Hance Haney

Hance Haney served as Director and Senior Fellow of the Technology & Democracy Project at the Discovery Institute, in Washington, D.C. Haney spent ten years as an aide to former Senator Bob Packwood (OR), and advised him in his capacity as chairman of the Senate Communications Subcommittee during the deliberations leading to the Telecommunications Act of 1996. He subsequently held various positions with the United States Telecom Association and Qwest Communications. He earned a B.A. in history from Willamette University and a J.D. from Lewis and Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon.

Archives

A Home Run For Better WiFi

There is a phenomenally better WiFi experience on the immediate horizon for those of us who may be working from home, consulting with our doctors from home or studying from home as a result of COVID-19.

Broadband Consumers Deserve Certainty, Not Partisan Politics

The Senate is expected to vote Wednesday on a proposal by Ed Markey (D-MA) to resurrect the Federal Communications Commission’s 2015 attempt to prevent blocking, throttling and paid prioritization by declaring that it has the right to regulate broadband using public utility-style regulation from 1934 that applied to telephones.  Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) let the cat out of the bag in remarks on the Senate floor on May 9 when he acknowledged that re-imposing public utility status would allow the FCC to regulate the price of broadband services. We believe that the internet (sic) should be kept free and open like our highways—accessible and affordable to every American, regardless of the ability to pay. The 1996 Telecommunications Act that passed the Senate by a

$8.2 Billion in Annual Losses to Advertisers and Media from Infringement and Fraud

The U.S. digital marketing, advertising and media industry lose $8.2 billion annually, according to a study prepared by EY for the Interactive Advertising Bureau, as a result of ad fraud; stolen video programming, music and editorial content; and malware. The report observes that each of these categories, i.e., “invalid traffic,” “infringed content” and “malvertising,” can be interrelated. An excellent example is a consumer who visits an infringed content site containing malware and infects the consumer’s browser with a robot that is later used to drive invalid traffic. If the industry can eliminate the profits earned by serving ads next to infringed content, it can reduce the amount of money available to drive illegal activities in the supply

More On What’s In Store for the FCC’s Open Internet Rules

Hal Singer has discovered that total wireline broadband investment has declined 12% in the first half of 2015 compared to the first half of 2014. The net decrease was $3.3 billion across the six largest ISPs. As far as what could have caused this, the Federal Communications Commission’s Open Internet Order “is the best explanation for the capex meltdown,” Singer writes. Despite numerous warnings from economists and other experts, the FCC confidently predicted in paragraph 40 of the Open Internet Order that “recent events have demonstrated that our rules will not disrupt capital markets or investment.” Chairman Wheeler acknowledged that diminished investment in the network is unacceptable when the commission adopted the Open Internet Order by a partisan 3-2

Special Access Regulation Would Harm Competition

A British telecom executive alleges that Verizon and AT&T may be overcharging corporate customers approximately $9 billion a year for wholesale “special access,” services, according to the Financial Times. The Federal Communications Commission is presently evaluating proprietary data from both providers and purchasers of high-capacity, private line (i.e., special access) services. Some competitors want nothing less than for the FCC to regulate Verizon’s and AT&T’s prices and terms of service. There’s a real danger the FCC could be persuaded-as it has in the past-to set wholesale prices at or below cost in the name of promoting competition. That discourages investment in the network by incumbents and new entrants alike. As researcher Susan Gately

Google probe may be revived

Attorneys general from forty states and the District of Columbia have asked the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to lift a preliminary injunction preventing a state attorney general from investigating Google’s business practices. In 2011, Google signed a non-prosecution agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice in which it acknowledged that it improperly assisted Canadian online pharmacy advertisers target U.S. consumers. Google agreed to forfeit $500 million and to adopt compliance and reporting measures. “State Attorneys General have reason to believe that Google’s services are still being used for unlawful activities,” according to a brief filed on behalf of Mississippi AG James M. Hood, III at the end of June. Google asserts that

