Further Reading, Other Developments, and Coming Events (26, 27, and 28 January 2021)

5G, Antitrust, CISA, Coming Events, Competition, COVID-19, Cybersecurity, Data Flows, Data Protection, data security, DHS, DOD, DOJ, EU, FBI, FCC, FTC, Further Reading, Misinformation, News Industry, NSA, NTIA, Other Developments, People's Republic of China, privacy, Russia, Section 230, Social Media, Technology, Telecommunications, United States 47 Minutes

Further Reading

  • “President Biden’s Tech To-Do List” By Shira Ovide — The New York Times. Another survey of the pressing tech issues President Joe Biden and his Administration will grapple with.
  • “Trying to improve remote learning? A refugee camp offers some surprising lessons” By Javeria Salman — The Hechinger Report. An organization that is helping refugee children advises that digital literacy is the necessary first step in helping all children have positive online learning experiences (assuming of course they have devices and internet access). This means more than being adept with Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat. They also suggest that children work on projects as opposed to busy work.
  • “Silicon Valley Takes the Battlespace” By Jonathan Guyer — The American Prospect. A company funded, in part, by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Rebellion Defense, landed two members on then President-elect Joe Biden’s official transition team, causing some to wonder about the group. This starts up writes artificial intelligence (AI) with defense industry applications, among other products. Schmidt chairs the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence and is widely seen as a bridge between Washington and Silicon Valley. Some see the rise of this company as the classic inside the Beltway tale of blurring interests and capitalizing on connections and know how.
  • “The fight to make Netflix and Hulu pay cable fees” By Adi Robertson — The Verge. Municipalities are suing platforms like Netflix, Hulu, Dish Network, DirecTV and others, claiming they are not paying the franchise fees and quarterly fees traditional cable companies have been subject to for the use of the localities’ rights of way and broadband service. The companies are, of course, arguing they are not subject to these laws because they are not cable companies. There have been a host of such suits filed throughout the United States (U.S.) and bear watching.
  • “Twitter’s misinformation problem is much bigger than Trump. The crowd may help solve it.” By Elizabeth Dwoskin — The Washington Post. Sounds like Twitter is going the route of Wikipedia with a pilot in which volunteers would fact check and provide context to problematic content. Perhaps this helps address the problems posed by social media platforms.
  • “Biden’s clean up of Silicon Valley poses a problem for Scott Morrison” By Harley Dennett — The Canberra Times. The concern down under is that the Biden Administration will press the Morrison government into weakening the “Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2020” that “establishes a mandatory code of conduct to help support the sustainability of the Australian news media sector by addressing bargaining power imbalances between digital platforms and Australian news businesses” according to the Explanatory Memorandum. Doing so would please Google, Facebook, and others, supposedly making them more amenable to the coming policy changes Democrats want to unleash on tech companies. It remains to be seen what the Biden Administration would get in return.
  • “China turbocharges bid to discredit Western vaccines, spread virus conspiracy theories” By Gerry Shih — The Washington Post. In light of more effective vaccines developed by United States (U.S.) companies and a World Health Organization (WHO) team in Wuhan investigating, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has kicked its propaganda campaign into high gear. All sorts of unsubstantiated claims are being made about the safety and effectiveness of the U.S. vaccines and the source of COVID-19 (allegedly from the U.S.)
  • “A Chinese hacking group is stealing airline passenger details” By Catalin Cimpanu — ZDNet.  Hackers associated with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) apparently hacked into one of the companies that generates Passenger Name Records (PNR) that details who flies where and when. There are many uses for these data, including identifying likely foreign intelligence operatives such as Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agents stationed abroad.
  • “Biden Has a Peloton Bike. That Raises Issues at the White House.” By Sheryl Gay Stolberg — The New York Times. This is the level of coverage of the new President. His predecessor used an insecure iPhone that other nations’ intelligence agencies were likely tapping and was famously careless with classified information. And yet, President Joe Biden’s Peloton worries cybersecurity experts. Buried inside the story are the revelations that during the Digital Age, Presidents present cybersecurity challenges and tailored solutions are found.
  • “Ministry of Electronics asks Whatsapp to withdraw changes to privacy policy, disclose data sharing practice” By Bismah Malik — The New Indian Express. India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) is asking WhatsApp to scrap plans to roll out an already delayed change to privacy policies. India is the company’s largest market and has already flexed its muscle against other foreign apps it claimed posed dangers to its people like TikTok. WhatsApp would likely be blocked under a proposed Indian law from moving ahead with its plan to make data people share with WhatsApp business accounts available to Facebook and for advertising. The Data Protection Bill is expected to pass the Parliament his year.
  • “WhatsApp Fueled A Global Misinformation Crisis. Now, It’s Stuck In One.” By Pranav Dixit — BuzzFeed News. A nice overview of how WhatsApp and Facebook’s missteps and limited credibility with people resulted in a widely believed misrepresentation about the changes to WhatsApp’s Terms of Service announced earlier this year.
  • “Amazon, Facebook, other tech giants spent roughly $65 million to lobby Washington last year” By Tony Romm — The Washington Post. While Amazon and Facebook increased their federal lobbying, Google cut back. It bears note these totals are only for the lobbying these entities are doing directly to the federal government and does not include what they spend on firms and lobbyists in Washington (which is plenty) or their contributions to organizations like the Information Technology Industry Council or the Center for Democracy and Technology (which, again, is a lot.) Let’s also not forget political contributions or fundraising by the leadership and senior employees of these companies and political action committees (PAC). Finally, these totals exclude funds spent in state capitals, and I expect tech companies dropped a ton of cash in places like Sacramento and Olympia last year as major privacy legislation was under consideration. Moreover, this article does not take in whatever the companies are spending in Brussels and other capitals around the world.
  • “Google won’t donate to members of Congress who voted against election results” By Ashley Gold — Axios. Speaking of using money to influence the political process, Google has joined other tech companies in pausing donations to Members who voted against certifying President Joe Biden’s victory in the Electoral College (i.e., Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Josh Hawley (R-MO), to name two). We’ll see how long this lasts.
  • “FCC’S acting chair says agency reviewing reports of U.S. East Coast internet outages” By Staff — Reuters; “Big Internet outages hit the East Coast, causing issues for Verizon, Zoom, Slack, Gmail” By Rachel Lerman — The Washington Post. On 26 January, there were widespread internet outages on the east coast of the United States (U.S.) that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is vowing to investigate. Acting FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel tweeted:
    • We have seen reports of internet-related outages on the East Coast, making it difficult for people to work remotely and go to school online. The @FCC Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau is working to get to the bottom of what is going on.
    • It is not clear where and why the roughly hour long outage occurred, but early fingers are being pointed at Verizon FIOS.
  • “Police Say They Can Use Facial Recognition, Despite Bans” By Alfred Ng — The Markup. No one should be surprised that many police departments are reading bans on using facial recognition technology as narrowly as possible. Nevertheless, legislators and advocates are fighting over the interpretations of these recently passed statutes, almost all of which have been put in place by municipalities. Jurisdictions in the United States may also soon choose to address the use of facial recognition technology by businesses.
