Oct. 20, 2000
8:00 AM ET.
Alert No. 46. |
TLJ Home Page
News from
the Web
Calendar
Search
Tech Law Journal is a free access online publication that
provides news, records, and analysis of legislation, litigation, and
regulation affecting the computer and Internet industry.
This email service is offered free of charge to anyone who requests
it.
Contact TLJ:
202-364-8882.
E-mail.
P.O. Box 15186, Washington DC, 20003.
Notices
& Disclaimers
Privacy
Policy
Copyright 1998 - 2000 David Carney, dba Tech Law Journal. All rights
reserved. |
|
|
| News Briefs |
10/19. The BXA
published new encryption export rules
[PDF] in the Federal Register. These rules amend the Export
Administration Regulations that implement the administration's
update to its encryption policy announced on July 17. The
previous regulatory update took place in January 2000. The new rules
allow exports of encryption products to end-users in 23 EU and other
nations under a license exception. U.S. companies can export under
license exception most encryption products to any end-user in 23
named countries, including the worldwide offices of firms and
organizations headquartered in these nations. U.S. companies can
ship their products to these nations immediately after they have
submitted a commodity classification to BXA, rather than waiting for
the review to be completed. The regulation streamlines and reduces
post-export reporting requirements for many products containing or
preloaded with encryption, including PCs, laptops, handheld devices,
network appliances, and short-range wireless technologies. See,
Federal Register, Vol. 65, No. 203, at pages 62600-62610. See also,
BXA release
and summary.
10/19. U.S. Register of Copyrights Marybeth Peters participated on a
panel on copyright in cyberspace at the annual meeting of the
American Intellectual Property Law
Association. She stated that while "the rules don't quite
fit yet" for web sites and databases, "registration is
still important". She added the Copyright Office will
conduct a rule making proceeding, probably in 2001.
10/19. The GAO
wrote a report on consumer choices of ISPs at the request of Sen. Mike DeWine (R-OH)
and Sen. Herb Kohl
(D-WI), the Chairman and ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee's
Antitrust Subcommittee. The report is titled "Technological and
Regulatory Factors Affecting Consumer Choice of Internet
Providers." The Senators stated that "the report also
indicates that as users shift from narrowband to broadband Internet
access, competitive options might become limited. Accordingly, it is
important to ensure that competition continues to thrive in this
expanding market."
10/19. House Majority Leader Dick
Armey (R-TX) sent a letter
to Atty. Gen. Janet Reno regarding the DOJ's
"independent review" of the Carnivore e-mail
surveillance system, and related systems. He wrote that
"documents recently released under the Freedom of Information
Act indicate that the Department of Justice has been busy working on
enhanced versions of Carnivore. That leads one to ask, is the review
of the current version of the software, or will the review include
Carnivore 2.0 and Carnivore 3.0? And will it also include the other
tools that are part of the 'DragonWare Suite'?" Rep. Armey also
questioned whether the people hired by the DOJ to conduct its
independent review are actually independent.
10/19. Ted Waite resigned from his position as a Director of MP3.com, which has been sued under
copyright laws by recording companies. Waite is the founder and
Chairman of Gateway. See, MP3.com
release.
10/19. U.S. Trade Representative Charlene
Barshefsky gave a speech
at the National Press Club
titled "From the Cold War to the Wired World: Trade Policy in
the Clinton Era." She cited several high tech trade
accomplishments. "The Uruguay Round, vigorous use of WTO
dispute settlement, U.S. law and 28 bilateral IPR agreements,
led well over 100 countries to adopt modern copyright, patent and
trademark laws; and radically improve enforcement." She also
reviewed progress in opening markets for high tech goods and
services. She also stated that "we will soon inaugurate a major
'networked economy' initiative - easing trade in the high-tech
manufactures and services at the heart of the world information
infrastructure, and addressing related topics such as intellectual
property protection in the digital environment and capacity-building
to address concerns about an international digital divide. In doing
so, as it opens up export opportunities it will help move our
trading partners toward the flexible, sophisticated New Economy we
have entered at home."
