Clips July 17, 2003

[Lillie Coney <lillie.coney@xxxxxxx>]

Clips July 17, 2003

ARTICLES

Beyond the Wall [Security]
U.S. passports to add facial biometrics 
TSA tests its smart card program
Senate Committee Tables Bill on Privacy [CA]
House Bill Aims to Up Stakes on Piracy
Cambodia arrests net phone users
Dean Flaunts His Internet Edge as Guest 'Blogger'
Americans log on for health info
EPA to spend more for analytics 
Postal Service wants feedback on automating 'flats' mail
Homeland Security Department to buy Microsoft software
Family of victim vows advocacy to ban cell phones on roads
EC follows US lead on spam

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Wired News
Beyond the Wall
Infrared surveillance cams. Seismic field sensors. Real-time data maps. Welcome to the new US Border Patrol.
By Michael Mechanic

They call it the line. El bordo. The edge. And in the early 1990s, the frontier that separates the United States and Mexico was pure chaos - a place where the understaffed Border Patrol fought a thankless, sometimes violent, and mostly futile battle against legions of illegal immigrants looking for a better life. The most lawless stretch: 15 miles of border near San Diego where two out of every three attempts to cross illegally succeeded. As evening approached, thousands would gather on the Mexican side, preparing for the nightly scramble. 

Today everything has changed. The Border Patrol's crackdown - launched in 1994 and dubbed Operation Gatekeeper - has become a showcase for the latest in digital enforcement. The war on terror has given Gatekeeper an even higher profile in Washington. In the past two years, the Bush administration has spent $100 million on sophisticated surveillance gear and a high-powered information network to keep undocumented immigrants out.

Gatekeeper is working, at least in the San Diego sector, which runs 66 miles east from Imperial Beach. The number of would-be immigrants trying to cross here has plummeted, with arrests falling 81 percent since the operation began. But this all-out effort has not kept aliens out of the United States. Like squeezing a balloon, enforcement has slowed the traffic in the most heavily traveled areas, only to see new bulges appear along the 2,000-mile border. Migrants have taken to remote mountain and desert routes, where hundreds have died. And, most telling of all, the total number of undocumented immigrants coming from the south has actually increased over the past decade, hitting an estimated 711,000 a year as of the last census. 

Is it feasible to stanch the tide of illegal immigration? The Border Patrol is extending its high tech net further into the Southwestern desert. But as long as the vast economic disparity between Mexico and the US remains, putting a stop to illegal crossings may be as difficult as maintaining a line in the sand.

Databases
Border Patrol detention centers have workstations with digital cameras and fingerprint readers. The system runs prints against an immigration fingerprint database, called Ident, to see if detainees have come through before. Agents can also search an alphabet soup of law enforcement databases, including the National Crime Index Center, the Crime Index System, the Deported Alien Control System, and El Paso Intelligence. At some stations, a newer machine captures digital handprints of migrants suspected of illegal activities and runs them against IAFIS, the FBI's print library. Queries that used to require days now take 10 minutes.
Handheld GPS
Field agents use GPS devices to mark arrest and rescue locations, and to map out trails and landmarks.

Site Selection
To find the best locations for video surveillance towers, technicians run simulations using digital maps of the mountainous terrain.
Fly-By Mapping
San Diego State University researchers have developed software that plots suspected trail markings from aerial images collected during Blackhawk flyovers. The software then compares the images with earlier views to determine how migration patterns are responding to sector enforcement and environmental conditions.

Video Surveillance

Pole-Mounted Digital Videocams
The San Diego sector is installing video-surveillance towers like those already deployed in the Yuma, Tucson, and Calexico sectors. Each 60-foot pole hosts two infrared videocams and two low-light DV cams. On dark nights the IR units offer a clear shot of any warm-blooded creature within a 1-mile radius. More expensive water-cooled versions can see 3 miles. The goal is to mount one of these $300,000 poles each mile along the border. Total cost: $19.8 million.

Field Sensors

Seismic Intrusion Detectors
Nearly 2,000 of these rugged plastic transmitters are buried near suspected migration routes. Each probe contains a magnet suspended within a wire coil. The slightest disruption produces electrical current and activates the transmitter. The unit radios its identity to a line-of-sight hilltop repeater, which forwards the signal to a dispatch database called ICAD for intelligent computer-aided dispatch, and then to briefcase-sized receivers carried by agents. Some models can detect a person treading 100 feet way.
Infrared Beam Breaks
With receivers placed about 15 feet apart, these devices send invisible beams across suspected paths and alert ICAD and agents when one is intersected.
Magnetic Sensors
Buried in pairs along border roads, these metal-detecting units pick up unauthorized vehicles and determine their direction.