  • “Why Are Moscow and Beijing Happy to Host the U.S. Far-Right Online?” By Fergus Ryan — Foreign Policy. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, supposedly. Hence, extremist right-wingers, white supremacists, and others are making common cause with the companies of the People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation by moving their websites and materials to those jurisdictions after getting banned by western companies. Given how closely Beijing and Moscow monitor their nations’ internet, this is surely done with the tacit permission of those governments and quite possibly to the same end as their disinformation campaigns: to disrupt the United States and neutralize it as a rival.
  • “After Huawei, Europe’s telcos want ‘open’ 5G networks “ By Laurens Cerulus — Politico EU. Europe’s major telecommunications companies, Deutsche Telekom, Telefónica, Vodafone and Orange, have banded together to support and buy Open RAN technology to roll out 5G instead of buying from Ericsson or Nokia who are promising to do it all. The Open RAN would allow for smaller companies to build pieces of 5G networks that would be interchangeable since everyone is working from the same standards. Huawei, of course, has been shut out of many European nations and see the development as more evidence that western nations are ganging up on it.

Other Developments

  • White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki confirmed that President Joe Biden has directed the United Intelligence Community (IC) to investigate and report to him on the SolarWinds breach perpetrated by the Russian Federation’s foreign intelligence service, Sluzhba vneshney razvedki Rossiyskoy Federatsii (SVR). Thus far, it appears that many United States (U.S.) agencies and private sector entities were quietly breached in early 2020 and then surveilled for months until FireEye, a private sector cybersecurity company, divulged it had been breached. Given former President Donald Trump’s aversion to acknowledging the malicious acts of Russia, it seemed likely the Biden Administration would start the U.S. response. Interestingly, the Biden Administration is extending two nuclear weapons control treaties at the same time it seeks to undertake this assessment of Russian hacking. And, whatever the results of the assessment, experts are in agreement that the Biden Administration would seem to have few good options to retaliate and deter future action.
    • At a 21 January press briefing, Psaki stated
      • I can confirm that the United States intends to seek a five-year extension of New START, as the treaty permits.  The President has long been clear that the New START Treaty is in the national security interests of the United States.  And this extension makes even more sense when the relationship with Russia is adversarial, as it is at this time.
      • New START is the only remaining treaty constraining Russian nuclear forces and is an anchor of strategic stability between our two countries.
      • And to the other part of your question: Even as we work with Russia to advance U.S. interests, so too we work to hold Russia to account for its reckless and adversarial actions.  And to this end, the President is also issuing a tasking to the intelligence community for its full assessment of the SolarWinds cyber breach, Russian interference in the 2020 election, its use of chemical weapons against opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and the alleged bounties on U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.
  • A group of 40 organizations urged President Joe Biden “to avoid appointing to key antitrust enforcement positions individuals who have served as lawyers, lobbyists, or consultants for Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google” in a letter sent before his inauguration. Instead, they encouraged him “to appoint experienced litigators or public servants who have recognized the dangers of, rather than helped to exacerbate, these corporations’ market power.” They closed the letter with this paragraph:
    • With your historic election, and the groundbreaking mandate Americans have entrusted you with, you face the challenge of not only rebuilding the country, but also rebuilding trust in government. We believe that appointing antitrust enforcers with no ties to dominant corporations in the industries they will be tasked with overseeing –particularly in regard to the technology sector –willhelp re-establish public trust in government at a critically important moment in our country’s history. We look forward to working with your administration to ensure powerful technology corporations are held accountable for wrongdoing in the months of years ahead.
    • The signatories include:
      • Public Citizen
      • American Economic Liberties Project
      • Open Markets Institute
      • Revolving Door Project
  • The National Security Agency (NSA) issued an advisory “Adopting Encrypted DNS in Enterprise Environments,” “explaining the benefits and risks of adopting the encrypted domain name system (DNS) protocol, DNS over HTTPs (DoH), in enterprise environments.” This advisory is entirely voluntary and does not bind any class of entities. Moreover, it is the latest in a series of public advisories that has seen the heretofore secretive NSA seek to rival the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in advising the owners and operators of cyber infrastructure. The NSA explained:
    • Use of the Internet relies on translating domain names (like “nsa.gov”) to Internet Protocol addresses. This is the job of the Domain Name System (DNS). In the past, DNS lookups were generally unencrypted, since they have to be handled by the network to direct traffic to the right locations. DNS over Hypertext Transfer Protocol over Transport Layer Security (HTTPS), often referred to as DNS over HTTPS (DoH), encrypts DNS requests by using HTTPS to provide privacy, integrity, and “last mile” source authentication with a client’s DNS resolver. Itis useful to prevent eavesdropping and manipulation of DNS traffic.While DoH can help protect the privacy of DNS requests and the integrity of responses, enterprises that use DoH will lose some of the control needed to govern DNS usage within their networks unless they allow only their chosen DoH resolver to be used. Enterprise DNS controls can prevent numerous threat techniques used by cyber threat actors for initial access, command and control, and exfiltration.
    • Using DoH with external resolvers can be good for home or mobile users and networks that do not use DNS security controls. For enterprise networks, however, NSA recommends using only designated enterprise DNS resolvers in order to properly leverage essential enterprise cybersecurity defenses, facilitate access to local network resources, and protect internal network information. The enterprise DNS resolver may be either an enterprise-operated DNS server or an externally hosted service. Either way, the enterprise resolver should support encrypted DNS requests, such as DoH, for local privacy and integrity protections, but all other encrypted DNS resolvers should be disabled and blocked. However, if the enterprise DNS resolver does not support DoH, the enterprise DNS resolver should still be used and all encrypted DNS should be disabled and blocked until encrypted DNS capabilities can be fully integrated into the enterprise DNS infrastructure.
  • The United States (U.S.) Government Accountability Office (GAO) has sent a report to the chair of the House Oversight Committee on its own initiative that “examines: (1) the Department of Defense’s (DOD) efforts to revise the process for identifying and protecting its critical technologies, and (2) opportunities for DOD’s revised process to inform U.S. government protection programs.” The GAO stated:
    • DOD’s critical technologies—including those associated with an acquisition program throughout its lifecycle or those still early in development—are DOD funded efforts that provide new or improved capabilities necessary to maintain the U.S. technological advantage. For the purposes of this report, we refer to these as critical acquisition programs and technologies. Also for the purposes of this report, U.S. government protection programs are those GAO previously identified across the federal government that are designed to protect critical technologies such as the Arms Export Control System, National Industrial Security Program, and the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S
    • Critical technologies are pivotal to maintaining the U.S. military advantage and, as such, are a frequent target for unauthorized access by adversaries such as through theft, espionage, illegal export, and reverse engineering. DOD has long recognized the need to effectively identify and ensure the consistent protection of these technologies from adversaries, but past efforts have not been fully successful. Recent efforts to revise its process for identifying and protecting its critical acquisition programs and technologies—led by DOD’s Protecting Critical Technology Task Force— offer some improvements.
    • However, DOD can further strengthen its revised process by determining the approach for completing key steps. These steps include ensuring its critical acquisition programs and technologies list is formally communicated to all relevant internal entities and other federal agencies, such as the Department of the Treasury as chair of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, to promote a consistent understanding of what DOD deems critical to protect. They also include developing appropriate metrics that DOD program offices as well as organizations—such as the military departments and Under Secretary of Defense level offices—can use to assess the implementation and sufficiency of the assigned protection measures. Finally, DOD has not yet designated an organization to oversee critical technology protection efforts beyond 2020. As DOD works to develop a policy for its revised process, addressing these issues will not only help improve and ensure continuity in DOD’s protection efforts, but also help ensure government- wide protection efforts are better coordinated as called for in the 2020 National Strategy for Critical and Emerging Technologies.
