Policy & Regulation

Meta Spells Out Absurdity of EU’s Plan to Tax Big Tech for Broadband Expansion

The EU is proposing a telecom-industry-backed plan to effectively tax Big Tech companies, with the intention of throwing that money toward Big Telecom companies for broadband expansion. The proposal is part of the EU's efforts to craft digital policies for the next few decades, with an eye on shoring up lagging broadband access. more

Experts Urge Immediate Halt on Development of “Giant” AIs

More than 1,000 experts in the artificial intelligence community have called for an immediate pause on the development of "giant" AI systems like GPT-4 for at least six months. more

Biden Administration Bans Federal Agencies from Using Commercial Spyware

The Biden administration has announced an executive order that would ban U.S. federal agencies from using commercially developed spyware that poses threats to human rights and national security. more

An Economic Perspective on Internet Centrality

The IETF met in November 2022 in London. Among the many sessions that were held in that meeting was a session of the Decentralised Internet Infrastructure Research Group, (DINRG). The research group's ambitions are lofty: DINRG will investigate open research issues in decentralizing infrastructure services such as trust management, identity management, name resolution, resource/asset ownership management, and resource discovery. more

Biden-Harris Administration Unveils National Cybersecurity Strategy

Today, the Biden Administration released the National Cybersecurity Strategy, which outlines the use of all available resources to protect the United States' security, safety, and economic prosperity. more

European Union Wants to Fix the GDPR

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was adopted in 2016 and has since become the global standard for privacy regulation. The GDPR has been a watershed moment in tech regulation, requiring companies to ask for consent to collect data online and threatening hefty fines if they don't comply. more

FAA Announces $175,000 Fine Against SpaceX for Failure to Submit Required Pre-Launch Information

SpaceX, the leading provider of commercial launches in the United States, is subject to FAA regulations and must provide safety data prior to any attempt at launch. Last year, SpaceX performed a record 61 launches, with 34 of them primarily for the Starlink program. more

Amazon Gets FCC Approval to Deploy Its Project Kuiper Broadband Satellites

Today, the FCC has sided with Amazon in a regulatory battle over Project Kuiper, the company's satellite internet system. Despite objections from rival SpaceX, the commission has approved Amazon's plan to prevent the upcoming satellite internet constellation from causing orbital debris in space. more

Global Standards Collaboration: Is It Possible?

On 24-27 April, a 33-year-old international organisation of ICT organisations will convene a meeting at London under ETSI auspices after a four-year hiatus. Known today as the GSC or Global Standards Collaboration organisation, it began its existence in the Spring of 1990 at Fredericksburg, Virginia, as an umbrella mechanism for all of the world's ICT standards bodies to collaborate on "high interest subjects." more

The European Commission Proposes Charging Data-Heavy Streamers for Telecom Upgrades

The European Union has launched a consultation on a proposal that would require technology companies, such as Netflix and Alphabet Inc., who use the most bandwidth to help pay for the next generation of internet infrastructure. more

U.N. Cybercrime Convention Enters Critical Stage

Negotiations for a U.N. cybercrime convention have reached a critical stage at the fourth round of discussions in Vienna. Delegates from over 150 states have met for over 100 hours to discuss the proposed convention, which has been met with skepticism from some states, nongovernmental organizations, and other stakeholders more

Blockchain Domains and What They Could Mean for Online Scams and Brand Protection

Blockchain domain names, domains that are stored on blockchain or cryptocurrency exchanges, are part of a growing, unregulated, and decentralized internet. Right now, blockchain domains are used mostly by cryptocurrency users, but they are growing in popularity - the Ethereum name service reported over 2.2 million .eth domain name registrations in 2022. At the same time, crypto scams are also exploding, reaching a total of $3.5 billion in losses in 2022. more

Removal of Price Caps for .ORG and .INFO Found Improper by IRP

After a prolonged legal process involving multiple hearings and months of consideration, an independent review panel (IRP) determined that ICANN had violated its own bylaws and articles of incorporation through its decision to remove price caps on certain top-level domains (TLDs) and that this decision was therefore invalid. more

Cuban Undersea Cable Politics

Undersea cables between the U. S. and Cuba have long been intertwined with politics. In 1887, The New York Times reported on the inauguration of a cable in support of the Cuban insurgents fighting for independence from Spain -- a precursor to the Spanish-American war. Phone service between the U.S. and Cuba began in 1921 with AT&T's installation of an undersea cable and AT&T dominated international telephony to Cuba until the 1990s. more

Justice Department Recommends That the FCC Deny the Proposed ARCOS Cable Segment Connecting Florida and Cuba

In September 2020, I wrote a post on a proposed 56-kilometer link between the ARCOS undersea cable and the north coast of Cuba, near Havana. The Trump-appointed Justice Department Committee for the Assessment of Foreign Participation in the United States Telecommunications Services Sector was to conduct a 120-day security review of the proposal. more