Data Synthesis

ArcInfo
A sophisticated terrain-mapping program called ArcInfo is at the heart of the Border Patrol network. The software crunches numbers on arrests, rescues, and deaths in the field; it also synthesizes detailed US Geological Survey maps, GPS trail data, and aerial photos. Supervisors use the completed picture to deploy patrols and search-and-rescue teams more effectively. ArcInfo, which resides on computers at the patrol's Chula Vista, California, headquarters can also comb an arrest database called Enforce, allowing agents to predict smuggling routes.

Dispatch

ICAD Dispatch Hub
Monitoring video feeds, the ICAD sensor network, and database updates, dispatchers in Chula Vista can route and coordinate field agents. By merging satellite photos with multispectral infrared images, the patrol gets accurate color and impressive resolution - 2 feet per pixel. Recently tripped sensors are displayed as a series of dots. Colored halos around each dot indicate the cause of the disturbance as reported by investigating agents.
Video Command
Banks of monitors provide a window on border activity night and day, and VCRs sit ready to tape. Stills are backed up to a hard drive every two seconds.

Field Agents

Intranet Maps
Sensor maps have been made browser-friendly with ArcSDE, a spatial database engine that serves as a translator between the image database and ArcInfo. Rank-and-file agents can log on to the patrol intranet before a shift, then click and zoom around sector maps to determine the real-time status of that evening's traffic.
Mobile Response
Field agents receive signals directly from tripped ground-based sensors as well as dispatches from the ICAD center.
Infrared Scopes
The San Diego sector has more than two dozen large, pickup-mounted IR scopes with a 6-mile range used for mobile field surveillance.
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Government Computer News
07/16/03 
U.S. passports to add facial biometrics 
By Vandana Sinha 

The State Department plans to develop ?intelligent? passports that will carry facial images with biometric data on advanced computer chips. 

The department will adopt a standard approved in late May by the International Civil Aviation Organization, which selected facial biometrics as the identification tool and high-capacity, contactless chips as the storage device. Contactless chips transmit data via low-power radio frequency, rather than direct contact with a reader device. 

?We want a globally interoperable system,? said Frank Moss, deputy assistant secretary for passport services at State. 

The move will put State in compliance with recent congressional mandates. The Enhanced Border Security Act and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002 require countries in the U.S. Visa Waiver Program to develop biometrics-enabled passports that comply with ICAO?s standards. 

This month, the department issued a request for information from vendors on integrating contactless chips into passports, which traditionally have been paper booklets. State also is seeking information on the chips? availability, technical performance, security, durability and delivery. 

In the RFI, State called for minimum chip capacity of 64K, double the 32K minimum designated by ICAO. The department estimates that a single facial biometric image would take up 12K. The chips also would contain biodata and other information secured by digital signatures. 

The department plans to release a request for proposals this fall, Moss said. It plans to pilot the intelligent passports beginning Oct. 26, 2004, and test them at a domestic passport issuance facility. Full implementation is slated to follow by the start of 2006, at an estimated annual cost of $100 million, he said. 

?I know this is aggressive,? Moss said yesterday at the Smart Cards in Government conference in Arlington, Va. ?We?re busy.? 

While State plans to use facial recognition, the Homeland Security Department?s entry-exit biometrics system will store two fingerprint images and a digital photograph of visitors to the United States in databases at consular offices and points of entry nationwide. 

Facial biometrics alone don?t fit DHS? needs, said Stewart Verdery, the assistant secretary for policy and planning at the department?s Border and Transportation Security Directorate. 

?In the U.S., there?s no database of faces,? Verdery said. ?There?s nothing to check [facial biometrics] against in our country as far as I know.? 
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 Federal Computer Week
TSA tests its smart card program
BY Sara Michael 
July 16, 2003

The Transportation Security Administration started evaluating specific technologies for a transportation worker identification card this week.

The technology evaluation pilot, started July 9 on the West Coast and today on the East Coast, will test potential technologies for the Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC) program, officials said today at the Smart Cards in Government conference in Arlington, Va.

