The United Kingdom Home Office sought a bill that it said would transform the law on the use and oversight of police, security and intelligence agencies' investigatory powers. While the bill would provide additional oversight for government surveillance practices, media and privacy groups said it would also erode privacy practices. It would have the effect of "forcing communications service providers to keep a record of their customers’ web browsing histories as well as their calls, e-mails, and other communications, and new restrictions that may hamper the use of end-to-end encryption technologies," said the Center for Democracy and Technology in a statement. A Home Office summary said the bill would introduce a "double-lock" for interception warrants that "cannot come into force until they have been approved by a judge" and establish an investigatory powers commissioner to oversee how such surveillance powers are used. It said the bill would ensure that Internet connection records are retained so police can identify the communications service tied to a device. But CDT legal fellow Sarah St.Vincent said these new powers would "likely violate the UK’s obligations under human rights and EU law. We remain concerned about how thorough that oversight will be, and whether it is actually capable of preventing serious abuses." The Investigatory Powers Bill "is part of a trend towards more surveillance in Europe," said the Computer and Communications Industry Association. It's a "setback for privacy rights," said CCIA Europe Director Christian Borggreen.

An FCC notice proposing to establish undersea cable reporting duties was published in the Federal Register, triggering deadlines for comments of Dec. 3 and replies Dec. 18. The FCC voted 5-0 Sept. 17 to adopt the NPRM to open the rulemaking aimed at collecting timely and systematic information on outages disrupting any of the roughly 60 undersea cables that connect the U.S. to the world (see 1509170047). The agency specifically proposed "to require submarine cable licensees, as a condition of their license, to report on outages involving either lost connectivity or degradation of 50 percent or more of a submarine cable's capacity for periods of at least 30 minutes, regardless of whether the cable's traffic is re-routed," Tuesday's notice said.

The Information Technology Industry Council told the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative Wednesday that increasing data localization practices by foreign governments threaten U.S. and global economic growth. In ITI's comments on the National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers (NTE), the group said members have "experienced a significant increase" in the use of localization measures across the globe. Data localization is the practice of governments employing measures to favor local businesses and enterprises primarily in the information and communications technology space, which ITI said can be done "under the guise of promoting local industries and protecting privacy." These practices have "forced [ITI member companies and others] to make costly adjustments to their operations on the ground, regionally or globally, in order to comply with these measures," ITI said. It identified localization requirements in China, Indonesia, Nigeria, Russia, Turkey and Vietnam, and warned it's possible more governments will consider or put in place similar requirements by the time the USTR's NTE is published. "ITI is greatly concerned about the impact of such digital protectionism on international trade and investment, innovation, and the ability of people and businesses all over the world to benefit from free and open flows of information and data through the Internet and Internet-based technologies," it said. ITI recently released a blog post citing Indonesia's need to address localization practices in order for it to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership (see 1510280075). The public comment submission period for the USTR report ended Wednesday, but comments were only being made available by those who filed them, not the government. “As Internet services become a greater part of the global economy,” it will become “more important to monitor digital trade barriers,” the Computer & Communications Industry Association said in comments. CCIA detailed how recent moves "to restrict online information for alleged copyright reasons violates current trade agreements"; how Internet censorship has affected countries in Asia, the Middle East and Russia; and problems companies face following the European Court of Justice’s ruling earlier this month that declared the U.S.-EU safe harbor agreement invalid, in its comments. “As the economy evolves, the NTE will need to increasingly investigate and respond to barriers to digital trade if the Internet and Internet-enabled services are to continue to be export growth leaders,” said CCIA CEO Ed Black in a news release.

