points out backdoors are a terrible way to address the problem.

Initially, lawmakers and some among law enforcement personnel believed the solution was simple: statutorily authorize law enforcement access to obtain encrypted data with a court order. Unfortunately, this proposal was riddled with unintended consequences, particularly if redesigning encryption tools to incorporate vulnerabilities—creating what some refer to as “backdoors”—actually weakened data security. Indeed those vulnerabilities would naturally be exploited by the bad guys—and not just benefit the good guys.

However, it also does not specifically take encryption backdoors off the table. As any good committee would, it suggests the solution lies with the formation of another committee and the generation of studies and reports.

Thus, in our estimation, the best way for Congress and the nation to proceed at this juncture is to formally convene a commission of experts to thoughtfully examine not just the matter of encryption and law enforcement, but law enforcement’s future in a world of rapidly evolving digital technology.

So far, so bureaucratic. The ordering of the formation of a commission (to be called the "National Commission on Security and Technology Challenges") is the tentative step forward -- one that will last an entire year. After that, the discussion of encryption backdoors can resume.

The Committee ordering the formation of a commission also has the unfortunate tendency to portray the government in a rosy glow it certainly hasn't earned.

Congress and the American people have always sought to strike the right balance between the rule of law and individual liberty. Several examples illustrate this point, including debates surrounding the development of a robust anti-money laundering regime in online and in-person banking in the 1980s and 1990s; the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act in the early 1990s; the appropriate use of “roving wiretaps” in response to the widespread adoption of mobile communications in the early 2000s; and current discussions on the proper role of commercial drone technology in public and private arenas.

Even if you ignore the fact that the "debate" surrounding CALEA mostly involved legislators listening to law enforcement lobbying (with compromise only resulting because telcos had similar lobbying weight) and the ongoing secrecy over government surveillance drone use, there's the part about "roving wiretaps." The "debate" that took place here was the result of a secret program being uncovered years after it went into effect. It had nothing to do with the government engaging with citizens prior to granting the NSA and FBI this power.

The House Committee also shows an unfortunate tendency to defer to Comey's encryption assertions. It goes so far as to echo his talking points that have no basis in reality.

In later testimony, Comey further commented, “There is no doubt that the use of encryption is part of terrorist tradecraft now because they understand the problems we have getting court orders to be effective when they’re using these mobile messaging apps, especially that are end-to-end encrypted” [emphasis added]. Indeed, the perpetrators of terrorist attacks in Garland, Texas, Paris, France, and San Bernardino, California, in 2015 all exploited encrypted communications.

The last two attacks listed uncovered no use of encryption. The Paris attackers used normal, unencrypted SMS and the notorious San Bernardino iPhone was eventually cracked by a third party, but revealed nothing of importance after being examined.

It's about as even-handed as one can expect from a committee that still believes there's an "honest conversation" to be had about a subject FBI Director James Comey refuses to discuss honestly. It notes that most countries people consider to be free (mainly Western European) have shot down encryption backdoors, even in the wake of terrorist attacks. The countries where governments have demanded backdoors are no one's idea of civil liberties paradises -- like China and Iran. Presented this way, there's a strong suggestion that the US government shouldn't come down on the side of countries whose human rights records are, at best, highly questionable. That should help keep the conversation more "honest," at least.

Filed Under: backdoors, congress, encryption, going dark, homeland security

Senate Funding Bill For State Dept. Asks It To Figure Out Ways To Stop Bad People From Using Tor

from the good-luck-with-that dept

It would appear that Congress is not so happy that the State Department is a major funding source for the Tor project. Tor, of course, is the internet anonymyzing system that was originally developed with support from the US government as a way to promote free and safe access to the internet for people around the globe (mostly focusing on those under threat in authoritarian countries). Of course, other parts of our government aren't huge fans of Tor, because it doesn't just help activists and dissidents in other countries avoid detection, but also, well, just about anyone (except on days when the FBI decides to hack their way in).

There has, of course, always been some tension there. There are always the conspiracy theorists who believe that because Tor receives US government funding it is by default compromised. Those tend to be tinfoil hat wearing types, though. The folks who work on Tor are not exactly recognized for being particularly friendly to intrusive government surveillance. They tend to be the exact opposite of that. And, of course, part of the Snowden revelations revealed that Tor was one tool that still stymied the NSA in most cases.

But it appears that Congress may be quietly trying to undermine this. On Friday, Politico had a tiny blurb in passing about how the latest State Department appropriations bill making its way through Congress includes some references to stopping "circumvention technologies" from being used by bad people. The Politico report suggests this is designed to apply more broadly to encryption, but reading the specifics it appears to be targeted straight at Tor. Here's the Senate report on the appropriations, where it discusses funding related to "internet freedom."