The national TWIC program is a multiphase project to provide common employee identification cards for about 12 million workers. Under a 150-day, $3.8 million contract, Reston, Va.-based Maximus, Inc. and Plano, Tex.-based EDS are working with TSA to test technologies such as integrated chips, optical stripes, magnetic stripes and bar codes, said Paul Hunter, deputy director for the TWIC project. They are testing facilities in airports in Los Angeles and Philadelphia.

A second phase of the testing pilot is expected to begin in September, Hunter said.
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Los Angeles Times
Senate Committee Tables Bill on Privacy
Jon Healey
July 17, 2003

A California Senate committee has postponed action on a bill by Assemblyman Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto) that would have required Internet services to notify customers of subpoenas seeking their identities and allow more time to challenge the requests in court.

At a hearing Tuesday, leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee told Simitian that he didn't have the votes to get Assembly Bill 1143 through the panel, and they suggested that he bring it back next year.

Opponents of the Assembly-passed measure, led by the Motion Picture Assn. of America and several video game companies, argue that it would make it harder to protect their intellectual property from being stolen online.
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Los Angeles Times
House Bill Aims to Up Stakes on Piracy
Measure introduced by Democrats tries to clarify existing law on file sharing.
By Jon Healey
July 17, 2003

To some music lovers, paying $18 for a CD with only one good song is a crime.

To some members of Congress, letting someone copy a song online without paying for it should be a felony.

A bill introduced by senior Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee would make it easier for federal prosecutors to bring felony charges against people who offer at least one song, movie or other digital file on Kazaa or other public computer networks.

The proposal by Reps. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) and Howard L. Berman (D-North Hollywood), which is co-sponsored by four other Democrats, also would make it a crime to record movies as they're being displayed in a theater or to register a Web site under a false name.

Berman said the point was to give federal prosecutors the tools and the incentive "to start enforcing these laws, and to gain what I think will be the substantial deterrent benefits of some highly publicized prosecutions in these areas."

The possible penalties for a felony copyright violation vary, but even a first offender could face a five-year prison term.

Lobbyists for the recording industry and Hollywood studios, who often find allies in Conyers and Berman, praised the measure. They argued that the provision on file sharing wouldn't be a change in the law so much as a clarification of the existing standards for a copyright felony.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group for online civil liberties and technology, disagreed.

"If this is an attempt to clarify existing law, it goes way overboard," said Jason Schultz, a foundation attorney. "I think it's an attempt to criminalize the use of computer networks."

Online piracy has skyrocketed over the last four years, yet federal prosecutors have been reluctant to take on file-sharing cases, a point of great frustration for the record companies and studios. The bill aims to remove some of the hurdles prosecutors have identified, as well as to provide money for enforcement.

Under current law, distributing 10 unauthorized copies of a work with a retail value of more than $2,500 is a felony  provided that prosecutors can show that the distribution was done deliberately and with an intent to violate copyrights. The Conyers-Berman bill would equate offering one or more works for others to copy the equivalent of distributing 10 copies worth more than $2,500.

"When someone makes available to 300 million people a new movie I think it's a pretty fair assumption that at least 10 copies are going to be downloaded," said Fritz Attaway of the Motion Picture Assn. of America. "And when somebody does that, that's grand theft."
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CNET News.com
Hot spots elude RIAA dragnet
By John Borland 
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
July 16, 2003, 4:00 AM PT

Early last spring, NYCWireless co-founder Anthony Townsend got a note in the mail saying that someone on his network had been violating copyright laws.

This type of note is becoming increasingly common as record companies and Hollywood studios subpoena Internet service providers (ISPs) for information about subscribers in order to stop people from trading songs and movies online. But Townsend's case was unusual: As the representative of a loose collection of wireless "hot spot" Internet access points, there was no way he or the relevant access point operator in New York's Bryant Park could identify or warn the file trader. 

"We brought the notice to the attention of the park management, but they weren't concerned," Townsend said. "That whole mechanism (for finding copyright violators) becomes really problematic when the ISP is someone sharing a wireless access point." 


Townsend and others' similar experiences, no matter how limited today, point to a slowly widening hole in the Recording Industry Association of America's (RIAA) recently announced drive to identify and ultimately sue what could be thousands of file swappers online. 

Wireless Net access through free, open or publicly available hot spots is proving to be a last bastion of privacy on an Internet where the veil of anonymity can now easily be pierced. Wi-Fi access points give anyone who possesses the appropriate computer equipment within a radius of about 300 feet the ability to reach the Internet. 

