Computing Research Policy Blog

Latest CRA-Bulletin is Out!


The latest issue of the CRA-Bulletin has been e-mailed to subscribers. You can find a web version here.
CRA-Bulletin is a free, occasional electronic bulletin to inform you about events we think are of interest to the computing community. You can find instructions on how to subscribe at the bottom of this page.

CA Attorney Gen. Circulates Anti-P2P Letter Authored by MPAA?


Wired has an eye-opening article on a draft letter circulated by the California Attorney General’s office to other state attorneys general that suggests peer-to-peer software producers are making a “dangerous product” and that the failure of technology makers to warn consumers could constitute a deceptive trade practice. More intriguing is that Wired obtained a copy of the draft document (a Word file) and reports that the document’s metadata suggests it was either authored by or reviewed by the Motion Picture Association of America.
The letter represents a continuation of the attack on P2P technologies themselves — rather than a focus on the illegal activities — begun by groups like MPAA and RIAA. From the letter (which is intended for P2P software producers):

It is widely recognized that P2P file-sharing software currently is used almost exclusively to disseminate pornography, and to illegally trade copyrighted music, movies, software and video games. File-sharing software also is increasingly becoming a means to disseminate computer worms and viruses. Nevertheless, your company still does little to warn consumers about the legal and personal risks they face when they use your software to “share” copyrighted music, movies and computer software. A failure to prominently and adequately warn consumers, particularly when you advertise and sell paid versions of your software, could constitute, at the very least, a deceptive trade practice.

Fred Lohman, of The Electronic Frontier Foundation, is quoted a bit later in the article in reaction:

It’s one thing for the MPAA to come up with a theory like that, but it would be quite another for a state attorney general to adopt it. The principle has no limit — you can use Internet Explorer to violate the law or unintentionally access pornography, so does he want to suggest that Microsoft is also breaking the law? Why stop at the Internet — should Ford be held liable for failing to warn drivers that exceeding the speed limit will expose them to citations?”

Here are the other behaviors the letter writers believe characterize P2P programs:

Whether it is the widespread availability of pornography, including child pornography, the disclosure of sensitive personal information to millions of people, the exposure to pernicious computer worms and viruses or the threat of legal liability for copyright infringement, P2P file-sharing software has proven costly and dangerous for many consumers.

Not a very optimistic view of the technology….
Anyway, it’s not surprising that MPAA may have been involved in drafting the document, but that doesn’t make it any less unseemly. If nothing else it shows they still have a bit to learn about digital content.

FBI, Justice Seek Easier Internet Wiretaps


Just a quick link to a worrisome Washington Post story about a Justice Department petition to the FCC urgently requesting the agency intervene to require internet service providers to allow easier access to their networks for wiretapping purposes. The news article suggests that Justice is asking for technological changes to the network in order to make this possible, but I have not yet read the 75-page Justice Department petition (link forthcoming, hopefully).

DARPA takes aim at IT sacred cows


Government Computing News has an interesting, short article on DARPA’s focus on new computer architectures and networking protocols, discussed this week at the DARPATech conference in Anaheim.

Flaws in the basic building blocks of networking and computer science are hampering reliability, limiting flexibility and creating security vulnerabilities, program managers said this week at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s DARPATech conference.
Among the IT holy grails that DARPA wants to see revamped are the Internet Protocol, the seven-layer Open Systems Interconnection model—which defines how devices communicate on today’s networks—and the von Neumann architecture, the basic design style underpinning almost all computers built today.
Many military commanders have been slow to adapt IT for critical tasks because they sense the equipment is unreliable, said Col. Tim Gibson. He is a program manager for DARPA’s Advanced Technology Office, which is leading efforts to radically redefine computer architecture.
“You go to Wal-Mart and buy a telephone for less than $10 and you expect it to work,” Gibson said. Yet people usually do not expect the same of their computers. “We don’t expect computers to work, we expect them to have a problem.”
“If a commander expects a system to have a problem, then how could they rely upon it?” Gibson said.

There’s an aspect of this that could be worrisome. DARPA Director Tony Tether told CRA’s Computing Leadership Summit last month that the Department of Defense increasingly sees the Internet and computer networks in general as critical to its network-centric strategy of warfare. As a result, they are, with increasing frequency, moving their information security and assurance research into the “black” or classified world. They believe that any information about DOD’s capability — offensive or defensive — in network warfare is a threat to national security. It will be interesting to see how their focus on new paradigms for the “building blocks” of computing will exist in this new, more classified environment.

Science Committee Views on the Budget


The House Science Committee released its annual Views and Estimates, its analysis of the President’s budget request for the agencies and programs under the Committee’s jurisdiction. The Committee provides this analysis to the House Budget Committee, which is in the process of putting together the House Budget Resolution for FY 2005.
The document confirms that the Science Committee’s top objective for the coming year will be evaluating the President’s space exploration initiative. But also cited for attention interagency efforts for networking and information technology R&D and cyber security R&D. Here’s what the Committee had to say about the President’s request in those areas:

The Administration proposes a 1 percent decrease from the FY04 estimated level for the interagency program on Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD). This program includes important work on high-end computing and high-confidence software and systems, and the Committee believes that funding for work in this area should be raised, not lowered.
While cybersecurity R&D is not a formal Presidential initiative, significant effort is being put into programs in this area at a number of agencies. While the budget requests $76 million for cybersecurity R&D and education and training programs at NSF (up 19 percent) and $18.5 million for cybersecurity R&D at NIST (up 48 percent), this funding is still well below the levels authorized in the Cyber Security Research and Development Act (P.L. 107-305). In addition, within the DHS Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate, the FY05 budget requests only $18 million for cybersecurity R&D, the same level as in FY04. The Committee believes that increased funding for, and increased coordination of cybersecurity R&D programs are needed.

