The European Commission released a broad Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) strategy today, which defines outstanding initiatives in the areas of authors’ IPRs, trademarks, designs, and geographical indications. The preliminary Directive covering orphan works was introduced today. Other topics will be introduced in the second half of the year or next year. The Computer & Communications Industry Association…
The proposed takeover of T-Mobile USA’s wireless communications business by AT&T raises serious competition policy issues that require careful analysis by the Federal Communications Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. The proposed transaction would reduce the number of national wireless carriers from four to three, and more importantly, create an…
The proposed takeover of T-Mobile USA’s wireless communications business by AT&T raises serious competition policy issues that require careful analysis by the Federal Communications Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. The proposed transaction would reduce the number of national wireless carriers from four to three, and more importantly, create an…
Top officials from the DOJ, Commerce, DHS and DOD briefed Senate committee staffers this week on the White House’s long awaited cybersecurity legislative proposal unveiled last week. The Obama Administration announcement is a series of proposed pieces of legislation in a number of different areas, all aimed at encouraging the protection of federal systems and…
Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy has introduced long awaited legislation to update the Electronic Communications Privacy Act that sets the ground rules for law enforcement to gather electronic information on citizens. The existing ECPA law was written before the modern Internet had developed. We now rely more on computing, including cloud computing, and face complex issues…
Today, the blogosphere has lit up with controversy as the Bill Formerly Known As COICA was reintroduced in the Senate, sporting a new coat of paint and a freshly minted backronym: “the PROTECTIP Act.” TechDirt, Public Knowledge, Prof. Wendy Seltzer, the Technology Liberation Front, CDT, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have all weighed in with a variety of concerns. CCIA’s statement is here. By…
Senators Leahy, Hatch and Grassley are reintroducing legislation, which will impose a mandate on additional industries to enforce copyright laws. Instead of COICA, the new acronym appears to sound less controversial – PROTECT IP. Like COICA, the new legislation would have the Attorney General serve court orders demanding credit card companies, ad networks and domain…
Two new pieces of privacy legislation and a hearing are keeping Congress busy this week, while the United Kingdom’s Information Commissioner’s Office just released a new set of rules for the use of cookies by websites. Center ring at the privacy circus this week was the first hearing called by the Senate Judiciary’s new Technology,…
After putting AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint and Cellular South CEOs under oath, Senators on the Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust asked tough questions about what the deal would really mean for the prices and service available to all mobile phone and Internet customers. Chairman Kohl admonished AT&T’s CEO as a fellow businessman not to pretend the merger…
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