Traditional ISPs give each subscriber a unique, if temporary, identification number while they're online. Wi-Fi access points don't, and that makes it difficult for the RIAA or anyone else to pinpoint exactly who is doing what using these nodes on the Net. 

Wi-Fi access, meanwhile, is one of the fastest-growing segments of the technology marketplace today. About 28,000 publicly accessible hot spots exist around the world today, according to research firm Allied Business Intelligence. That figure is expected to grow to 160,000 by 2007, the firm predicted in a report last week. 

Not all of those hot spots provide the same kind of anonymous access as the free services provided by Armstrong's network in New York. Most commercial Wi-Fi points are run as pay services by companies such as T-Mobile USA or Boingo, typically requiring computer users to pay for their time, usually with a credit card, and log in to their account while online. This allows customers to be identified just as easily as they would on an ordinary ISP using telephone or cable lines. 

Increasingly, cafes, parks and even private homes are offering access to Net where no registration is required. With people logging in and out without offering identities, it becomes virtually impossible for groups such as the RIAA to track down the identity of copyright infringers using these nodes. 

Changing Wi-Fi patterns
It is hard to argue that this type of network access makes up more than a tiny fraction of file swapping. People using public Wi-Fi access points typically use them for just a few minutes or hours, rather than staying online for the long periods of time necessary to download movie files, for instance. 

This could change as the patterns of Wi-Fi use change, becoming more residential, however. Just last week, ISP Speakeasy opened a program that allows home broadband subscribers to sell wireless Net access to their neighbors, becoming in effect a mini-ISP with Speakeasy's help. 

This kind of program illustrates further the potential holes in the RIAA dragnet. A Speakeasy customer who has several customers of her own could wind up unwittingly being the conduit for file-sharing activity. 

In that case, Speakeasy would receive a subpoena, and be required under recent court decisions to give up her name. Moreover, under the provisions of the company's new program, her role as "administrator" for other people's accounts would make her responsible for any illegal activity by the people using her wireless Net access. 

"If our terms of service are violated on (that broadband) line, we hold the administrator responsible," said Speakeasy CEO Mike Apgar. "We think the best person to understand their local area is the administrator." 

However, unless the administrator keeps detailed logs of everybody's account use--which is not required by law--she may well not know who was swapping files at the time the RIAA identified a problem, and the subpoena may hit a dead end. 

Recording industry officers declined to discuss their legal strategy in detail, but said that the Wi-Fi issue was not necessarily a dead end for investigations. 

"We are not limiting ourselves in that respect," said RIAA Senior Vice President Matt Oppenheim. 

What the group and other copyright holders can do if Wi-Fi access points turn out to be a substantial nexus for piracy isn't wholly clear. Unlike the file-swapping market, which in Napster's wake has been populated mostly by small companies that exist on the margin of the law, Wi-Fi is the technological darling of giants that range from Intel to Verizon Communications. 

In theory, copyright holders could press policymakers for some regulatory framework that would require individual computer users to be identified wherever they were logged on to a network. That way, even people logging on to a free access point like the one in New York City's Bryant Park could be traced if found to be doing something illegal. 

However, previous technological measures that involved the strict ability to identify users or users' computers, such as the unique serial numbers once built into Intel chips, have proven extremely controversial. 

Privacy and civil-liberties activists, by contrast, are encouraging the spread of Wi-Fi access points, whether officially under a plan like Speakeasy's, or simply by setting up a wireless access point on their own. 

"I think there is good reason for people to become ISPs and offer this service in order to give people real anonymity again," said Fred von Lohmann, an Electronic Frontier Foundation attorney who has represented file-swapping companies against the recording industry. 

Von Lohmann, a copyright lawyer, contends that individuals and businesses that operate open Wi-Fi hot spots should be eligible for the same legal shields that ensure that ISPs aren't liable for the online actions of their customers. 

Hot spot operators like Townsend say they are likely to attract the RIAA's subpoenas and lawsuits, which are due in mid-August. But they say, for now, they're not worried. 


"It is obvious that people are using wireless hot spots to do the same kind of thing other people online are doing," said Townsend, whose NYCWireless group is made up of 160 hot spots around the city, mostly run by volunteers. "But there's no evidence that this kind of thing is any more prevalent. We haven't been asked to make (identifying people) any easier." 
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Australian IT
Cambodia arrests net phone users
A correspondent in Phnom Penh
JULY 17, 2003  
 
AN Australian is among a large group of foreigners being questioned by Cambodian police for allegedly making illegal overseas phone calls.

