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Clips January 17, 2003

Clips January 17, 2003

ARTICLES

Military worried about Web leaks
FTC Targets International License Scam
Librarians Split on Sharing Info
FCC: Open up TV waves to wireless
Technology Center Aims to Close 'Digital Divide'
Adm. Doran promotes biometrics, joint training
'Hello, SSA, it's me'
Firm picked for USAJobs overhaul
Critical infrastructure chief leaves Commerce post
Piracy, CD-burning contributing to music industry's woes

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CNET.com
Military worried about Web leaks
By Declan McCullagh
January 16, 2003, 3:58 PM PT

WASHINGTON--The U.S. Defense Department is worried that sensitive information remains exposed on its Web sites.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned in a directive sent to military units this week that too much unclassified but worrisome material was popping up on the Web, and said Al Qaeda and other foes were sure to take advantage of it.

The directive, drafted as the U.S. is readying troops for a possible attack on Iraq, reminded military Webmasters they must adhere to the department's 1998 policies and procedures.

Rumsfeld's order further restricts what information will be publicly available on military sites, effectively tightening controls that have been in place for at least five years and that became far more strict after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

"An Al Qaeda training manual recovered in Afghanistan states: 'Using public sources openly and without resorting to illegal means, it is possible to gather at least 80 percent of information about the enemy,'" Rumsfeld wrote. "At more than 700 gigabytes, the DoD Web-based data makes a vast, readily available source of information on DoD plans, programs and activities. One must conclude our enemies access DoD Web sites on a regular basis."

Steven Aftergood, an analyst at the Federation of American Scientists who works to limit government secrecy, says that Rumsfeld's order is too broad.

"I'm concerned that it sends a chilling signal that will only accelerate the withdrawal of public information from the Web," Aftergood said. "If he had said anything like operational plans should not be on the Web, I'd be hard pressed to disagree with that. But what he said is that anything that might be useful to an adversary should not be on the Web. And that is overreaching, because anything could be useful to an adversary."

The Federation of American Scientists, which was founded in 1945 by Manhattan Project scientists, removed hundreds of documents from its vast archive of military information after the Sept. 11 attacks. But Aftergood said the information included photos of military bases and building schematics that represented only a small fraction of the total the group makes available to the public.

There have been no confirmed reports about classified information making its way to military sites, but Rumsfeld said he was concerned about other categories he dubbed "sensitive" or "for official use only." Rumsfeld's directive was first reported by InsideDefense.com.

Rumsfeld said that 1,500 instances of such public distribution have been spotted in the last year. Those appearances could violate the 1998 DoD policy, which says: "A DoD Web site may not post For Official Use Only information, or information not specifically cleared and approved for public release unless it employs adequate security and access controls."

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration has "vastly expanded the zone of secrecy that surrounds the White House and most of the federal government," according to an October 2002 report from the advocacy group OMB Watch. The report says that thousands of documents and tremendous amounts of data have been removed from government sites, including airport safety data, environmental data, and information that remains available on private-sector sites.

In an October 2001 memorandum distributed throughout the government, Attorney General John Ashcroft formally reduced the amount of information federal agencies would make available. Ashcroft wrote that in nearly all cases, the Justice Department would seek to defend an agency's decision not to release records requested under the Freedom of Information Act.
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Associated Press
FTC Targets International License Scam
Thu Jan 16, 1:59 PM ET
By DAVID HO, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Federal regulators are accusing six marketers of selling over the Internet bogus international driver's permits, often to immigrants looking for legitimate identification documents.


The Federal Trade Commission said Thursday it was seeking injunctions to prevent the marketers from selling the fake documents. The cases were filed this month in federal courts in California, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and the District of Columbia.

International driver's permits are intended to help people with valid driver's licenses drive in foreign countries that have signed a U.N. traffic convention, the FTC said. The permit is a booklet that translates a government-issued driver's license into different languages. It is not a substitute for a license.

Only the American Automobile Association and American Automobile Touring Alliance can issue the permits in the United States.


Howard Beales, director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, said there is no evidence of a connection between the fake documents and terrorism, but the agency is concerned the permits could be a first step for people seeking to create more elaborate false identities.


"This is a fairly easy document to get as a fake ID," Beales said at a news conference.


The FTC charged that the marketers falsely claimed the permits were a legitimate alternative to state-issued driver's licenses, allowing users to drive legally in the United States even if they have suspended or revoked licenses. The marketers also promoted the permits as acceptable substitutes for government-issued photo identification.


