Week in Review

Bezos and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

  • A United Nations investigation implicated Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the 2018 hacking of Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos’ cellphone. The report showed that Bezos’ phone was infected with malware and hacked after receiving a WhatsApp message from the Saudi prince; the Saudi Embassy has denied reports that the country was behind the cyberattack.
  • Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) sent a letter to Bezos asking for more details about the type of technology used to hack his cellphone. Bezos has until Feb. 14 to respond.

Davos

  • During his annual speech at the World Economic Forum, billionaire George Soros said without providing evidence that he believes that Facebook Inc. and President Donald Trump have an “informal mutual assistance operation or agreement” to help the president get re-elected and protect the company. Soros added that Facebook’s only guiding principle is to “maximize your profits irrespective of what harm it may do to the world”; Facebook spokesman Andy Stone said Soros’ allegations are “just plain wrong.”

Cybersecurity and national security

  • Roughly two years ago, Apple Inc. abandoned plans to encrypt iPhone users’ iCloud storage, including back-ups of the devices, after the Federal Bureau of Investigation objected, according to six sources familiar with the matter. At the time, FBI officials argued that end-to-end encryption on iPhones would remove one of the agency’s most effective tools for learning about suspects who own the phones, according to one current and three former FBI officials; a year later, the company had nixed the plans, the six sources said, although it’s unclear why exactly it did so.
  • More than 1 million voters in King County, Wash., which includes Seattle, will be able to use their smartphones or computers to cast ballots for the first time in an election for a board seat of the King Conservation District, a local agency focused on environmental efforts. Tusk Philanthropies, a charitable organization founded by venture capitalist Bradley Tusk, is funding the new technology, which has been tested through pilot projects in a few other states.
  • A bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced “The Safeguarding Americans’ Private Records Act,” which would limit what intelligence agencies can collect without a warrant and permanently end their ability to collect phone records, as well as reforming the controversial Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court so independent attorneys have access to its proceedings. The lawmakers — Wyden and Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), along with Democratic Reps. Zoe Lofgren (Calif.) and Pramila Jayapal (Wash.) — introduced the companion bills in an effort to reform several surveillance authorities that are expiring in March.
  • Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) issued a letter to Clearview AI Chief Executive Hoan Ton-That requesting information about which companies and law enforcement agencies the controversial facial recognition app works with, as well as previous security breaches and whether the platform can recognize children under the age of 13. The letter comes after a New York Times investigation detailing the company’s database, which scrapes images from social media and other sites.

Digital taxes

  • The United Kingdom is expected to move forward with plans to introduce a new digital tax in April, a spokesperson for Prime Minister Boris Johnson said, despite Washington’s threat to levy tariffs in retaliation. The decision comes as the United Kingdom and the United States prepare to start talks over a post-Brexit trade deal next month, and the same week the United States agreed to a truce with Paris in the trade battle surrounding France’s own digital tax.
  • European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said she is a “strong supporter” of individual countries pushing their own digital tax proposals as a way to add pressure to negotiations for an international policy, saying that “it is very important that we keep up the momentum.” The comments come despite Trump’s threats to apply retaliatory tariffs against European countries, including France and the United Kingdom, if they pursue such a tax.

Huawei

  • United Kingdom officials proposed giving Huawei Technologies Co. a limited role in building out the country’s 5G network that would prevent it from accessing restricted government systems and the core part of the network, according to two people with knowledge of the matter, in opposition to American recommendations to completely ban the company from the project due to Chinese spying concerns. British officials are set to meet with the country’s National Security Council next week to formally decide how to deploy Huawei’s equipment, the sources said.

Social media

  • ByteDance Inc. has been interviewing candidates in recent months to be TikTok’s new chief executive, according to people familiar with the matter, at a time when the growing social media app has drawn scrutiny from U.S. lawmakers and national security officials. It’s unclear what the new CEO’s relationship would be to current TikTok head Alex Zhu; the sources said the role’s official duties will depend on who is hired.

Autonomous vehicles

  • Uber Technologies Inc. said it will start mapping Washington, D.C., in preparation for an expected pilot of its autonomous vehicles in the city later this year. Three mapping vehicles will drive around the city over the next few weeks to collect data on how its vehicles would respond to the city’s infrastructure, and this would be the fourth city Uber has mapped after Dallas, San Francisco and Toronto.
  • Waymo, Alphabet Inc.’s self-driving unit, will start mapping and then begin testing its autonomous long-haul trucks in three Texas cities and parts of southern New Mexico, with plans to focus tests primarily on interstates. Waymo has already started testing its self-driving trucks in Arizona, the Bay Area and Atlanta.

What’s Ahead

  • The Senate and House are scheduled to be in session. 
  • The FCC’s next open commission meeting is Thursday. Agenda items  include establishing the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund and consideration of an enforcement action.

Events Calendar (All Times Local)

01/27/2020
FCC’s Arizona and New Mexico Rural Tour
FTC’s workshop on voice cloning technologies 12:30 pm
01/28/2020
State of the Net Conference 2020
FCC’s Arizona and New Mexico Rural Tour
Senate Commerce’s transportation and safety subcommittee hearing on infrastructure 10:00 am
NTIA’s Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee Meeting 1:00 pm
01/29/2020
FCC’s Arizona and New Mexico Rural Tour
House Science Committee’s hearing on competition in critical technologies 10:00 am
House Energy & Commerce communications subcommittee’s hearing on digital equity and internet adoption 10:30 am
FCBA Inaugural Women’s Summit 12:00 pm
SHLB’s “Unfinished Business in the RHC Program” webinar 1:00 pm
CSIS’s American Innovation in the Quantum Future event 4:30 pm
View full calendar

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