Jimm Phillips

Legislation that seeks to curb patent litigation abuse has a good chance of passing both chambers before the end of the year, two top patent revamp advocates in Congress said Wednesday. “It’s a pretty good bet you could see something on this, this year,” said Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, at a Politico event sponsored by the pro-revamp Main Street Patent Coalition. Lee and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., are the main sponsors of the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act (S-1720), the Senate’s marquee bill addressing patent litigation. The House has already passed the Innovation Act (HR-3309), its own patent litigation revamp measure, but the two bills are not completely similar.

Backlash against controversial National Security Agency surveillance programs “directly impacts” Congress’s ability to pass cybersecurity legislation, said Keith Alexander, NSA director and commander of the U.S. Cyber Command, during a Georgetown University event Tuesday. Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s leaks about the NSA programs “have caused grave, significant and irreversible damage to our nation and to our allies,” Alexander said. “It will take us years to recover.” Alexander told the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that Congress needs to “get on with cyber legislation” since “a lack of legislation will impact our ability to defend the country in this area” (CD Feb 28 p11). That legislation should include amended versions of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act and the Stored Communications Act, which both needed to be updated to allow for improved information sharing, Alexander said Tuesday.

Continued DHS work to build its relationships with private sector stakeholders is “crucial” to its continued mission to address cybersecurity in the private sector and on government networks, Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson told the House Homeland Security Committee Wednesday. Johnson, who took office in December, outlined his vision for DHS and addressed concerns about the department’s programs. DHS’s private sector outreach on cybersecurity has been most public on the department’s role in implementing President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity executive order, Johnson said.

Patent assertion entity Intellectual Ventures (IV) filed with the Federal Elections Commission last week to organize its own political action committee, Intellectual Ventures PAC, according to documents the FEC released Friday (http://1.usa.gov/Nj8CiR). IV has not commented on what Intellectual Ventures PAC’s political agenda will be, but the company has been highly critical of many provisions in legislation under consideration on Capitol Hill that would curb abusive patent litigation. The House passed the Innovation Act (HR-3309) in December, and the Senate is considering the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act (S-1720) and several other bills. Advocates of that legislation told us it isn’t surprising that IV has formed its own PAC, citing IV’s history of lobbying on patent legislation.

The White House announced a set of new executive actions Thursday that aim to curb abusive patent litigation to be accomplished through U.S. Patent and Trademark Office programs, along with an update to the executive actions President Barack Obama took in June (CD June 5 p12). The White House actions are collectively important because “our patent system simply must keep up with the ever-evolving needs of industry,” said Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker during a White House event Thursday that announced the new actions. Advocates of efforts to rein in what they see as abuses by patent assertion entities praised the White House announcement, though they noted the most effective actions still require further legislative action from Congress. The Thursday announcement followed up on the White House’s promise in conjunction with Obama’s State of the Union speech in late January to announce progress on the June initiatives. Obama had urged Congress during the State of the Union to “pass a patent reform bill that allows our businesses to stay focused on innovation, not costly, needless litigation” (CD Bulletin Jan 29 p1).

The legacy of President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity executive order (EO) remains a work in progress even after the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s release last week of the finalized “Version 1.0” Cybersecurity Framework, said cybersecurity experts in interviews. The framework has been the most high-profile element of the executive order, but the experts said the order’s legacy will ultimately depend on whether federal agencies are able to encourage voluntary industry adoption of the framework’s standards and best practices.

The Department of Defense plans to roll out its revised spectrum strategy Thursday, which will articulate a more “proactive” approach to DOD’s future handling of spectrum issues, said Maj. Gen. Robert Wheeler, deputy chief information officer-command, control, communications and computers. DOD reached an agreement with NAB in November that allowed the department to move ahead with plans to partially vacate the 1755-1780 MHz band and move those operations to the 2025-2110 MHz band, where it will share spectrum with broadcasters (CD Nov 26 p1). That deal is a “very good marriage of industry needs and DOD and federal users’ needs,” which is “the right plan at this particular time,” Wheeler said Tuesday at a Center for Strategic and International Studies event. DOD has been too reactive in its past spectrum strategic efforts and must “think about how to do this better next time,” he said.

Comcast, Google, Microsoft, Time Warner Cable, the Consumer Electronics Association and other industry stakeholders said they formed WifiForward, a coalition to urge the FCC and Congress to increase the amount of unlicensed spectrum so it’s available for Wi-Fi use. Wi-Fi use is growing 68 percent a year, meaning policymakers will need to open up additional spectrum for unlicensed use in order to avoid a crunch greater than the current congestion being caused “by a deluge of data from more devices, applications and services,” the coalition said Thursday. Analysts said the coalition is likely to have some effect on the policymaking debate around unlicensed spectrum, but immediate change is unlikely.

The White House marked the one-year anniversary Wednesday of President Barack Obama’s cybersecurity executive order (CD Feb 14/13 p1), showcasing the release of the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s (NIST) final “Version 1.0” of the Cybersecurity Framework. The White House also touted the start of the Department of Homeland Security’s voluntary Critical Infrastructure Cyber Community (C3) program to encourage industry adoption of the framework. The Version 1.0 framework drew praise from Capitol Hill and several industry stakeholders.

Capitol Hill’s approach to preparing legislation aimed at curbing abusive patent litigation has shifted since attention moved to the Senate, with industry stakeholders telling us they've noticed the Senate Judiciary Committee has been “deliberative” in its examination of the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act (S-1720) and other bills. Senate Judiciary held a hearing on S-1720 soon after the House passed the Innovation Act (HR-3309) in December, but several members of the committee urged further hearings and more deliberative consideration of legislation on the Senate side (CD Dec 18 p11). Work since then has been at a slower pace and largely behind the scenes, which stakeholders on all sides of the debate said has been beneficial.