"Victims don't necessarily know they're victims until pretty late in the game," Beales said. "They might be arrested for driving without a license or presenting a false ID to a police officer."


He said the marketers used e-mail spam and Web sites to sell the permits for between $65 and $375. Real permits are just $10.


Beales said he did not know how many bogus permits had been sold.


"These scams lead innocent travelers to spend hundreds of dollars for false documents," said Sandra Hughes, vice president of AAA Travel. "Even worse, they encourage unlicensed drivers to return to our highways, endangering all of us."


The FTC filed complaints against the following people and companies, some of which operated under multiple names:


_Yad Abraham, also known as Tim Thorn and Timothy Thorn, and doing business as Sharpthorn Internet Solutions and Internex.


_Jaguar Business Concepts, doing business as Libertymall.com and Cheyenne Investment Alliance, and Jacqueline Demer as a Cheyenne manager.


_Jordan Maxwell, also known as Russell Pine, doing business as BBCOA, BBC of America, Better Book and Cassette of America, and Vic Varjabedian, also known as Varouj Varjabedian.


_William Scott Dion, individually and doing business as PT Resource Center and PTRC, also known as Don Glessner.


_Carlton Press Inc., Carlton Press Ltd., and Kim Fleming Bo Weiss.


_the Institute for International Licensing, Aladdin Financial Management, University Systems, and Wheelie International Limited.
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Wired News
Librarians Split on Sharing Info
02:35 PM Jan. 16, 2003 PT

In the year following the passage of the Patriot Act, librarians' response to law enforcement requests for patrons' records has been sharply divided, according to a nationwide survey.

The Patriot Act allows investigators to seize patrons' book-borrowing and Internet-surfing records to investigate terrorist leads; it also prohibits library staff from publicizing law enforcement requests for such materials.

The survey (PDF) of 906 libraries by the Library Research Center at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign found that in the year following the Sept. 11 attacks, federal and local law enforcement agents visited at least 545 libraries to inquire after patrons' records.

When asked to voluntarily forfeit patrons' records, roughly half the librarians cooperated with investigators without demanding a subpoena or court order, the study found.

"What surprised me most was real tension between personal beliefs and concern about what librarians are obligated to do under the law," said center director Leigh Estabrook.

Estabrook said librarians -- traditionally fierce guardians of free speech and information access -- have been forced to juggle conflicting obligations: protecting patrons' privacy as good librarians and collaborating with law enforcement requests as good citizens.

"There's so much emphasis in the media of needing to be fearful of terrorist activity," said Estabrook. "It's no wonder that some librarians have bought into those fears."

In the collaborative vein, some libraries have begun to ask patrons to show identification before using Internet terminals, while others have withdrawn materials that could be used to plan terrorist attacks, such as materials on bomb making or bio-terrorism.

Nevertheless, 60 percent of the librarians who responded said they believed the gag order precluding them from publicizing visits from investigators was an abridgement of their First Amendment rights. Indeed, Estabrook allows that the gag order may have skewed the survey results.

The American Library Association, a trade group representing the nation's libraries, has also denounced the Patriot Act.

"I think it's a serious issue that some people are voluntarily cooperating with law enforcement," said Emily Sheketoff, the executive director of the Washington, D.C., office of the ALA.
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News.com
FCC: Open up TV waves to wireless
By Richard Shim
January 16, 2003, 2:51 PM PT


The Federal Communications Commission is quietly considering opening the television broadcast spectrum for use by other wireless devices, including Wi-Fi products.
The proposal, revealed in a notice of inquiry adopted last month, would allow devices using unlicensed spectrum--bandwidth not licensed to broadcasters--to operate in the TV broadcast spectrum. However, they would tap into only those parts of the TV spectrum not being used and only be allowed to do this when they wouldn't interfere with authorized services.

The Dec. 20 notice will take effect when it is published later this month in the Federal Register, said an FCC representative. At that point, the agency will kick off a 75-day comment period.



The regulatory body is expecting a dogfight from TV broadcasters who in the past have been very protective of their territory--opposition that could derail the proposed changes or delay them.

"We're in for a bit of a bumpy ride," said Alan Scrime, chief of the policy and rules division in the FCC's office of engineering and technology. "TV broadcasters are an influential bunch. We're not expecting this to be a real quick one."