    • The GAO made three recommendations to the DOD:
      • The Secretary of Defense should direct the Deputy Secretary of Defense in conjunction with the Protecting Critical Technology Task Force to determine a process for formally communicating future critical acquisition programs and technologies lists to all relevant DOD organizations and federal agencies. (Recommendation 1)
      • The Secretary of Defense should direct the Deputy Secretary of Defense in conjunction with the Protecting Critical Technology Task Force to identify, develop, and periodically review appropriate metrics to assess the implementation and sufficiency of the assigned protection measures. (Recommendation 2)
      • The Secretary of Defense should direct the Deputy Secretary of Defense in conjunction with the Protecting Critical Technology Task Force to finalize the decision as to which DOD organization will oversee protection efforts beyond 2020. (Recommendation 3)
  • The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) “under sponsorship of and in collaboration with the Department of Defense (DOD) 5G Initiative” “issued a Notice of Inquiry (NOI)…to explore a “5G Challenge” aiming to accelerate the development of an open source 5G ecosystem that can support DOD missions.” The NTIA explained:
    • A key innovation in 5G that is becoming more pervasive in the larger 5G ecosystem is the trend toward “open 5G” architectures that emphasize open interfaces in the network stack. NTIA, under sponsorship of and in collaboration with the DOD 5G Initiative, is seeking comments and recommendations from all interested stakeholders to explore the creation of a 5G Challenge that would accelerate the development of the open 5G stack ecosystem in support of DOD missions.
    • For the purposes of this Notice, NTIA has organized these questions into three broad categories: (1) Challenge structure and goals; (2) incentives and scope; and (3) timeframe and infrastructure support. NTIA seeks public input on any and/or all of these three categories.
  • The Court of Justice for the European Union’s (CJEU) Advocate General has released his opinion in a case on whether a different data protection authority (DPA) from the lead agency in a case may also bring actions in its court system. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has a mechanism that organizes the regulation of data protection in that one agency, often the first to act, becomes the lead supervisory authority (LSA) and other DPAs must follow its lead. Most famously, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) has been the LSA for the action Maximillian Schrems brought against Facebook that led to the demise of two adequacy agreements between the United States (U.S.) and the European Union (EU). In each case, the DPC was the LSA. The CJEU is not obligated to follow the Advocate General’s opinions, but they frequently prove persuasive. In any event, the Advocate General found DPAs may, under some circumstances, bring cases for cross border infringement even if another DPA is LSA. Advocate General Michal Bobek summarized the facts of the case:
    • In September 2015, the Belgian data protection authority commenced proceedings before the Belgian courts against several companies belonging to the Facebook group (Facebook), namely Facebook INC, Facebook Ireland Ltd, which is the group’s main establishment in the EU, and Facebook Belgium BVBA (Facebook Belgium). In those proceedings, the data protection authority requested that Facebook be ordered to cease, with respect to any internet user established in Belgium, to place, without their consent, certain cookies on the device those individuals use when they browse a web page in the Facebook.com domain or when they end up on a third party’s website, as well as to collect data by means of social plugins and pixels on third party websites in an excessive manner. In addition, it requested the destruction of all personal data obtained by means of cookies and social plugins, about each internet user established in Belgium.
    • The proceedings at issue are at present in progress before the Hof van beroep te Brussel (Court of Appeal, Brussels, Belgium) with however their scope being limited to Facebook Belgium, as that court previously established that it had no jurisdiction with regard to the actions against Facebook INC and Facebook Ireland Ltd. In this context, Facebook Belgium asserts that, as of thed ate on which the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)1has become applicable,the Belgian data protection authority has lost competence to continue the judicial proceedings at issue against Facebook. It contends that, under the GDPR, only the data protection authority of the State of Facebook’s main establishment in the EU (the so-called ‘lead’ data protection authority in the EU for Facebook), namely the Irish Data Protection Commission, is empowered to engage in judicial proceedings against Facebook for infringements of the GDPR in relation to cross-border data processing.
    • Bobek summed up the legal questions presented to the CJEU:
      • Does the GDPR permit a supervisory authority of a Member State to bring proceedings before a court of that State for an alleged infringement of that regulation with respect to cross-border data processing, where that authority is not the lead supervisory authority with regard to that processing?
      • Or does the new ‘one-stop-shop’ mechanism, heralded as one of the major innovations brought about by the GDPR, prevent such a situation from happening? If a controller were called upon to defend itself against a legal challenge concerning cross-border data processing brought by a supervisory authority in a court outside the place of the controller’s main establishment, would that be ‘one-stop-too-many’ and therefore incompatible with the new GDPR mechanism?
    • Bobek made the following findings:
      • [F]irst, that it transpires from the wording of the GDPR that the lead data protection authority has a general competence over cross-border data processing, including the commencement of judicial proceedings for the breach of the GDPR, and, by implication, the other data protection authorities concerned enjoy a more limited power to act in that regard.
      • Second, the Advocate General recalls that the very reason for the introduction of the one-stop-shop mechanism enshrined in the GDPR, whereby a significant role has been given to the lead data protection authority and cooperation mechanisms have been set up to involve other data protection authorities, was to address certain shortcomings resulting from the former legislation. Indeed, economic operators used to be required to comply with the various sets of national rules implementing that legislation, and to liaise, at the same time, with all the national data protection authorities, which proved to be costly, burdensome and time-consuming for those operators, and an inevitable source of uncertainty and conflicts for them and their customers.
      • Third, the Advocate General stresses that the lead data protection authority cannot be deemed as the sole enforcer of the GDPR in cross-border situations and must, in compliance with the relevant rules and time limits provided for by the GDPR, closely cooperate with the other data protection authorities concerned, the input of which is crucial in this area.
  • The United States (U.S.) Department of Defense added more companies from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to the list of those associated with or controlled by the Chinese Communist Party or the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) “in accordance with the statutory requirement of Section 1237 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1999.” The previous lists were released last year (here, here and here.) This designation will almost certainly make doing business in the United States (U.S.) and elsewhere more difficult.
    • The first part of Section 1237 grants the President authority to “exercise International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) authorities (other than authorities relating to importation) without regard to section 202 of the IEEPA (50 U.S.C. 1701) in the case of any commercial activity in the United States by a person that is on the list.” IEEPA grants the President sweeping powers to prohibit transactions and block property and property interests for nations and other groups subject to an IEEPA national emergency declaration. Consequently, those companies identified by the DOD on a list per Section 1237 could be blocked and prohibited from doing business with U.S. entities and others and those that do business with such Chinese companies could be subject to enforcement actions by the U.S. government.
    • The statute defines a “Communist Chinese military company” as “any person identified in the Defense Intelligence Agency publication numbered VP-1920-271-90, dated September 1990, or PC-1921-57-95, dated October 1995, and any update of those publications for the purposes of this section; and any other person that is owned or controlled by the People’s Liberation Army; and is engaged in providing commercial services, manufacturing, producing, or exporting.” Considering that the terms “owned” and “controlled” are not spelled out in this section, the executive branch may have very wide latitude in deeming a non-Chinese company as owned or controlled and therefore subject to the President’s use of IEEPA powers. Moreover, since the President already has the authority to declare an emergency and then use IEEPA powers, this language would seem to allow the President to bypass any such declaration and immediately use such powers, except those regarding importation, against any Chinese entities identified on this list by the Pentagon.
