Roy Mark

Google said Thursday it would “vigorously” resist complying with a federal court order to turn over data the Department of Justice (DoJ) deems necessary for its flagging constitutional defense of the Child Online Protection Act (COPA). COPA has been in legal limbo since 1998, when Congress passed the legislation making it a criminal act to […]

WASHINGTON – The FBI told a senate panel Thursday afternoon no more new laws are needed to deal with online child pornography, insisting existing prohibitions are more than adequate to prosecute kiddie porn purveyors. “The laws are pretty well defined,” James H. Burris, deputy assistant director of the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division told the Senate […]

Federal lawmakers wasted little time Wednesday responding to the growing black-market traffic in stolen private wireless and wireline telephone records, introducing legislation to criminalize the practice. Meeting on the first day of the 2006 legislative session, Senators Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Arlen Specter (R-Penn.) and Charles Nelson (D-Fla.) immediately dropped the Consumer Telephone Records Protection Act […]

WASHINGTON — Consumer groups urged Congress today to pass legislation barring broadband providers from engaging in what the groups call potentially discriminatory pricing for high speed Internet service. As Congress prepares for a serious run at telecom reform this year, telephone and cable companies are lobbying lawmakers for the right to charge Internet content and […]

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is going after online data brokers hawking private wireless and wireline telephone records. The data the brokers are selling allegedly includes numbers dialed, calls received and the location of wireless callers. The FCC said it is investigating the practice. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 prohibits phone companies from using or […]

The United States Congress returns to work today with an unusually heavy tech agenda ahead. At the same time, Congress still is trying to resolve the issues left behind when it adjourned in December. Compounding the heavy and pressing congressional schedule is the fact that 2006 is an election year, with the entire House of […]

Internet pioneer and entrepreneur Mark Cuban wants a multi-tiered Internet where bandwidth-intensive applications, such as video, cost a premium, echoing recent comments of the Baby Bells and cable companies that dominate the U.S. broadband market. Cuban, the current owner of the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks and a founder of Broadcast.com, which he sold to Yahoo in […]

The second round of testing e-passports that contain contactless chips with biometric data begins Sunday at San Francisco International Airport (SF0). A joint effort between the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore, the testing will assess the operational impact of using new software and hardware to verify the information embedded in e-passports. “This test […]

The proposed onboard airline broadband service will hit the runway May 10 when the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) plans to auction off spectrum for a high-flying Internet connection. The FCC’s proposal calls for new spectrum licenses in three possible band plan configurations, with the ultimate configuration to be determined on the results of the auction. […]

A new year and an old story: Americans fall prey to data theft. A new year and another old story: Congress does nothing about it, not even requiring companies to inform consumers of the breaches. According to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, 2005 saw more than 100 reported breaches involving the personal data of more than […]

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is opposing a proposed class action settlement agreement between Netflix and consumers, claiming the deal appears to unfairly favor the online movie DVD rental outfit. Under the proposed settlement, class members who are current Netflix customers would receive a free one month upgrade on their service and former Netflix customers […]

A new law extending telephone harassment prohibitions and penalties to anonymous e-mails and Voice over IP calls has raised nary a peep among civil liberty groups and the legal community. In the blogosphere, however, news of the amended law is prompting an outpouring of concern about free speech and fears that the legislation could impact […]