Three takeaways from FTC Commissioner Julie Brill’s speech Friday before the Amsterdam Privacy Conference, summarized in her Friday tweets: (1) the European Court of Justice’s “invalidation of Safe Harbor is a loss for transparency and FTC enforcement”; (2) the Schrems decision is an opportunity for a broad, honest, holistic discussion between the U.S. and the European Union on privacy; and (3) privacy discussions on technology need to integrate consumer, law enforcement and national security views. “We should recognize that important protections were lost through the Court’s invalidation of the European Commission’s decision in 2000 to approve safe harbor as a data transfer mechanism,” Brill said in her speech. “And they will continue to be lost if we do not have a durable and protective mechanism for information flow between the U.S. and Europe." Safe harbor’s transparency is unmatched by alternatives, Brill said: “We should create a new data transfer mechanism that strengthens the privacy protections that were in the safe harbor principles.” She said the safe harbor principles -- notice, choice, access, security, use restrictions and “other protections that one would expect from a baseline privacy regime” -- were “very expansive and protective.” Historically, privacy conversations in the U.S. have been largely siloed, Brill said. But as law enforcement asks for access to unencrypted versions of encrypted communications, the “debate has started to chip away at the silos,” Brill said. “Although I believe the U.S. consumer privacy framework is strong and multifaceted, I also believe the U.S. needs to go further with its consumer privacy laws to ensure that we are adequately protecting consumers with respect to these new technologies.” Brill said she supports additional privacy legislation, but she doesn’t believe such legislation is a “prerequisite for a post-Schrems data transfer mechanism.”

Ericsson plans to purchase the operations of software developer Ericpol in Poland and Ukraine, Ericsson said in a news release Thursday. Ericsson has concluded a preliminary share purchase agreement with Ericpol, it said, and approximately 2,000 of the developer's employees will join Ericsson upon completion of the acquisition. Pending regulatory approval, the transaction is expected to finalize during Q1 2016, Ericsson said.

The FTC and consumer protection agencies in 33 other countries that are part of the International Consumer Protection and Enforcement Network released an updated version of the ICPEN econsumer.gov website Tuesday, a commission news release said. The site is designed to help law enforcement authorities “gather and share cross border consumer complaints that can be used to investigate and take action against international scams,” it said.

MasterCard and Tata Communications partnered to financially empower 25,000 women in developing countries by giving them connected digital financial tools, Tata said in a news release Wednesday. The initiative, announced by both companies at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting, is part of a larger plan to reach 100 million women globally by 2020, said the release. The businesses, in coordination with a network of partners, will begin with pilot projects in India, Indonesia, Guatemala and Nigeria, said Tata.

Microsoft praised the U.S. State Department's Global Connect initiative, which seeks to connect 1.5 billion individuals across the globe to the Internet by 2020 (see 1509280046). In a company blog post Monday, Paul Mitchell, Microsoft tech policy senior director, called the new initiative an "ambitious effort" and "remarkable," especially against the backdrop of the U.N.'s newly announced sustainable development goals. Mitchell also said Microsoft plans to engage in the State Department's new program. "By working together as part of the Global Connect initiative, we can enable these benefits for those not yet connected," he said. Microsoft joins a bevy of industry groups and businesses that have vocalized support for Global Connect, with some observers calling it overly ambitious.

Sky has begun connecting its first customers to its new “ultrafast” fiber-to-the-home broadband network in York, U.K., the company said in a Monday announcement. Ultrafast customers will be able to receive broadband speeds of up to 940 Mbps, almost 500 times faster than Sky’s existing “service obligation,” making York the first U.K. city to test ultrafast broadband, it said. “The increased downloads speeds offered by ultrafast broadband mean that customers can download an HD movie in less than 30 seconds.” Sky is the U.K.’s first broadband service provider “to offer guaranteed broadband speeds,” said Lyssa McGowan, director of Sky Broadband, in a statement. “As Ofcom continues its review of the broadband market, we believe that trials like this are a valuable demonstration of the alternative technologies now available,” McGowan said of the U.K. regulator. “With the right conditions for investment and innovation, consumers and businesses could benefit from more ultrafast connections across the UK.”

The FCC proposal to remove filing requirements for imported devices is a “success story” within a multiagency effort to simplify international trade data filing within the U.S. government, said Cynthia Whittenburg, executive director, Trade Policy and Programs at Customs and Border Protection. Whittenburg mentioned the FCC proposal (see 1507210072) while speaking at a National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America (NCBFAA) conference Monday. The multiagency work, which is being overseen by CBP, included a request that the involved agencies review data filing requirements, and the FCC came to the conclusion that the device certification information of its Form 740 is no longer useful, she said. The FCC is still accepting comments on the proposal and the NCBFAA recently submitted comments in support of the NPRM, while asking for some language changes (see 1509240044).