In what appears to be a shady stock-selling scheme, 20 foreigners are being questioned for using the internet to make phone calls - a crime in Cambodia. 
The group comprises 14 Britons, two Americans, an Australian, a New Zealander, a Filipino and a Thai. 

By law, all phone calls must be routed through the state phone company or firms it has licensed. The companies charge comparatively high rates for international calls. 

Military police raided a house in central Phnom Penh where the 20 were staying yesterday, prosecutor Khut Sopheang said. 

Three of the unnamed detainees were women, he said. It was not clear if the 20 would be charged or what maximum penalty they would face. 

Police said they had been told the 20 would be released once they paid the state phone company for the overseas phone calls. 

One of the detainees denied any wrongdoing to reporters who went to the house where the detainees were being held. 

Military police officer Pou Davy said the foreigners were calling overseas to sell "stock options." He did not elaborate. 

Police in Southeast Asia have periodically closed companies in which Western sales staff make high-pressure solicitations over the phone to persuade would-be investors in other countries to purchase shares in shaky or nonexistent companies. 
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Washington Post
Dean Flaunts His Internet Edge as Guest 'Blogger' 
By Jonathan Krim
Thursday, July 17, 2003; Page A07 


With lots of early buzz and some surprising online fundraising, Howard Dean has established himself early as the Internet candidate in the crowded field of Democrats hoping for the party's nomination for president. This week he's pressing the advantage.

Dean has entered the "blogosphere," the growing world of individual Web pages that contain personal musings, commentary and pointers to other information in the vast Internet ocean.

Bloggers -- who run the gamut from political writers such as Andrew Sullivan to tech geeks talking about software code to people who care intensely about ferrets -- think blogs embody 21st-century democracy. 

For a candidate hoping to make an end run around the political establishment, nothing could be more perfect. Dean has had a blog on his campaign Web site for some time, but he received a big boost this week when he was invited to sit in to pen the Web log of vacationing Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig, one of the nation's premier thinkers on cyberspace law, copyright and the power of the "creative commons" that the Internet can facilitate.

Dean wasted no time warming to the theme in his first post Monday evening (at cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/).

"The Internet might soon be the last place where open dialogue occurs," he wrote, using the occasion to bash the Federal Communications Commission's recent decision to allow media companies to own more outlets.

In a post the next morning, Dean reiterated why he opposed the strike against Iraq, arguing that President Bush failed to make his case for war or used deception to do so.

With Dean's picture superimposed over Lessig's, and with the "Dean Internet Team" posting the occasional message reminding readers where to get more information on the campaign, the Dean blog is clearly more than just intellectual discourse. 
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USA Today
Americans log on for health info
By Janet Kornblum, USA TODAY 
Posted 7/16/2003 11:54 PM

The majority of U.S. adults online  80%  use the Net to find health information. And most say it helps them get better health care, a study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project reports today.
About 93 million people go to the Net for health information, making health searches the third-most-popular use of the Internet, after e-mail and investigating a product or service before making a purchase, the study says. 

People turn to the Net to search for everything from diet and exercise tips to environmental hazards and sexual problems. But the most searched-for health topic is information about a specific disease or medical problem. The No. 2 search topic: information about a specific medical treatment or procedure. 

Three-quarters (73%) of searchers say the Net has improved the quality of the health information and services available to them.

Net searches also give people access to information they might not otherwise have. Eighteen percent, for instance, have looked for experimental treatments and medicines.

"People are looking for all sorts of health topics, not just symptoms of the flu," says Susannah Fox, the Pew project's director of research. 

But Net users should greet online information with a healthy dose of skepticism, experts warn.

Numerous studies on the quality of health information available online have shown that reliable information is spotty and that patients do not always look critically enough at the sources of the information they find. 

The Pew study finds that only about one-quarter of searchers thoroughly check the source and timeliness of online information.

And not all doctors are receptive to patients who come to appointments clutching printouts of Web pages. 

Cara Cozine, a homemaker from Kenosha, Wis., says her doctor wouldn't even look at articles that suggested her family's symptoms might be caused by gluten intolerance, a sensitivity to wheat that has been linked to a variety of seemingly unrelated ailments. 

Doctors need to find a way to "learn how to use (the Net) in their practices effectively because the Net is here. It's not just a passing fancy," says Daniel Sands, who teaches at Harvard Medical School and the Center for Clinical Computing at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. 