That, of course, was the reasoning behind Tor in the first place, but here Congress is now trying to put some limitations on what the State Dept. can do with its funds, including demanding that it seek out ways to stop bad guys from using technology like Tor. In the report, it's described this way:

...the Committee requires that spend plans submitted by the Department of State and BBG pursuant to section 7078(c) of the act include a description of safeguards to ensure that circumvention technologies are not used for illicit purposes, such as coordinating terrorist activities or online sexual exploitation of children.

In the full bill, the key section notes that the funding shall only be available for internet freedom after efforts are made to stop bad people from using the tools.

... made available for the research and development of new tools or techniques authorized in paragraph (A) only after the BBG CEO, in consultation with the Secretary of State and other relevant United States Government departments and agencies, evaluates the risks and benefits of such new tools or techniques, and establishes safeguards to minimize the use of such new tools or techniques for illicit purposes.

In case you're wondering, the "BBG CEO" is the CEO of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the US government agency that manages media efforts around the globe, such as the Voice of America.

Make no mistake, this appears to be an attempt to sneak in an attack on Tor via Congress into the State Dept. Tor has been developed to provide the best absolute anonymity/privacy tools for people using the internet -- with the acknowledgement that it can be misused, because the people developing it recognize that the best way to protect the vast majority of its users is to build a system that is truly secure -- not one that artificially tries to limit its uses. Hopefully, this provision is changed, or else it may be eventually leveraged as a way to attack Tor, to attack Tor's funding and try to get the State Department to stop supporting such useful projects.

Filed Under: congress, funding, state department, tor

White House Warns Congress To Stop Its Sneak Attacks On Net Neutrality

from the duopoly-defenders dept

For most of the last year, the House has desperately been trying to punish the FCC for standing up to ISPs on net neutrality. This has included an endless number of taxpayer funded "accountability" hearings designed to shame the agency, as well as attempts to gut FCC authority and funding via sneaky budget riders. The latest example is the House Appropriations Committee's 29-17 vote to approve an FCC appropriations bill (pdf), part of a larger Financial Services Bill determining the 2017 budgets for multiple agencies. That bill not only dramatically reduces the FCC budget, but tries to hamstring net neutrality rule enforcement.

Apparently growing tired of these kinds of sneak attacks, the White House last week was forced to issue a statement of administration policy (pdf) lamenting the use of "highly problematic ideological provisions" in budget bills aimed at stopping regulators overseeing multiple sectors from doing their jobs. Specifically, the White House defends the FCC's net neutrality plan, noting that bureaucratic sneak attacks will not be able to undermine an agency vote and the support of millions of Americans:

"For almost a century, U.S. law has recognized that companies who connect Americans to the world have special obligations not to exploit the monopoly they enjoy over access in and out of Americans' homes or businesses. It is common sense that the same philosophy should guide any service that is based on the transmission of information—whether a phone call, or a packet of data. The FCC's rules recognize that broadband service is of the same importance, and must carry the same obligations as so many of the other vital services do.

These carefully-designed rules have already been implemented in large part with little to no impact on the telecommunications companies making important investments in the U.S. economy, and would ensure that neither the cable company nor the phone company would be able to act as a gatekeeper, restricting what Americans can do or see online. The appropriations process should not be used to overturn the will of both an independent regulator and millions of Americans on this vital issue.

The White House also takes a moment to slam the House attempt to kill the FCC's plan to bring competition to the cable box. Specifically, the statement complains how budget riders would have forced the plan into permanent committee purgatory:

"The Administration opposes section 636 that aims at delaying the FCC from adopting or enforcing new rules to open the video set-top box market to additional competition. Currently, 99 percent of cable and satellite TV consumers rent set-top boxes directly from the cable providers, costing households an average of $230 per year. The FCC is already committed to a lengthy, thorough rulemaking process that would establish a robust record of comment and analysis from companies, non-profit organizations, and academics. The current provision unnecessarily interferes with these long-established processes by requiring a delay of at least 270 days, and probably much longer, and a redundant, potentially costly study."

Again, the politicians opposing both of these FCC initiatives breathlessly claim they're only concerned about government "overreach." In reality, campaign contributions simply have them tripping over themselves to see who can best defend the nation's telecom duopolists from the faintest specter of competition and accountability. The White House statement makes it abundantly clear these sneak attacks will be vetoed, meaning that while they may be cathartic for net neutrality opponents trying to protect AT&T, Comcast and Verizon from the will of the public, they aren't likely to be effective.

With the net neutrality rules now on solid legal ground and an appeal victory seen as unlikely, net neutrality opponents only have one real way to weaken the rules: elect a president sure to stock the FCC with revolving door regulators who'll refuse to actually enforce them.