Modernize the Copyright Office

The U.S. Copyright Office would be given greater autonomy pursuant to a proposal unveiled by two members of Congress last week, and the agency’s Director would be appointed for a ten year term by the President upon the advice of a bipartisan, bicameral commission and with the consent of the Senate. The Copyright Office was established as a separate department in the Library of Congress in 1897. The head of the Copyright Office, known as the Register of Copyrights, serves at the pleasure of the Librarian of Congress. But the Copyright Office has outgrown the Library of Congress. For example, the Library of Congress hasn’t delivered the necessary information technology environment so the Copyright Office can meet or exceed customer expectations in the Digital Age. An efficient

The Wrong Way to End the Terrestrial Radio Exemption

A bill before Congress would for the first time require radio broadcasters to pay royalty fees to recording artists and record labels pursuant to the Copyright Act. The proposed Fair Play Fair Pay Act (H.R. 1733) would “ sure that all radio services play by the same rules, and all artists are fairly compensated,” according to Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY). … AM/FM radio has used whatever music it wants without paying a cent to the musicians, vocalists, and labels that created it. Satellite radio has paid below market royalties for the music it uses … The bill would still allow for different fees for AM/FM radio, satellite radio and Internet radio, but it would mandate a “minimum fee” for each type of service for the first time. A February report

This Is Not How We Should Ensure Net Neutrality

Chairman Thomas E. Wheeler of the Federal Communications Commission unveiled his proposal this week for regulating broadband Internet access under a 1934 law. Since there are three Democrats and two Republicans on the FCC, Wheeler’s proposal is likely to pass on a party-line vote and is almost certain to be appealed. Free market advocates have pointed out that FCC regulation is not only unnecessary for continued Internet openness, but it could lead to years of disruptive litigation and jeopardize investment and innovation in the network. Writing in WIRED magazine, Wheeler argues that the Internet wouldn’t even exist if the FCC hadn’t mandated open access for telephone network equipment in the 1960s, and that his mid-1980s startup either failed or was doomed because the

Secret conspiracy to revive SOPA?

According to Google, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has: "conspired to achieve [the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA)]'s goals through non-legislative means,"; "pointed its guns at Google," and "did the legal legwork for the Mississippi State Attorney General." Where to begin? If MPAA and its members are protecting their rights through "non-legislative means," is that a bad thing? Absolutely not.

The Myth That Title II Regulation of Broadband and Wireless Would Be Comparable

Supporters of Title II reclassification for broadband Internet access services point to the fact that some wireless services have been governed by a subset of Title II provisions since 1993. No one is complaining about that. So what, then, is the basis for opposition to similar regulatory treatment for broadband? Austin Schlick, the former FCC general counsel, outlined the so-called “Third Way” legal framework for broadband in a 2010 memo that proposed Title II reclassification along with forbearance of all but six of Title II’s 48 provisions. He noted that “this third way is a proven success for wireless communications.” This is the model that President Obama is backing. Title II reclassification “doesn’t have to be a big deal,” Harold

Combating online piracy with better and more convenient legitimate services

The motion picture industry has established a search site to help consumers find non-pirated movies and TV shows available on the Internet: WheretoWatch.com. A study by NetNames estimated that 23.8% of all the bandwidth consumed in North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific in January 2013 was used to access pirated content. There are more than 100 legal online services offering movie and television content in the U.S., according to Chairman and CEO Senator Chris Dodd of the Motion Picture Association of America, and a study by KPMG found that 94% of the most popular and critically acclaimed films were legally available online in December 2013.

How Much Tax?

As I and others have recently noted, if the Federal Communications Commission reclassifies broadband Internet access as a “telecommunications” service, broadband would automatically become subject to the federal Universal Service tax–currently 16.1%, or more than twice the highest state sales tax (California-7.5%), according to the Tax Foundation. Erik Telford, writing in The Detroit News, has reached a similar conclusion. U.S. wireline broadband revenue rose to $43 billion in 2012 from $41 billion in 2011, according to one estimate. “Total U.S. mobile data revenue hit $90 billion in 2013 and is expected to rise above $100 billion this year,” according to another estimate. Assuming that the wireline and wireless broadband industries as a whole earn

Tax Consequences of Net Neutrality

Would the Federal Communications Commission expose broadband Internet access services to tax rates of at least 16.6% of every dollar spent on international and interstate data transfers–and averaging 11.23% on transfers within a particular state and locality–if it reclassifies broadband as a telecommunications service pursuant to Title II of the Communications Act of 1934? As former FCC Commissioner Harold Furchtgott-Roth notes in a recent Forbes column, the Internet Tax Freedom Act only prohibits state and local taxes on Internet access. It says nothing about federal user fees. The House Energy & Commerce Committee report accompanying the “Permanent Internet Tax Freedom Act” (H.R. 3086) makes this distinction clear. The law specifies that it does not