  • A group of 13 House Democrats wrote Attorney General designate Merrick Garland asking that the Biden Administration “to withdraw from the United States (U.S.) federal government’s lawsuit against the State of California over its net neutrality law as one of the first actions after inauguration.” The Trump Administration had sued California after a measure became law in 2018, mandating net neutrality there in the wake of the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) rollback of federal net neutrality. The Members argued:
    • In September 2018, then-Governor Jerry Brown signed into law SB 822, the strongest net neutrality law in the country. The Trump Department of Justice (DOJ) sued to overturn California’s law hours later, and associations of telecommunications providers sued within days. Parties to the case agreed to put the case on hold until Mozilla v. FCC was resolved. In that case, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit vacated the part of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)’s 2018 Restoring Internet Order (RIF) that preempted state net neutrality laws.
    • The arguments of the Trump DOJ and telecommunications associations in U.S. v. California extend further than even the FCC’s RIF and have implications on the ability of California and other states to regulate many communications and technology policy issues.
    • The Eastern District of California has scheduled a hearing in U.S. v. California for a request for an injunction on January 26, 2021. It is for these reasons, we ask that the federal DOJ withdraw from U.S. v. California shortly after President-elect Biden is inaugurated.
  • On its first day in power, the Biden Administration issued its “National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness.” In the cover letter, President Joe Biden stated:
    • For the past year, we could not turn to the federal government for a national plan to answer prayers with action — until today. In the following pages, you will find my Administration’s national strategy to beat the COVID-19 pandemic. It is a comprehensive plan that starts with restoring public trust and mounting an aggressive, safe, and effective vaccination campaign. It continues with the steps we know that stop the spread liked expanded masking, testing, and social distancing. It’s a plan where the federal government works with states, cities, Tribal communities, and private industry to increase supply and administer testing and the vaccines that will help reopen schools and businesses safely. Equity will also be central to our strategy so that the communities and people being disproportionately infected and killed by the pandemic receive the care they need and deserve.
    • Given the numerous cyber-attacks and intrusions throughout the pandemic and growing risks to the entire vaccine supply chain, the President asked the Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines to “lead an assessment of ongoing cyber threats and foreign interference campaigns targeting COVID-19 vaccines and related public health efforts” in order to “counter any threat to the vaccination program.” The Administration stated “[t]he U.S. Government will take steps to address cyber threats to the fight against COVID-19, including cyber attacks on COVID-19 research, vaccination efforts, the health care systems and the public health infrastructure.”
    • Specifically, the strategy requires the following:
      • To assist in the Federal Government’s efforts to provide warning of pandemics, protect our biotechnology infrastructure from cyber attacks and intellectual property theft, identify and monitor biological threats from states and non-state actors, provide validation of foreign data and response efforts, and assess strategic challenges and opportunities from emerging biotechnologies, the Director of National Intelligence shall:
        • (i) Review the collection and reporting capabilities in the United States Intelligence Community (IC) related to pandemics and the full range of high-consequence biological threats and develop a plan for how the IC may strengthen and prioritize such capabilities, including through organizational changes or the creation of National Intelligence Manager and National Intelligence Officer positions focused on biological threats, global public health, and biotechnology;
        • (ii) Develop and submit to the President, through the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (APNSA) and the COVID-19 Response Coordinator, a National Intelligence Estimate on
          • (A) the impact of COVID-19 on national and economic security; and
          • (B) current, emerging, reemerging, potential, and future biological risks to national and economic security; and
        • (iii)  In coordination with the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Administrator of United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and the heads of other relevant agencies, promptly develop and submit to the APNSA an analysis of the security implications of biological threats that can be incorporated into modeling, simulation, course of action analysis, and other analyses.
  • Before the end of the Trump Administration, the Departments of State and Treasury imposed sanctions on a group of Russians for taking part in “a Russia-linked foreign influence network associated with Andrii Derkach, who was designated on September 10, 2020, pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13848 for his attempt to influence the 2020 U.S. Presidential election” according to the Trump Administration Department of State press release. These sanctions emanate from a narrative pushed by Derkach, a likely Russian agent, that the Biden family were engaged in corrupt dealings in Ukraine. Allies of the Trump Campaign pushed this narrative, too, until it failed to gain traction in the public sphere. It is little wonder the last administration waited until the tail end of the Trump presidency to levy such sanctions. State went on to explain:
    • Former Ukraine Government officials Konstantin Kulyk, Oleksandr Onyshchenko, Andriy Telizhenko, and current member of the Ukrainian parliament Oleksandr Dubinsky, have publicly appeared with or affiliated themselves with Derkach through the coordinated dissemination and promotion of fraudulent or unsubstantiated allegations involving a U.S. political candidate.  They have made repeated public statements advancing malicious narratives that U.S. Government officials have engaged in corrupt dealings in Ukraine.  These efforts and narratives are consistent with or in support of Derkach’s objectives to influence the 2020 U.S. presidential election.  As such, these individuals have been designated pursuant to E.O. 13848 for having directly or indirectly engaged in, sponsored, concealed, or otherwise been complicit in foreign influence in an attempt to undermine the 2020 U.S. elections.
    • NabuLeaks, Era-Media, Only News, and Skeptik TOV are media front companies in Ukraine that disseminate false narratives at the behest of Derkach’s and his associates.  They are being designated pursuant to E.O. 13848 for being owned or controlled by Derkach or his media team.  Today’s action also includes the designation of Petro Zhuravel, Dmytro Kovalchuk, and Anton Simonenko for having materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or goods or services to or in support of, Derkach.
    • Additionally, the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) “took additional action against seven individuals and four entities that are part of a Russia-linked foreign influence network associated with Andrii Derkach” according to the agency’s press release. OFAC stated “[a]s a result of today’s designations, all property and interests in property of these targets that are subject to U.S. jurisdiction are blocked, and U.S. persons are generally prohibited from engaging in transactions with them. Additionally, any entities 50 percent or more owned by one or more designated persons are also blocked.”
  • The United States (U.S.) Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) published “a draft of the Trusted Internet Connections (TIC) 3.0 Remote User Use Case and the draft National Cybersecurity Protection System (NCPS) Cloud Interface Reference Architecture (NCIRA): Volume 2.” The agency remarked in its press release:
    • The TIC initiative was launched under former President George W. Bush to limit the access points to the wider internet federal agencies used based on the logic of physical defense. And so, fewer entry and exit points made for a safer compound. However, over time, this proved problematic, especially as new technology came into use. Consequently, in the aforementioned OMB memorandum, the Trump Administration began a revamp from which these documents flow:
      • To continue to promote a consistent baseline of security capabilities, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will define TIC initiative requirements in documentation called TIC Use Cases (refer to Appendix A). TIC Use Case documentation will outline which alternative security controls, such as endpoint and user-based protections, must be in place for specific scenarios in which traffic may not be required to flow through a physical TIC access point. To promote flexibility while maintaining a focus on security outcomes, the capabilities used to meet TIC Use Case requirements may be separate from an agency’s existing network boundary solutions provided by a Trusted Internet Connection Access Provider (TICAP) or Managed Trusted Internet Protocol Services (MTIPS). Given the diversity of platforms and implementations across the Federal Government, TIC Use Cases will highlight proven, secure scenarios, where agencies have met requirements for government-wide intrusion detection and prevention efforts, such as the National Cybersecurity Protection System (including the EINSTEIN suite), without being required to route traffic through a TICAP/MTIPS solution.