The Pew study is based on a phone survey in December of 2,038 American adults, 1,220 of whom are Net users. It was supplemented with a 20-question online survey, answered by 2,000 people.
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Government Computer News
07/17/03 
EPA to spend more for analytics 
By Susan M. Menke 

Environmental Protection Agency CIO Kimberly T. Nelson, speaking at a breakfast yesterday hosted by Input of Reston, Va., said the agency will invest more in IT integration to ?better use environmental data to make decisions, set priorities and achieve agency goals.? 

The projects include: 


Windows to My Environment, an intergovernmental geographic portal where users can map their local environmental features by entering a ZIP code or address 
Central Data Exchange, an entry point that accepts reports from industry, states and other jurisdictions to the Environmental Information Exchange Network. Nelson said seven of the data flows are in production and nine are in development or testing for deployment by fiscal 2005. 
The Geospatial One-Stop e-government portal 
A sequencing plan for a target enterprise architecture 
Metadata and data registries for an eventual enterprise repository 
Identity and access management. 

After almost two years at EPA, Nelson said, "An enterprise architecture has been one of my highest priorities. The baseline shows everything in place now. The sequencing plan shows where we will go in the future, how we will build out and how we will do the integrations." 

Nelson also referred to ?getting to green? on the Office of Management and Budget?s scorecard citing progress toward meeting the President?s Management Agenda. On the most recent scorecard, EPA was upgraded to green for financial management but downgraded to yellow for e-government progress (see story at www.gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/22742-1.html). 

For fiscal 2004, Nelson said, 100 percent of EPA?s business cases received OMB approval. She said the agency uses managed services under a seven-year, performance-based task order to Computer Sciences Corp. under the General Services Administration?s Millennia contract, with an $860 million ceiling. 

Input has estimated that EPA in fiscal 2003 will spend $370 million on IT and will raise spending at a 9 percent compound annual growth rate, reaching $570 million by fiscal 2008.
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Computerworld
Postal Service wants feedback on automating 'flats' mail
The change would affect items such as magazines and catalogs 
By LINDA ROSENCRANCE 
JULY 17, 2003

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is looking for feedback from customers on its Corporate Flat Strategy, a plan designed to automate the delivery of "flats" mail, which includes magazines and catalogs. 

Using what it's learned from automating letters, the USPS is planning to automate what it refers to as flat-shaped mail to avoid costs associated with manual sorting. The Postal Service said it will then pass those savings onto customers (download PDF). 

According to the USPS, flats represent about 25% of total mail volume and generate approximately $16.1 billion in revenue a year. However, nearly half of last year's 51.6 billion flats weren't presorted for carrier delivery, making them more costly to process because of the additional sorting required. 

The Corporate Flat Strategy identifies initiatives to reduce the $4-billion-per-year cost of having letter carriers spend almost three hours a day sorting mail before they make their rounds, the USPS said. 

Despite its name, flat-shaped mail varies greatly in size and shape and is sorted on various machines or presorted by mailers to carrier routes. Because there is no one machine that combines this mail, letter carriers also spend time checking through as many as five separate flat bundles at the customer's mailbox before delivering the mail. 

"It's important that we find innovative ways to increase the amount of bar-coded flats in the system, since bar-coded flats are sorted quickly and at the lowest cost," said John Rapp, senior vice president of operations for the USPS, in the statement. He said the USPS is investing in research and development projects to determine if equipment can be designed to inexpensively handle a wide range of sizes and shapes. 

Rapp said the larger goal is to reduce mail streams, first to two -- automated and manual -- and then to one, Deliver Point Packaging (DPP), if the technology can be developed. 

DPP is an R&D initiative that uses automation to simultaneously sort both letters and flats into delivery order and then bundle the mail into one package for each delivery stop. Rapp said that while the technology isn't yet available and a decision has yet to be made on how quickly to pursue it, the Postal Service expects to have a DPP machine simulation available for evaluation during fiscal 2005 or 2006. 

A second option, the Flats Sequencing System, will be designed to sequence flat-shaped mail in two passes. 

Decisions to move forward with either or both of the initiatives are expected to be made next year, with possible deployment targeted for 2006 or 2007, the USPS said. 