Study shows credit card companies collect millions for cyberlockers that infringe copyright laws

A report by NetNames for the Digital Citizens Alliance has found that the “overwhelming use of cyberlockers is for content theft.” At least 79-84% of sampled files on 30 of the most popular online file sharing destinations infringed copyright, according to the analysis. The report also estimates that the sites generate profit margins of 88-96% on combined revenue of over $95 million per year. The primary sources of income are premium account subscriptions enabled by payment processors such as VISA and MasterCard, and advertising. Every cyberlocker that offered paid premium accounts to users provided the ability to pay for those subscriptions by Visa or MasterCard, with only one exception. Only a single cyberlocker accepted PayPal. PayPal’s policy regarding

First Sale in the Digital Age

The House Judiciary Committee examined the “first sale” doctrine at a recent field hearing in New York City as part of the committee’s comprehensive review of copyright. The first sale doctrine made perfect sense during the Industrial Age, but in some respects it’s problematic for the Digital Age. Consumers have the right to give away, lend or sell a book that they own, thanks to a 1908 Supreme Court decision that was subsequently codified by Congress at 17 U.S.C. §109(c). There’s no dispute that “hysical copies of works in a digital format, such as CDs or DVDs, are in the same way as physical copies in analog form.” However, consumers with an Internet connection are downloading more and more digital content from remote servers pursuant to

Son’s Criticism of U.S. Broadband Misleading and Misplaced

Chairman and CEO Masayoshi Son of SoftBank again criticized U.S. broadband (see this and this) at last week’s Code Conference. The U.S. created the Internet, but its speeds rank 15th out of 16 major countries, ahead of only the Philippines. Mexico is No. 17, by the way. It turns out that Son couldn’t have been referring to the broadband service he receives from Comcast, since the survey data he was citing–as he has in the past–appears to be from OpenSignal and was gleaned from a subset of the six million users of the OpenSignal app who had 4G LTE wireless access in the second half of 2013. Oh, and Son neglected to mention that immediately ahead of the U.S. in the OpenSignal survey is Japan. Continue reading at Technology Liberation

Copyright Alert System successfully launches

Over 1.3 million notices of alleged copyright infringement were sent to users of peer-to-peer (P2P) networks suspected of illegally sharing copyrighted material over a ten month period beginning in late February 2013, according to the Center for Copyright Information (CCI). The Copyright Alert System, a voluntary private sector initiative of the CCI that is “based on the premise that most consumers will take corrective action if alleged copyright infringement involving their Internet account is brought to their attention,” generated the notices. P2P networks are monitored on behalf of recording artists and music producers, filmmakers, and creators and distributors of movies and television shows, and notices of alleged copyright infringement are generated through the use of

The Gravest Threat To The Internet

Allowing broadband providers to impose tolls on Internet companies represents a “grave” threat to the Internet, or so wrote several Internet giants and their allies in a letter to the Federal Communications Commission this past week. The reality is that broadband networks are very expensive to build and maintain. Broadband companies have invested approximately $250 billion in U.S. wired and wireless broadband networks–and have doubled average delivered broadband speeds–just since President Obama took office in early 2009. Nevertheless, some critics claim that American broadband is still too slow and expensive. The current broadband pricing model is designed to recover the entire cost of maintaining and improving the network from consumers. Internet companies get

Can NSA Force Telecom Companies To Collect More Data?

Recent reports highlight that the telephone meta-data collection efforts of the National Security Agency are being undermined by the proliferation of flat-rate, unlimited voice calling plans. The agency is collecting data for less than a third of domestic voice traffic, according to one estimate. It’s been clear for the past couple months that officials want to fix this, and President Obama’s plan for leaving meta-data in the hands of telecom companies–for NSA to access with a court order–might provide a back door opportunity to expand collection to include all calling data. There was a potential new twist last week, when Reuters seemed to imply that carriers could be forced to collect data for all voice traffic pursuant to a reinterpretation of the current