10/19. Doug Melamed, the Acting Asst. Atty. Gen. for the DOJ Antitrust Division gave a speech
at Fordham University titled "Promoting Sound Antitrust
Enforcement in the Global Economy." He stated that "The
increasing importance of global markets means that nations face an
increasing prospect that their economies will be harmed by
anticompetitive conduct that takes place, at least to some degree,
in other countries. And it means that each country, including the
U.S., has an interest in the choices other countries make about the
adoption and enforcement of antitrust laws." He continued that
"We need to ensure that antitrust works effectively and
efficiently in the global economy. Enforcement coherence cannot be
defined and decreed, once and for all, by the U.S. or anyone
else."
10/19. Commerce Sec. Norman Mineta is on a three day campaign swing
through western states promoting "digital divide"
programs. He said in a speech
in Oakland CA that "I want to help President Clinton and Vice
President Gore continue their efforts to work with private and
public partners to help close the digital divide for all
Americans." See also, speech
in San Francisco, speech
at the SF Public Library, and release.
At all events, Sec. Mineta discussed the NTIA's
annual "digital divide" report, titled "Falling
Through the Net: Toward Digital Inclusion," which was released
on Oct. 16. See, full
report [139 pages in PDF] and NTIA
release.
10/19. The USTA, a group that
represents local exchange carriers, sent a letter to Members of
Congress opposing any changes to the law regarding capping cable
ownership by a single company. AT&T
supports a change. The USTA asserted that "Allowing AT&T to
continue to own facilities serving more than 40 percent of
America’s cable customers – even for an additional year -- would
allow AT&T to raise residential cable prices and dominate the
high speed internet market." The Consumers Union also released a statement
criticizing AT&T. "This is a blatant attempt by AT&T to
circumvent the conditions it agreed to when the FCC cleared the
AT&T- MediaOne merger," said CU chief Gene Kimmelman.
10/19. The Board of Directors of the Cellular Telecommunications Industry
Association (CTIA) approved the acquisition of the Wireless Data
Forum (WDF). The WDF Board of Directors has already approved the
merger. See, release.
10/17. The FBI's National
Infrastructure Protection Center (NIPC) issued an advisory
regarding a new DDoS threat. "A new variant of the SubSeven
Trojan Horse has been discovered in the wild. This malicious
computer code could constitute a new threat of distributed denial of
service (DDoS) attacks. DDoS attacks were responsible for serious
disruptions of several major e-commerce web sites in February 2000.
The NIPC and industry partners believe that this new variant may be
used to conduct further DDoS attacks which may be more difficult to
detect."
9/29. Stan Smith filed a complaint in U.S. District Court (NDAl)
against Network Solutions
alleging violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act for refusing to
delete expired domain names from its central WHOIS registry
database. The named plaintiff, who seeks class action status, is
represented by Scott Powell
of the law firm of Hare, Wynn, Newell
and Newton, of Birmingham AL. See, Hare release.
Editor's Note: This column includes all News Briefs added to
Tech Law Journal since the last Daily E-Mail Alert. The dates
indicate when the event occurred, not the date of posting to Tech
Law Journal. |
|
|
| New Documents |
BXA:
amendments
to encryption export rules, 10/19 (PDF, BXA).
Armey:
letter
to Reno re Carnivore, 10/19 (HTML, Armey).
Barshefsky:
speech
re trade and high tech, 10/19 (HTML, USTR).
Melamed:
speech
re globalization and antitrust, 10/19 (HTML, DOJ).
|
| New and Updated Sections |
Calendar
(updated daily).
News
from Around the Web (updated daily).
|
| Quote of the Day |
"I have questioned the independence of this review. Several in
the media have questioned this review. Several universities refused
to submit review proposals because, in their opinion, the review
process was unfair. It seems to me that there is no point in
spending $175,000 on a review that raises more questions than it
answers."
Rep. Dick Armey (R-TX) on the DOJ's "independent
review" of Carnivore.
(source)
|
|