Customers can offer feedback on the plans by logging onto ribbs.usps.gov, which is where the Corporate Flat Strategy can also be viewed. On the left column under "RIBBS Links," click on the "Corporate Flat Strategy" link. The FlatStrategyFeedback@xxxxxxxx e-mail address routes all comments to the Postal Service headquarters. 
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Computerworld
Homeland Security Department to buy Microsoft software
The agency is buying $90 million worth of Microsoft products over five years 
By Tom Krazit, IDG News Service
JULY 16, 2003

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has agreed to purchase $90 million worth of Microsoft Corp. software over the next five years from reseller Dell Computer Corp., the department said July 16. 

Microsoft will supply software for both desktops and servers within DHS, said Rachael Sunbarger, an agency spokeswoman. The department will install products such as Windows XP, Office XP, Microsoft Project, Microsoft Exchange and Windows Server 2003. 

DHS has an option to extend the deal for a sixth year, which would bring the total value of the deal to $110 million, Sunbarger said. 

No hardware is involved in the deal, despite Dell's role in bringing the agreement to completion. DHS has been a customer of Dell's since the department was formed in November, and Dell often resells Microsoft software to its enterprise and government customers, a Dell spokeswoman said. 
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Washington Post
Fraud Issue Could Undermine 'E-Rate' Program 


By David McGuire
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Thursday, July 17, 2003; 7:26 AM 


A billion-dollar federal program that subsidizes Internet connections for public schools and libraries is facing renewed scrutiny from Congress, as lawmakers investigate claims of widespread fraud.

Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-La.), chairman of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee, on Monday sent letters to 15 companies that have "significant involvement" in the federal "E-rate" program. Tauzin asked the companies, which include IBM and SBC Communications, to provide detailed records of the money they received and the services they provided under the program.

"Based on some of the evidence that we've reviewed already, it's clear that some vendors have gamed the system. We're trying to find out whether these are just isolated incidents or are part of a greater pattern of abuse," Energy and Commerce Committee spokesman Ken Johnson said.

The committee will hold a hearing on E-rate fraud in the fall, Johnson said.

E-rate supporters fear the congressional investigation masks a deeper effort to scale back or end the program, which they say provides reliable Internet access to thousands of poor children and adults who have no other way to get online.

"I'm very suspicious of any activity Mr. Tauzin is involved in. He hates the E-rate," said Emily Sheketoff, executive director of the American Library Association's Washington, D.C. office. 

Tauzin has been one of the most vocal critics of E-rate, which detractors once dubbed the "Gore Tax," after former Vice President Al Gore, who championed the program. Tauzin has no plans to kill E-rate, according to Johnson, but the congressman still believes that the program is funded by a hidden tax that consumers shouldn't have to pay.

Created under the 1996 Telecommunications Act, the E-rate program is part of the Universal Service Fund, which telephone customers subsidize through a charge on their monthly bills. Since its inception, the program has made it possible for more than 87 percent of public school classrooms and 95 percent of public libraries nationwide get connected to the Internet, according to a recent study by Edlinc, a national coalition of schools and libraries.

The $2.25 billion-a-year program has also proved an attractive target for at least a few scam artists and companies looking to line their coffers with improperly inflated government payouts. The Federal Communications Commission employs three full-time staffers to monitor E-rate, and is currently tracking 42 federal, state and local fraud investigations related to the program, according to Tom Bennett, the FCC assistant inspector general in charge of overseeing the program.

Earlier this year, the owner of a New York-based Internet services company pleaded guilty in the first-ever criminal fraud case relating to E-rate. The FCC is also hearing an appeal by the single largest E-rate vendor -- IBM -- after some of the company's E-rate contracts were blocked based on suspicions that IBM was not abiding by the program's competitive bidding provisions.

When companies game the system, their ill-gotten gains come out of consumers' pockets, Johnson said. "It's clear that rate payers have been ripped off to the tune of tens of millions of dollars. We're not trying to kill the troubled e-rate program. We're just trying to clean it up."

Edlinc Chairwoman Mary Kusler said she applauds any effort to "ferret out bad actors," but disagrees with allegations that E-rate has become a bastion of fraud. "I don't necessarily agree that it is a troubled program. We really see this as a program that is a huge success."

Kusler also questioned the need for increased investigations, noting that the existing E-rate audit process caught the irregularities that prompted the IBM investigation.

In addition to its routine audits, the Universal Service Administrative Company, a nonprofit that administers E-rate on behalf of the government, has commissioned KPMG to conduct a random audit of e-rate contracts to determine the extent of fraud and abuse.

Despite those efforts, Bob Williams, who wrote a report on e-rate fraud for the nonprofit watchdog Center for Public Integrity, said government attention could help determine the true extent of abuse in the program. 