    • In the Remote User Use Case, it is explained that
      • The TIC 3.0 Remote User Use Case (Remote User Use Case) defines how network and multi-boundary security should be applied when an agency permits remote users on their network. A remote user is an agency user that performs sanctioned business functions outside of a physical agency premises. The remote user scenario has two distinguishing characteristics:
        • 1. Remote user devices are not directly connected to network infrastructure that is managed and maintained by the agency.
        • 2. Remote user devices are intended for individual use (i.e., not a server).
      • In contrast, when remote user devices are directly connected to local area networks and other devices that are managed and maintained by the agency, it would be considered either an agency campus or a branch office scenario. TIC architectures for agency campus and branch office scenarios are enumerated in the TIC 3.0 Traditional TIC Use Case and the TIC 3.0 Branch Office Use Case respectively.
    • In NCIRA, it is stated:
      • The NCPS Cloud Interface Reference Architecture is being released as two individual volumes. The first volume provides an overview of changes to NCPS to accommodate the collection of relevant data from agencies’ cloud environments and provides general reporting patterns for sending cloud telemetry to CISA. This second volume builds upon the concepts presented in NCPS Cloud Interface Reference Architecture: Volume One and provides an index of common cloud telemetry reporting patterns and characteristics for how agencies can send cloud-specific data to the NCPS cloud-based architecture. Individual cloud service providers (CSPs) can refer to the reporting patterns in this volume to offer guidance on their solutions that allow agencies to send cloud telemetry to CISA in fulfillment of NCPS requirements.
  • The Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) published its “2020 Annual Report” “on human rights and the rule of law in China.” The CECC found that:
    • the Chinese government and Communist Party have taken unprecedented steps to extend their repressive policies through censorship, intimidation, and the detention of people in China for exercising their fundamental human rights. Nowhere is this more evident than in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) where new evidence emerged that crimes against humanity—and possibly genocide—are occurring, and in Hong Kong, where the ‘‘one country, two systems’’ frame-work has been effectively dismantled.
    • These policies are in direct violation of China’s Constitution, which guarantees ‘‘freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration,’’ as well as ‘‘freedom of religious belief.’’ The actions of the Chinese government also contravene both the letter and the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; violate its obligations under the Inter-national Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which the Chinese government has signed but not ratified; and violate the Inter-national Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, ratified in 2001. Further, the Chinese government has abandoned any pretense of adhering to the legally binding commitments it made to the international community when it signed the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration on the future of Hong Kong.
    • President and Party General Secretary Xi Jinping has tightened his grip over China’s one-party authoritarian system, and the Party has further absorbed key government functions while also enhancing its control over universities and businesses. Authorities promoted the official ideology of ‘‘Xi Jinping Thought’’ on social media and required Party members, government officials, journalists, and students to study it, making the ideology both pervasive, and for much of the country, mandatory.
    • Regarding freedom of expression, the CECC recommended:
      • Give greater public expression, including at the highest levels of the U.S. Government, to the issue of press freedom in China, condemning: the harassment and detention of both domestic and foreign journalists; the denial, threat of denial, or delay of visas for foreign journalists; and the censorship of foreign media websites. Consistently link press freedom to U.S. interests, noting that censorship and restrictions on journalists and media websites prevent the free flow of information on issues of public concern, including public health and environ-mental crises, food safety problems, and corruption, and act as trade barriers for foreign companies attempting to access the Chinese market. Assess the extent to which China’s treatment of foreign journalists contravenes its World Trade Organization commitments and other obligations.
      • Sustain, and where appropriate, expand, programs that develop and widely distribute technologies that will assist Chinese human rights advocates and civil society organizations in circumventing internet restrictions, in order to access and share content protected under international human rights standards. Continue to maintain internet freedom programs for China at the U.S. Department of State and the United States Agency for Global Media to provide digital security training and capacity-building efforts for bloggers, journalists, civil society organizations, and human rights and internet freedom advocates in China.
      • Raise with Chinese officials, during all appropriate bilateral discussions, the cost to U.S.-China relations and to the Chinese public’s confidence in government institutions that is incurred when the Chinese government restricts political debate, advocacy for democracy or human rights, and other forms of peaceful  political  expression.  Emphasize  that  such  restrictions  violate  international  standards  for  free  expression,  particularly  those  contained  in  Article  19  of  the  International  Covenant  on  Civil  and  Political  Rights  and  Article  19  of  the  Universal  Declaration of Human Rights.
  • The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) issued its “Recommendations to the Biden Administration and 117th Congress to Advance Civil Rights & Civil Liberties in the Digital Age” that called for reform to content moderation, election law, privacy, big data, and other policy areas.
  • A United States (U.S.) federal court denied Parler’s request for a preliminary injunction against Amazon Web Services (AWS) after the latter shut down the former’s website for repeated violations of their contract, including the use of the conservative tilting platform during the 6 January 2021 insurrection at the United States Capitol. Parler was essentially asking the court to force AWS to once again host its website while its litigation was pending. The court reviewed Parler’s claims and clarified the scope of the case:
    • In its Complaint, Parler asserts three claims: (1) for conspiracy in restraint of trade, in violation of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1; (2) for breach of contract; and (3) for tortious interference with business expectancy. AWS disputes all three claims, asserting that it is Parler, not AWS, that has violated the terms of the parties’ Agreement, and in particular AWS’s Acceptable Use Policy, which prohibits the “illegal, harmful, or offensive” use of AWS services.
    • It is important to note what this case is not about. Parler is not asserting a violation of any First Amendment rights, which exist only against a governmental entity, and not against a private company like AWS. And indeed, Parler has not disputed that at least some of the abusive and violent posts that gave rise to the issues in this case violate AWS’s Acceptable Use Policy. This motion also does not ask the Court to make a final ruling on the merits of Parler’s claims. As a motion for a preliminary injunction, before any discovery has been conducted, Parler seeks only to have the Court determine the likelihood that Parler will ultimately prevail on its claims, and to order AWS to restore service to Parler pending a full and fair litigation of the issues raised in the Complaint.
    • However, the court ruled against Parler:
      • Parler has failed to meet the standard set by Ninth Circuit and U.S. Supreme Court precedent for issuance of a preliminary injunction. To be clear, the Court is not dismissing Parler’s substantive underlying claims at this time. Parler has fallen far short, however, of demonstrating, as it must, that it has raised serious questions going to the merits of its claims, or that the balance of hardships tips sharply in its favor. It has also failed to demonstrate that it is likely to prevail on the merits of any of its three claims; that the balance of equities tips in its favor, let alone strongly so; or that the public interests lie in granting the injunction.