Filed Under: broadband, congress, net neutrality, white house

As Republicans Turn Off House Live Feed, Reps & C-SPAN Turn To Periscope And Facebook Live Video To Cover Sit In

from the we-all-are-the-media dept

So something fascinating happened in Congress today. No matter what your opinion is on gun control or the various legislative proposals around it that have been up for debate in the past week or so, it's hard to fathom what Congressional Republicans thought they were doing today in shutting off the live video feed from the House floor. A bunch of Democrats decided to hold a sit in on the House floor to push for a vote on some gun legislation. That's a bit of a stunt no matter how you look at it, but the Republicans shot back by helping that stunt get much more attention by not just gavelling the House out of session, but also turning off the live feed of the House floor that flows to C-SPAN and out to the rest of us. C-SPAN doesn't control the cameras and is at the whim of Congress to access that feed, so when the GOP shut off the feed, C-SPAN was left without. This isn't a stupid move that's limited to the Republican side of Congress, apparently. Eight years ago the Democrats did the same thing when they controlled the House and were upset about Republicans trying to focus on a particular issue.

Of course, we now live in a modern technological age, where everyone has the power to broadcast live video in the devices we all carry in our pockets. Thus, despite House rules that forbid any sort of broadcasting from the floor, Rep. Scott Peters started broadcasting from the floor. And even as the Sergeant at Arms tried to stop the broadcasting, more people on the floor started using Periscope, Snapchat and Facebook Live, leading to C-SPAN rebroadcasting those feeds.

C-SPAN claims it's the first time it's done this (and let's not even bother with the copyright questions related to all of this...). But it seems like yet another example of a form of the Streisand Effect. The sit in was designed to get attention, and it certainly would have no matter what. But shutting off the cameras and trying to shut down the entire process only seemed to drive that much more attention to what was going on, and modern technology helped let the story still come out, no matter what the "House rules" happened to say.

Filed Under: cameras, congress, democrats, facebook live, gun control, periscope, republicans, streaming, video
Companies: c-span, facebook, snapchat, twitter

House Attacks Net Neutrality, Cable Box Reform With Sneaky Budget Rider

from the dysfunction-junction dept

As we've noted a few times, there's really only two ways the telecom sector can successfully destroy U.S. net neutrality rules. Broadband providers could prevail on part or all of their multi-headed lawsuit against the FCC, a decision on which is expected any day now. Or the rules could be dismantled by the next President, who could repopulate the FCC with the usual assortment of revolving-door sector sycophants, reverting the agency back to its more consistent, historical role as a dumbly nodding enabler of broadband sector dysfunction.

Every other attempt to kill the rules is just politicians barking loudly for their campaign contribution dinners -- though that's not to say the barking doesn't get very loud from time to time.

The latest example is the House Appropriations Committee's 29-17 vote to approve an FCC appropriations bill (pdf), part of a larger Financial Services Bill determining the 2017 budgets for multiple agencies. The bill was passed last week with amendment language intended to hobble the FCC's net neutrality rules -- and its quest to bring competition to the cable set top box. More specifically, the bill prohibits the FCC from enforcing its net neutrality rules until the ongoing court case is settled. But it also would relegate the FCC's attempt to bring competition to the cable box to committee purgatory.

This attempt to force the FCC's cable box reform plan into a "study" that never ends -- despite an already scheduled extensive public comment period -- has been a constant drum beat among telecom lobbyists, who've masterfully enjoyed having a laundry list of Senators parrot their claims that cable set top box reform will somehow hurt consumer privacy, spike piracy rates, and even harm minorities. The real reason for the sector's opposition is the $21 billion in captive annual set top rental fees the cable sector enjoys, and the fact that more set top box competition means better, cheaper hardware that will highlight streaming alternatives to legacy television (the horror).

As is usually the case, politicians supporting the hamstringing of the FCC profess they're wasting taxpayer money and legislative time not because they're paid allies of the telecom duopolists, but because they're just breathlessly worried about the health of the nation. For example, Chairman of the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Subcommittee, Florida Representative Ander Crenshaw, issued a statement making it abundantly clear he's not happy with a regulator actually doing its job:

"In addition, this Committee has strong concerns that the FCC seems to be prolonging their pattern of regulatory overreach with its recent set-top box proposal. And so, we include language that requires the FCC to stop and study this controversial rule before they can move any further. The telecommunications industry is more competitive than ever. And yet, the Commission has been more active than ever in trying to exert regulatory control over market innovation. To return the FCC’s focus towards mission critical work and away from politically charged rule makings, the bill requires the FCC to do less with less."

And by "mission critical work" Crenshaw means joining him in pretending that the broadband sector is actually competitive, and that forcing consumers to pay thousands of dollars for sub-standard, closed cable hardware is the pinnacle of innovation. Like past efforts of this type, the rider language won't make it very far, but it's always entertaining to see folks like Crenshaw dressing up cronyism as a noble assault on the very dysfunction he covertly enables.

Filed Under: competition, congress, fcc, funding, net neutrality