The FCC has been pushing TV broadcasters toward digital television, in order to free up the analog TV spectrum for uses such as wireless home networking technology.

The agency is looking at TV spectrum because it provides significant amounts of bandwidth per channel. In addition, the frequencies and amount of unused TV spectrum varies in different regions, leaving more opportunities for use, according to the notice.

Current 802.11b-based, or Wi-Fi, wireless home networking products operate in the 2.4GHz band and can interfere with other devices--such as cordless phones--in the same band. Expanding the spectrum of unlicensed devices would mitigate many interference issues, and could pave the way for new types of devices that can operate in other bands.

Scrime said that manufacturers have been developing products that can sense when they would interfere with other devices.

The FCC and specifically its chairman, Michael Powell, have promoted the adoption of broadband access by consumers. Wireless home networking technology has been viewed by the regulatory body as a significant complement to broadband, because it makes the service more valuable by allowing multiple consumers to share access wirelessly.

Others in Washington have been promoting the use of Wi-Fi technology. Late Tuesday, Sens. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and George Allen, R-Va. proposed the Jumpstart Broadband Act, which would allocate additional radio spectrum for unlicensed use by wireless broadband devices and add wireless technology as a third method of improving the establishment of broadband access.

The notice of inquiry to be published does not specifically identify Wi-Fi wireless home networking technology. However, as technology that uses unlicensed spectrum, Wi-Fi products would get a boost.

Wi-Fi products operate in the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, which are unlicensed parts of the radio spectrum. Analog TV stations operate in 6MHz channels and the FCC is targeting the 54MHz to 72MHz, 76MHz to 88MHz, 174MHz to 216MHz and 470MHz to 806MHz bands.

"Wi-Fi should benefit, if this comes to pass," Scrime said.

The point of the notice and similar efforts by the FCC are to make more efficient use of the radio spectrum, as wireless devices become more popular among manufacturers and consumers.

"The FCC wants to encourage the sharing of spectrum and take advantage of it when it's not being used, as long as there is not interference," Scrime said. "Long term, we want to make sure there is enough of it available so that it isn't crowded to the point where it doesn't work."
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Los Angeles Times
Technology Center Aims to Close 'Digital Divide'
The Pacoima facility offers job training and Internet access for adults, as well as homework assistance for youths.
By Stephanie Stassel
January 17 2003

A computer center that opened Thursday in the northeast San Fernando Valley is more than just a place to type a resume.

The Pacoima Community Technology Center offers training for medical office jobs as well as online college classes for adults and computer instruction and homework help for children.

The center houses the Valley Family Technology Project, a $3-million government-industry partnership launched in October 2001 to help close the so-called "digital divide" in the community.

"We're in the heart of Pacoima, where many people who face obstacles to employment live," said Mario Matute, director of the project.

The center, at 13630 Van Nuys Blvd., is two doors down from the office of Los Angeles City Council President Alex Padilla, who was one of the driving forces behind it.

The facility has a lab with 20 laptop computers and 22 flat-screen desktop units, plus three additional computers for area residents who want to write e-mail or surf the Internet.

Converting and furnishing the former discount store cost $270,500, said Dixon Slingerland, director of the Youth Policy Institute, a nonprofit agency that runs the Valley Family Technology Project.

At the new center, adults training for a medical office career will complete three months of English, math and computer classes before taking on a three-month paid internship at a local hospital.

Leyda Carrillo, who began studying this week at the center, called the facility "a safe, comfortable place to be."

"Everything is brand-new," said Carrillo, 23, who wants to become a licensed vocational nurse. "They want to help you. They talk to you and are really familiar with you."

In addition to job training, the center offers online courses through Cerritos College for 45 adults who are working toward high school diplomas or simply want to further their education.

Beginning Feb. 18, the center will have a free after-school program for youths struggling in the classroom. And later this year, computer and literacy courses will be offered for seniors.

The center, which has bilingual instructors and materials, is open from 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. weekdays and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays. The phone number is (818) 899-5550.
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Government Computer News
1/17/03
Adm. Doran promotes biometrics, joint training
By Dawn S. Onley

SAN DIEGOAdm. Walter F. Doran, commander of the Pacific Fleet, said the Navy has set up a test bed in San Diego for faster development of command, control, communications, computer, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance technologies to protect personnel.