  • The United States (U.S.) Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) issued a statutorily required “National Strategy to Secure 5G Implementation Plan” and Appendices. The NTIA explained:
    • In accordance with the Secure 5G and Beyond Act of 2020, the Executive Branch has developed a comprehensive implementation plan. This implementation will be managed under the leadership of the National Security Council and the National Economic Council, supported by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), and with contributions from and coordination among a wide range of departments and agencies. The implementation plan took into account the 69 substantive comments in response to NTIA’s Request for Comments received from companies, industry associations, and think tanks representing a range of interests and aspects of the telecommunications ecosystem. Consistent with the National Strategy to Secure 5G, the implementation plan encompasses four lines of effort:
      • Line of Effort One: Facilitate Domestic 5G Rollout: The first line of effort establishes a new research and development initiative to develop advanced communications and networking capabilities to achieve security, resilience, safety, privacy, and coverage of 5G and beyond at an affordable cost. Advancement of United States leadership in Secure 5G and beyond systems and applications will be accomplished by enhancing centers of research and development and manufacturing. These efforts will leverage public-private partnerships spanning government, industry, academia, national laboratories, and international allies. This line of effort also intends to identify incentives and options to leverage trusted international suppliers, both to facilitate secure and competitive 5G buildouts, and to ensure the global competitiveness of United States manufacturers and suppliers.
      • Line of Effort Two: Assess Risks to & Identify Core Security Principles of 5G Infrastructure: The second line of effort is oriented toward identifying and assessing risks and vulnerabilities to 5G infrastructure, building on existing capabilities in assessing and managing supply chain risk. This work will also involve the development of criteria for trusted suppliers and the application of a vendor supply chain risk management template to enable security-conscious acquisition decision-making. Several agencies have responsibilities for assessing threats as the United States’ manages risks associated with the global and regional adoption of 5G network technology as well as developing mitigation strategies to combat any identified threats. These threat assessments take into account, as appropriate, requirements from entities such as the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), the Executive Order (E.O.) on Establishing the Committee for the Assessment of Foreign Participation in the United States Telecommunications Services Sector (Team Telecom), and the Federal Acquisition Security Council (FASC). In addition, this line of effort will identify security gaps in United States and international supply chains and an assessment of the global competitiveness and economic vulnerabilities of United States manufacturers and suppliers. Finally, this set of activities will include working closely with the private sector and other stakeholders to identify, develop, and apply core security principles for 5G infrastructure. These efforts will include leveraging the Enduring Security Framework (ESF), a working group under the Critical Infrastructure Partnership Advisory Council (CIPAC). These emerging security principles will be synchronized with or complementary to other 5G security principles, such as the “Prague Proposals” from the Prague 5G Security Conference held in May 2019.
      • Line of Effort Three: Address Risks to United States Economic and National Security during Development and Deployment of 5G Infrastructure Worldwide: The third line of effort involves addressing the risks to United States economic and national security during the development and deployment of 5G infrastructure worldwide. As a part of this effort, the United States will identify the incentives and policies necessary to close identified security gaps in close coordination with the private sector and through the continuous evaluation of commercial, security, and technological developments in 5G networks. A related activity is the identification of policies that can ensure the economic viability of the United States domestic industrial base, in coordination with the private sector through listening sessions and reviews of best practices. An equally important activity relates to the identification and assessment of “high risk” vendors in United States5G infrastructure, through efforts such as the Implementation of E.O. 13873, on “Securing the Information and Communications Technology and Services Supply Chain.” These efforts will build on the work of the CFIUS, the FASC, and Team Telecom reviews of certain Federal Communications Commission (FCC) licenses involving foreign ownership. This element of the implementation plan will also involve more intense engagement with the owners and operators of private sector communications infrastructure, systems equipment developers, and other critical infrastructure owners and operators. The engagements will involve sharing information on 5G and future generation wireless communications systems and infrastructure equipment. Such work will be conducted through the Network Security Information Exchange, the IT and Communications Sector and Government Coordinating Councils, the National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee, and NTIA’s Communications Supply Chain Risk Information Partnership (C-SCRIP).
      • Line of Effort Four: Promote Responsible Global Development and Deployment of 5G: The fourth line of effort addresses the responsible global development and deployment of 5G technology. A key component of this line of effort is diplomatic outreach and engagement to advocate for the adoption and implementation of 5G security measures that prohibit the use of untrusted vendors in all parts of 5G networks. A related component involves the provision of technical assistance to mutual defense treaty allies and strategic partners of the United States to maximize the security oftheir5G and future generations of wireless communications systems and infrastructure. The goal of providing financing support and technical assistance is to help enable countries and private companies to develop secure and trusted next generation networks that are free of untrusted vendors and that increase global connectivity. A key part of 5G deployment involves international standards development, thus the implementation plan outlines several steps in support of the goal of strengthening and expanding United States leadership in international standards bodies and voluntary consensus-based standards organizations, including strengthening coordination with and among the private sector. This line of effort will also include collaboration with allies and partners with regard to testing programs to ensure secure 5G and future wireless communications systems and infrastructure equipment, including spectrum-related testing. To successfully execute this work, continued close coordination between the United States Government, private sector, academic, and international government partners is required to ensure adoption of policies, standards, guidelines, and procurement strategies that reinforce 5G vendor diversity and foster market competition. The overarching goals of this line of effort are to promote United States-led or linked technology solutions in the global market; remove and reduce regulatory and trade barriers that harm United States competitiveness; provide support for trusted vendors; and advocate for policies and laws that promote open, competitive markets for United States technology companies. This will also be supported through close collaboration with partners on options to advance the development and deployment of open interfaced, standards-based, and interoperable 5G networks.
  • The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued its annual “Broadband Deployment Report,” one of the last reports on FCC policy under the stewardship of former Chair Ajit Pai. In the agency’s press release, Pai claimed “[i]n just three years, the number of American consumers living in areas without access to fixed broadband at 25/3 Mbps has been nearly cut in half.” He added:
    • These successes resulted from forward-thinking policies that removed barriers to infrastructure investment and promoted competition and innovation.  I look forward to seeing the Commission continue its efforts to ensure that all Americans have broadband access.  Especially with the success of last year’s Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I auction, I have no doubt that these figures will continue to improve as auction winners deploy networks in the areas for which they got FCC funding.
    • In relevant part, the FCC claimed:
      • Moreover, more than three-quarters of those in newly served areas, nearly 3.7 million, are located in rural areas, bringing the number of rural Americans in areas served by at least 25/3 Mbps to nearly 83%. Since 2016, the number of Americans living in rural areas lacking access to 25/3 Mbps service has fallen more than 46%.  As a result, the rural–urban divide is rapidly closing; the gap between the percentage of urban Americans and the percentage of rural Americans with access to 25/3 Mbps fixed broadband has been nearly halved, falling from 30 points at the end of 2016 to just 16 points at the end of 2019.
      • With regard to mobile broadband, since 2018, the number of Americans lacking access to 4G LTE mobile broadband with a median speed of 10/3 Mbps was reduced by more than 57%, including a nearly 54% decrease among rural Americans.  As of the end of 2019, the vast majority of Americans, 94% had access to both 25/3 Mbps fixed broadband service and mobile broadband service with a median speed of 10/3 Mbps. Also as of the end of 2019, mobile providers now provide access to 5G capability to approximately 60% of Americans. These strides in mobile broadband deployment were fueled by more than $29 billion of capital expenditures in 2019 (roughly 18% of global mobile capital spending), the largest mobile broadband investment since 2015.