"If this thing is honeycombed with fraud and financial mismanagement then that means there's that much less money" for schools and libraries, Williams said.
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USA Today
Family of victim vows advocacy to ban cell phones on roads
July 17, 2003

A southeast Wisconsin woman promised Wednesday to do everything she could to convince state lawmakers to ban drivers from talking on cell phones, as she grieved the death of her daughter-in-law and unborn grandchild in a crash where a cell phone was being used. 
"I just hope something can be accomplished now," Marie Micheau said, fighting back tears, "so this doesn't happen to another family. Your heart hurts. Kelly was so good of a mother. She was so happy." 

Kelly J. Micheau, of Oostburg, was killed Monday near Hustisford when a Madison businessman talking on a cell phone drove his SUV through a stop sign and slammed into her car, court records said. Micheau, 31, her husband and their 16-month-old daughter were returning from a family reunion in Iowa, court records said. 

One of three eyewitness told investigators that Roy Simon, 36, was talking on his cell phone "and not paying attention to the road" just before the crash on County Highway E at Wisconsin 60 in Dodge County, according to a criminal complaint charging Simon with two counts of homicide by negligent use of a motor vehicle. 

Micheau's fetus was 16 weeks old, the complaint said. 

Simon told investigators he was traveling from Madison to Hustisford for a business meeting and failed to see the stop sign, the complaint said. 

Under terms of his $1,000 cash bail, Simon, the owner of Midwest Mortgage Investors in Madison, is prohibited from using a cell phone while driving, according to his attorney. 

Marie Micheau, 55, said no one should have to die because of cell phones. 

"We want people to know what happened and why it happened," the Milwaukee woman said. "You are talking. Your mind is on a conversation. You are not paying attention." 

Her husband drives a lot and sees plenty of problems, Micheau said. 

"He said, 'I have seen women combing their hair, talking on the phone and they must be driving with their knee.' ... It's ridiculous," she said. 

One bill has been introduced in the state Assembly that would prohibit drivers from using cell phones other than to report an emergency, said Dan Ritsche, an analyst for the Legislative Reference Bureau. 

It would carry a fine up to $400  the same punishment for an existing law that prohibits inattentive driving, Ritsche said. 

Rep. Carol Owens (R-Oshkosh) introduced the bill in February. She said that given Monday's tragedy, she has requested a hearing on it soon. 

"The common-sense people who don't want to be the next statistic are calling me," she said. "Eventually, you know we are going to face some sort of legislation if people won't control their own actions. ... If you are on the phone, you are not giving 100% to your driving. That is a given. Pull over." 

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, three states have passed laws putting restrictions on cell phone use for general drivers. 

Matt Sundeen, a transportation expert for the conference, said New York has the strictest law, prohibiting the use of hand-held phones but allowing hands-free phones. The law takes effect Nov. 1. 

Maine and New Jersey prohibit drivers under the age of 21 who only have learners permits from using cell phones while driving, Sundeen said. 

According to Sundeen, 42 state legislatures had bills before them this year regarding cell phones while driving. Most of them  32  were intended to prohibit the use of hand-held phones. 

"The outright prohibition of cell phones, that is something that has diminished in popularity the last couple of years," he said. "It is something that hasn't been politically palatable yet." 

Representatives of wireless phone companies have argued in the past that outlawing cell phone use is unfair because there are other distractions that lead to accidents. 

A survey of cell phone use in traffic crashes investigated by the Wisconsin State Patrol last year was inconclusive in finding out how big a role the technology may play in crashes, the agency said earlier this month. 

Of 2,691 crashes investigated between May and October 2002, 49 drivers reported they were talking on a cell phone at the time, and of those, 24 believed the phone was a possible contributing factor, said Loralee Brumund, coordinator of the study for the State Patrol. 
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Europedia.net
EC follows US lead on spam
16/07/2003

The European Commission is following the lead made by the US Congress in considering anti-spam legislation and promising to take ?concrete action? by October, according to Computer Week. 

The pronouncement was made by Erkki Liikanen, European Commissioner for Enterprise and the Information Society, who told Computer Week that combating spam ?has become one of the most significant issues facing the internet today.? 

Exactly what form the ?fight? will take is unclear, but it is thought that anti-spam regulations could be slipped into data protection laws due to hit the statute books in October. New directives are likely to call for increased international cooperation against the spam pandemic, and as well as advocating technological methods for countering the e-mail blight may also include suggestions for increased consumer education.
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