He said the Naval Air Station North Island is testing a biometric identification system for base access called Smart Gate, which can operate unstaffed. The Navy is also testing vehicle bar coding, the Common Access smart card for entry, automatic surveillance and swimmer detection systems as the service prepares for war with Iraq.

Doran, speaking at the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association's conference here yesterday, said the Navy is also working on advanced underwater sensors and distribution of a common tactical picture across different platforms.

"The technical community is on the front line in this global war on terrorism," Doran said. "That's our asymmetric advantage. We will turn to you [technology vendors] with our requirements, and you will develop the systems and technology. We will train and lead our sailors, and they will operate the most advanced systems in the world."

Doran said the Joint Forces Command advocates combined training of the military services with new technologies. Last month, a joint task force of 400 went to Japan for a USS Blue Ridge exercise. The task force has members from each of the services, dispersed across the country from Alaska to Maryland. They communicate with each other daily via the Internet and tailored Web sites, he said.

"Web tools are in place to bring new members up to speed, and their training is reviewed and managed remotely," Doran said. "All of this can be accomplished while members continue with their full-time day jobs."
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Government Computer News
01/17/03
'Hello, SSA, it's me'
By Susan M. Menke

The Social Security Administration made "a huge leap" in efficiency by letting employers file W-2 wage reports online at www.ssa.gov/employer, and now the agency is testing voiceprint authentication of filers by telephone, SSA project manager Chuck Liptz said today.

Until now, SSA has authorized each electronic filer by requiring a supervisor's approval and sending a personal identification number by postal or e-mail. In the voiceprint test, which began Jan. 6, "We'll see if employers think it's an easier way to do business," Liptz said. "We don't want to implement technology without including the people it's going to affect." The test will run for about three months, he said.

SSA received about 100 million wage reports from employers for tax year 2001.

So far, a couple of dozen employers filing their 2002 W-2s have volunteered to record their voiceprints reading employer ID number and other required information, which they later repeat over the phone to be authenticated during each Web filing session. The combination of PIN and voiceprint is legally binding, Liptz said, and the voiceprint file size is "just a few bytes." A survey at the end of the voiceprinting call has returned mostly favorable results, he said.

Authentify Inc. of Chicago helped SSA set up the biometric authentication test. Authentify's announcement said the "no training, no software, no hardware" approach will cut costs and could become a model for other government online authentication projects.
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Federal Computer Week
Firm picked for USAJobs overhaul
BY Colleen O'Hara
Jan. 15, 2003

The Office of Personnel Management has awarded a contract to TMP Worldwide Government Services Inc. to redesign and operate the USAJobs Web site, the agency announced Jan. 14.

TMP, the parent company of online job portal Monster.com, will be called upon to improve the look and operation of USAJobs. The first improvements -- to be completed early this year -- will include an enhanced search engine so job seekers can search for a position in a variety of ways, a resume builder tool and online vacancy announcements that are shorter and easier to read.

Other changes that job-seekers can expect from the site include:

* A data mining feature that allows federal managers to locate job candidates by sifting through resumes on file at USAJobs.

* A universal resume development and submission function that is compatible with all agency automated application processing systems.

* An application tracking feature for applicants.

"There is a window of opportunity now for the government to take advantage of the downturn in the private sector to attract individuals to public service that may not have been interested at other times," said Jocelyn Talbot, senior vice president of Monster Government Solutions, a division of TMP Worldwide Government Services. Enhancing USAJobs will help to attract the best and the brightest job seekers, she said.
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Government Executive
January 16, 2003
Critical infrastructure chief leaves Commerce post
From National Journal's Technology Daily


John Tritak, director of the Commerce Department's Critical Infrastructure Assurance Office, has left the government and will not take a position at the new Homeland Security Department, as many in the high-tech industry had expected.


"This was something he was planning to do for awhile," a department spokesman said of his departure, which was final Jan. 10.


Tritak joined the Critical Infrastructure Assurance Office, which is responsible for working with the business community to improve computer security, in August 1999. He joined the office from the law firm of Verner, Liipfer, Bernhard, McPherson and Hand, where he worked with domestic and international clients in the areas of defense, telecommunications and transportation. Before that, he held several senior advisory posts within the State Department.


The Critical Infrastructure Assurance Office is heavily involved with private sector outreach and attempts to impress upon the companies that control 90 percent of the nation's infrastructure the necessity of protecting their information systems.