      • .  With this Report, the Commission fulfills the Congressional directive to report each year on the progress made in deploying broadband to all Americans. Despite this finding, our work to close the digital divide is not complete.  The Commission will continue its efforts to ensure that all Americans have the ability to access broadband.
  • The chair of the House Oversight and Reform Committee wrote a letter asking Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray to conduct “a comprehensive investigation into the role that the social media site Parler played in the assault on the Capitol on January 6.” Chair Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) indicated her committee is also investigating the events of 6 January, suggesting there could be hearings soon on the matter. In the letter, Maloney asserted:
    • It is clear that Parler houses additional evidence critical to investigations of the attack on the Capitol. One commentator has already used geolocation data associated with Parler to track 1,200 videos that were uploaded in Washington, D.C. on January 6.
    • Questions have also been raised about Parler’s financing and its ties to Russia, which the Intelligence Community has warned is continuing to use social media and other measures to sow discord in the United States and interfere with our democracy. For example, posters on Parler have reportedly been traced back to Russian disinformation campaigns. The company was founded by John Matze shortly after he traveled in Russia with his wife, who is Russian and whose family reportedly has ties to the Russian government. Concerns about the company’s connections to Russia have grown since the company re-emerged on a Russian hosting service, DDos-Guard, after being denied services by Amazon Web Services. DDos-Guard has ties to the Russian government and hosts the websites of other far-right extremist groups, as well as the terrorist group Hamas.According to another recent report, “DDoS-Guard’s other clients include the Russian ministry of defence, as well as media organisations in Moscow.”
    • Given these concerns, we ask that the FBI undertake a robust review of the role played by Parler in the January 6 attacks, including (1) as a potential facilitator of planning and incitement related to the attacks, (2) as a repository of key evidence posted by users on its site, and (3) as potential conduit for foreign governments who may be financing civil unrest in the United States.
  • Microsoft released further detailed, technical findings from its investigation into the wide-ranging SolarWinds hack. Last month, Microsoft revealed that its source code had been accessed as part of the Russian hack and stressed that source code for its products had not been changed or tampered with. In its update on its SolarWinds investigation, Microsoft explained:
    • As we continue to gain deeper understanding of the Solorigate attack, we get a clearer picture of the skill level of the attackers and the extent of planning they put into pulling off one of the most sophisticated attacks in recent history. The combination of a complex attack chain and a protracted operation means that defensive solutions need to have comprehensive cross-domain visibility into attacker activity and provide months of historical data with powerful hunting tools to investigate as far back as necessary.
    • More than a month into the discovery of Solorigate, investigations continue to unearth new details that prove it is one of the most sophisticated and protracted intrusion attacks of the decade. Our continued analysis of threat data shows that the attackers behind Solorigate are skilled campaign operators who carefully planned and executed the attack, remaining elusive while maintaining persistence. These attackers appear to be knowledgeable about operations security and performing malicious activity with minimal footprint. In this blog, we’ll share new information to help better understand how the attack transpired. Our goal is to continue empowering the defender community by helping to increase their ability to hunt for the earliest artifacts of compromise and protect their networks from this threat.
    • As mentioned, in a 31 December 2020 blog posting, Microsoft revealed:
      • Our investigation has, however, revealed attempted activities beyond just the presence of malicious SolarWinds code in our environment. This activity has not put at risk the security of our services or any customer data, but we want to be transparent and share what we’re learning as we combat what we believe is a very sophisticated nation-state actor.
      • We detected unusual activity with a small number of internal accounts and upon review, we discovered one account had been used to view source code in a number of source code repositories. The account did not have permissions to modify any code or engineering systems and our investigation further confirmed no changes were made. These accounts were investigated and remediated.
  • The Trump Administration’s United States Trade Representative (USTR) weighed in on Australia’s proposed law to make Google, Facebook, and other technology companies pay for using Australian media content. The USTR reiterated the United States (U.S.) position that forcing U.S. firms to pay for content, as proposed, in unacceptable. It is likely the view of a Biden Administration is not likely to change. The Australian Senate committee considering the “Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2020” had asked for input. In relevant part, the USTR argued:
    • the U.S. Government is concerned that an attempt, through legislation, to regulate the competitive positions of specific players in a fast-evolving digital market, to the clear detriment of two U.S. firms, may result in harmful outcomes. There may also be long-lasting negative consequences for U.S. and Australian firms, as well as Australian consumers. While the revised draft has partially addressed some U.S. concerns—including an effort to move towards a more balanced evaluation of the value news businesses and platforms offer each other in the context of mandatory arbitration—significant issues remain.
  • Plaintiffs have filed suit in California state court against WeChat and Tencent by Plaintiff Citizen Power Initiatives for China (CPIFC) and six unnamed California residents who use WeChat. They argue that the government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) controls WeChat and forces it and its parent, Tencent, to turn over user data to the PRC in violation of California law. They make other allegations of unlawful conduct, including denying users in California the right to access funds though the app in the PRC. They are seeking class action status in order to bring a larger action against the PRC company. The plaintiffs claimed:
    • This case arises from Tencent’s practices of profiting from politically motivated, pro-Chinese Communist Party (“CCP”) censorship and surveillance of California WeChat users (“challenged practices”), which includes the practice of turning over private user data and communications to the government of the People’s Republic of China (“PRC government,” and, together with the CCP, the “Party-state”), and which inflicts an array of harms. Specifically, the challenged practices include Tencent’s practices of: (i) turning over private California WeChat user data and communications to the Party-state; (ii) profiting by using California WeChat user data and communications to improve Tencent’s censorship and surveillance algorithms; (iii) censoring and surveilling California WeChat user communications for content perceived as critical of the Party-state; (iv) suspending, blocking, or deleting California WeChat user accounts and/or data over such content; and (v) prohibiting California WeChat users from withdrawing funds stored in their WeChat accounts when those users do not possess an account with a PRC financial institution subject to monitoring by the Party-state.
    • This action also challenges provisions in Tencent’s terms of service and privacy policy  which,  taken  together,  are  oppressive,  obfuscatory,  and  incoherent  (“challenged provisions”). The challenged provisions include privacy-related terms that are deliberately vague and ambiguous with respect to whether the challenged practices are permitted or prohibited (“vague and ambiguous privacy provisions”), which in turn benefits Tencent by reserving to it the right to adopt self-interested interpretations. However, California WeChat users are entitled to clear, unambiguous, and testable language with respect to the nature and scope of their privacy on WeChat—in other words, to honesty and transparency.
    • Yet, even if the challenged practices were unambiguously prohibited under the challenged provisions, the challenged provisions include terms that make it practically impossible for California WeChat users to seek meaningful redress for the harms caused by those practices (“remedy-limiting provisions”). 
    • Finally, the challenged provisions include terms that impermissibly discriminate against California WeChat users who happen to be citizens of the PRC (“long-arm provisions”).