About half of the committee members endorsed this V&E, including the Committee Chair Sherwood Boehlert and new Committee Ranking Member Bart Gordon. Here’s the complete list.

CRA, Taulbee Survey Mentioned in NY Times


In a piece about the outsourcing phenomenon and its impact on computer science students, and Microsoft’s Bill Gates’ recent tour of UIUC, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, MIT, and Harvard trying to drum up enthusiasm for the discipline, the NY Times cited CRA’s Taulbee Survey as evidence of the declining numbers of undergraduates in comp sci. Despite the downturn, Gates used the visits to stress the positives.

In an effort to counter the trend, Mr. Gates, who personifies technological optimism and the potential payoff, sought to reassure students that their futures were no less bright in an era of outsourcing. The effect of computer technology, he told them, is just beginning and opportunity abounds. Computing, he added, is an ideal field for fine minds to make a difference in society.

Here’s the article: Microsoft, Amid Dwindling Interest, Talks Up Computing as a Career

USENIX Open Letter Re: SCO’s Assault on Open Source


Thanks to Ellie Young of USENIX for passing this along:

The SCO Group, Inc. (SCO) has recently sued IBM and Novell and launched broad attacks on the legality of and the economic justification for so-called open source licensing, including the free licensing of Linux. (see http://www.osaia.org/letters/sco_hill.pdf) As an organization dedicated to advancing the skills and contributions of computer researchers and developers, the USENIX Association is compelled to address and refute the position SCO has taken regarding open source software.
Usenix will be sending this letter to Congress and the press.

Hearings, Hearings, Hearings


The last two days have featured a number of congressional hearings of interest to the computing research community. Here’s a brief summary:
Senate VA-HUD Appropriations Subcommittee, Thursday – OSTP Director John Marburger, NSF Interim Director Arden Bement, and National Science Board Director Warren Washington testified before subcommittee chair Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) and Ranking Member Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) to defend the Administration’s FY 05 budget request for NSF and the physical sciences. Bond and Mikulski both cited the large disparity in federal funding between the life sciences supported by NIH and the physical sciences and engineering as supported by NSF. Bond said he was “alarmed by the disparity” and believed it put the nation on track to lose its leadership in technology. “I think we need to treat this as a crisis,” Mikulski agreed.
Senate Budget Committee, Wednesday – Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge told the Senate Budget committee that DHS was not using data-mining techniques to threaten the privacy of US citizens. “I can assure you nothing we are doing in the Department of Homeland Security has been designed to collect information or spy on Americans…We are getting access to personal information and to some extent, proprietary information,” Ridge said. (Thanks to Tech Daily (subscription req’d) for the quote). Ridge was responding to concerns from Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), the Senator who led the charge against DARPA’s Terrorism Information Awareness (TIA) project in 2003. Wyden has a very negative perception of data-mining, and believes its use by the federal government is intrinsically bad. “Nobody is in charge, nobody knows how many programs involve data mining, nobody knows how much money is being spent, or how many agencies, and no one knows whether there are any privacy protections,” he told Tech Daily.
House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Science, and Research and Development, Wednesday – DHS Undersecretary for Science and Technology Charles McQueary defended his agency’s decision to direct the most funding towards research aimed at preventing biological attacks rather than cyber security research. The ranking minority member of the full committee, Rep. Jim Turner (D-TX) criticized the funding level for cyber research, saying “I’m not certain I’m very comfortable with the process that leads us to conclude that $18 million (the DHS request for FY 2005) is sufficient for cyber.”
House VA-HUD Appropriations Subcommittee, Wednesday – OSTP Director John Marburger told the House appropriations subcommittee that he satisfied with the President’s request for R&D in FY 2005. “We’d be in good shape,” if the budget was enacted as proposed, he said. He also noted a few areas of technology he believed would provide the most return on the government investment in research, including nanotechnology, information technology, and biomedical research.
House Science Committee, Wednesday – The Science Committee heard testimony on the impact of US Visa Policy on Scientific Research at a hearing timed to correspond with the release of a new GAO study on the same subject commissioned by the committee one year ago. In the report, GAO found that the average delay in issuing a visa to a foreign researcher or student is 67 days, and that much of that delay is attributable to a faulty process for the Visa Mantis program. Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) noted the concerns the science committee has with the issue: “Americans must keep our doors open to innovation and new ideas. The work of foreign students and the collaboration with their American born colleagues has not only created scientific discoveries and technological advancements for our country, but it has resulted in job creation that our economy so desperately needs. The visa system should incorporate enhanced security checks that do not create unnecessary or burdensome bureaucracies that will only further damage our scientific leadership and image throughout the world.”
House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection, Tuesday – In a suprise move, Subcommittee Chair Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) introduced his own version of a database protections bill, reneging on an agreement the committee had reached with the House Judiciary Committee, which has already passed its version of the legislation. Stearns bill, which was subsequently approved by the subcommittee, is a more restrictive version of the judiciary committee bill — a bill which would provide publishers of databases of facts broad protections against the misappropriations of their databases. Stearns bill sets a more stringent test for content to be protected than the judiciary measure, which is supported by a coalition of database companies, publishers, realtors and newspaper companies. USACM has some great background material on the issue. Wednesday’s markup throws into doubt the fate of either bill, as the House Leadership had counted on an agreement between the two committees to work together.

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