During his tenure, Tritak was responsible for coordinating the creation and implementation of the "National Strategy for Critical Infrastructure Protection." Tritak also was key in developing Project Matrix, which federal agencies must use to determine their reliance on critical infrastructures.


A department spokesman said Tritak is not likely to be replaced, as the Critical Infrastructure Assurance Office will be absorbed into Homeland Security in March.
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USA Today
Piracy, CD-burning contributing to music industry's woes
January 17, 2003

LONDON (Reuters) Global recorded music sales look set to fall for the fourth straight year in 2003 thanks to piracy and the economic downturn, and its bosses are desperate for solutions.

Executives gathering for the global music industry conference Midem in southern France this weekend know it's make or break time.

The bruised industry needs a new formula as fans increasingly spend their disposable income on video games and "burn" their own CD compilations while labels desperately seek a new crop of long-lasting stars.

Major music labels have so far responded by slashing jobs, axing B-list artists and trimming back their bloated businesses. However, the industry appears no closer to a long-term solution than last year and talk of consolidation among the big five music companies is growing louder by the day.

"2003 will be the tipping point. The fundamentals continue to deteriorate and consolidation will have to happen," said Michael Nathanson, media analyst at U.S.-based investment research firm Sanford Bernstein.

Forecasts see sales sliding another 6% in 2003 a fall felt most by the big five music giants Universal, Sony, Warner, EMI and BMG which account for 70% of sales.

That comes on top of an estimated 9% fall in 2002, a 5% dip in 2001 and a 1.4% fall in 2000.

Pirates ahoy!

Critics assert that the age-old business model of merely selling physical copies of music to the masses is hopelessly out of date in a digital era of track downloads and song-swapping on Internet services like Kazaa and Morpheus.

Music execs, meanwhile, remain cautious about the Net, held back by technological, economic and legal limitations to putting their entire repertoire online.

The fear persists that the popularity of song-swapping services and the ease of CD-copying will give birth to a sort of doomsday scenario generations of music fans who refuse to pay. Unsurprisingly, piracy will be a key topic at this year's Midem.

Trade organization International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) has gone to battle against the proliferation of music bootlegs, primarily by pouring money and resources into helping police shut down the pirate operations.

The IFPI estimates the market for bootlegged music, whether it be mass-produced in CD-pressing factories or burned onto recordable CDs from a university dorm, was $4.3 billion in 2001 with sales of pirated discs hitting 950 million units.

The toll of Internet song-trading networks is harder to quantify. According to an IFPI study, at any one time, there are five million users on peer-to-peer networks swapping 900 million files.

Cooperative spirit

Over the past year, the majors exhibited a rare piece of cooperative spirit, making available more of their tunes to subscription-based music download services Pressplay and MusicNet, plus to third-party players such as the UK's OD2.

But the industry-backed services, with their relatively meager music selection and downloading limitations, have failed to slow the popularity of the free services.

IFPI Chairman and CEO Jay Berman will issue a call to arms in his annual address on Sunday, asking the majors to step up their online activities.

"This is a time when different sectors of the music industry, for all their diverging interests, have one big common interest: namely to develop a new online music business and to fight piracy," Berman told Reuters.

Critics are dubious.

"The politics at the major labels hasn't changed. The guy who puts his neck out on the line could get fired. Whereas the guy who keeps his head down is safe, and he gets to keep his BMW for another year," said Paul Myers, founder of Wippit.com, a subscription download site.

Consolidation talk

In the meantime, the five major music companies need to find ways of cutting costs further, but European regulators showed a distaste for further consolidation among the big five in the last attempt in 2000.

However, the subsequent collapse in the industry could encourage them to be more accepting now, observers believe.

Of the five majors, EMI is the only music company that is not part of a bigger conglomerate. EMI, home to ColdPlay and Pink Floyd, has been peppered by merger speculation of late, propelling the stock to a 20% gain in the past two weeks as reports of a BMG tie-up surfaced.

As the industry looks for a new business model and possibly new combinations, finding the next chart-topping newcomer, such as last year's teen rocker Avril Lavigne, will be key. Still, landing the next big thing isn't likely to draw attention from the industry's dismal business fortunes.

"The outlook is miserable. It's going to take at least two years to get out of this and a lot of people will disappear in the process," one music executive predicted.

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Lillie Coney
Public Policy Coordinator
Association for Computing Machinery
2120 L Street, NW, Suite 510
Washington, DC 20037
202-478-6124 (phone)
202-478-6313 (fax)