  • Representatives Anna Eshoo (D-CA) and Tom Malinowski (D-NJ) wrote the CEOs of Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube “urging the companies to address the fundamental design features of their social networks that facilitate the spread of extreme, radicalizing content to their users” per their press release. Last fall, Eshoo and Malinowski introduced the “Protecting Americans from Dangerous Algorithms Act” (H.R.8636) that would subject platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube to civil suits on the basis of the algorithms used to amplify content that violates the civil rights of others or results in international terrorism. They asserted:
    • The lawmakers note that the rioters who attacked the Capitol earlier this month were radicalized in part in digital echo chambers that these platforms designed, built, and maintained, and that the platforms are partially responsible for undermining our shared sense of objective reality, for intensifying fringe political beliefs, for facilitating connections between extremists, leading some of them to commit real-world, physical violence.
  • The United States (U.S.) Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) announced “[u]sing enterprise risk management best practices will be a focus for CISA in 2021, and today the National Risk Management Center (NRMC) is launching a Systemic Cyber Risk Reduction Venture to organize our work to reduce shared risk to the Nation’s security and economic security.” CISA explained that “[w]e anticipate three overarching lines of effort:
    • Build the Underlying Architecture for Cyber Risk Analysis to Critical Infrastructure. The critical infrastructure community is underpinned by a dependent web of hardware, software, services, and other connected componentry.
    • Cyber Risk Metric Development. Supporting efforts to better understand the impact of cyber risk across the critical infrastructure community will require developing usable metrics to quantify cyber risk in terms of functional loss. There’s no need to get bogged down with Greek equations with decimal place-level specificity. Metrics that provide even directional or comparative indicators are enormously helpful.
    • Promoting Tools to Address Concentrated Sources of Cyber Risk. Central to our venture to reduce systemic cyber risk is finding concentrated sources of risk that, if mitigated, provide heightened risk management bang for the buck if addressed.
  • The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) issued its first assessment of a government program to fund research and development of advanced information technology for the first time since 2015. PCAST explained:
    • As required by statute, PCAST is tasked with periodically reviewing the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) Program, the Nation’s primary source of federally funded research and development in advanced information technologies such as computing, networking, and software. This report examines the NITRD Program’s progress since the last review was conducted in 2015, explores emerging areas of interest relevant to the NITRD Program, and presents PCAST’s findings and recommendations.
    • PCAST made the following recommendations:
      • Recommendation 1: The current NITRD Program model and its approach to coordinating foundational research in NIT fields across participating agencies should continue as constituted, with the following modifications:
        • NITRD groups should continue to review the PCAs regularly using a fast track action committee (FTAC) and adjust as needed (with a frequency of perhaps every 3 years rather than every 5–6 years, as had been recommended in the 2015 NITRD Review). It should also continue to review IWGs periodically, as recommended in the 2015 NITRD Review.
        • The NITRD Program should continue to pursue incremental modifications of existing structures (e.g., IWGs, PCAs) rather than engage in wholesale reorganizations at this time.
        • When launching wholly new IWGs and PCAs (e.g., such as the AI IWG and AI PCA), the NITRD Program should consider showing clearly in the annual NITRD Supplement to the President’s Budget which lines of effort derive from previous structures and which are wholly new programmatic areas and funding lines. This will be especially important should NITRD groups increase the frequency with which they review and modify PCAs.
      • Recommendation 2: The NITRD Program should examine current structures and operations to identify opportunities for greater multi-sector engagement in its activities. Opportunities include the following:
        • Amplify multi-sector outreach and engagement efforts. While the NITRD Program notifies the public about its convening activities, it could augment its outreach.
        • Expand the NITRD Program’s efforts to track non-U.S. coordinated NIT efforts and collaborate with international efforts where appropriate. This should be done in coordination with the NSTC International S&T Coordination Subcommittee to avoid duplicating efforts.
      • Recommendation 3: The NITRD Program should examine current structures and operations to identify opportunities for improving coordination in IotF areas related to the program. Opportunities could include:
        • AI—continue coordination efforts within the NITRD Program and between NITRD IWGs and the NSTC Select Committee on AI and the Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence (MLAI) Subcommittee.
        • Advanced communications networks—continue coordination efforts within the NITRD Program through the Subcommittee and the LSN and WSRD IWGs.
        • QIS—increase coordination with the NQCO and the NSTC QIS Subcommittee, particularly on topics such as post-quantum cryptography R&D and other implications of the development of quantum technologies on the NIT landscape with advances in QIS.
        • Biotechnology—coordinate with NSTC bodies working in biosciences-related areas such as the Biodefense R&D (BDRD) Subcommittee and the Biological Sciences Subcommittee (BSSC).
        • Advanced manufacturing—coordinate with the NSTC Subcommittee on Advanced
        • Manufacturing and large-scale manufacturing R&D efforts such as the Manufacturing USA Institutes.
      • Recommendation 4: The NITRD Program should incorporate microelectronics R&D explicitly into its programmatic activities.
        • Could take the form of a separate IWG or incorporating hardware/components R&D into existing IWGs.
        • Should be stronger NNI-NITRD coordination to ensure alignment of R&D strategies and programmatic activities.
      • Recommendation 5: The NITRD Program should further examine ways it can coordinate its participating agencies—such as through an IWG or other multiagency bodies—to ensure they support and emphasize the following:
        • STEM education, including PhD fellowships, in NIT.
        • Programs at the intersection and convergence of computational science and other fields (CS + X) at 2-year and 4-year educational institutions.
        • Retraining and upskilling the non-technical workforce to participate in the cyber-ready workforce.
        • A diverse and inclusive NIT workforce across all levels of technical staff, engineers, and scientists.
        • Strengthen efforts to attract and retain international students, scientists, and engineers who wish to contribute to NIT R&D in the United States. These efforts should be informed by conducting studies of the role that international talent plays in the U.S. NIT workforce and any factors affecting recent changes in recruitment and retention.

Coming Events

  • The Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee will hold a hearing on the nomination of Gina Raimondo to be the Secretary of Commerce on 26 January.
  • On 17 February, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will hold an open meeting, its first under acting Chair Jessica Rosenworcel, with this tentative agenda:
    • Presentation on the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program. The Commission will hear a presentation on the creation of an Emergency Broadband Benefit Program. Congress charged the FCC with developing a new $3.2 billion program to help Americans who are struggling to pay for internet service during the pandemic.
    • Presentation on COVID-19 Telehealth Program. The Commission will hear a presentation about the next steps for the agency’s COVID-19 Telehealth program. Congress recently provided an additional $249.95 million to support the FCC’s efforts to expand connected care throughout the country and help more patients receive health care safely.
    • Presentation on Improving Broadband Mapping Data. The Commission will hear a presentation on the work the agency is doing to improve its broadband maps. Congress directly appropriated $65 million to help the agency develop better data for improved maps.
    • Addressing 911 Fee Diversion. The Commission will consider a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that would implement section 902 of the Don’t Break Up the T-Band Act of 2020, which requires the Commission to take action to help address the diversion of 911 fees by states and other jurisdictions for purposes unrelated to 911. (PS Docket Nos. 20-291, 09-14)
    • Implementing the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act. The Commission will consider a Third Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that proposes to modify FCC rules consistent with changes that were made to the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act in the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021. (WC Docket No. 18-89)
  • On 27 July 2021, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will hold PrivacyCon 2021.

© Michael Kans, Michael Kans Blog and michaelkans.blog, 2019-2021. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Michael Kans, Michael Kans Blog, and michaelkans.blog with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Photo by Photoholgic on Unsplash

Published by Michael Kans

An attorney who specializes in technology policy, law, and politics with other areas of expertise.

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