Computers and computing activities play an increasingly integral role in daily life in America, affecting our financial activity, social interactions, and more. With an increased level of dependence on networked devices comes the risk of theft, or even attacks, on and through our computer networks. While the business community has…
President Barack Obama is summoning top congressional Republicans and Democrats to a rare Sunday meeting at the White House to begin “hard bargaining” on a broad debt-reduction deal. At the July 10 session Obama will make his latest bid to break a partisan impasse over whether to include cuts in…
Will investors move out of their “safe haven” markets? In 2009, downgrades and debt auction failures in countries like the UK, Greece, Ireland and Spain were a stark reminder that unless advanced economies begin to put their fiscal houses in order, investors and rating agencies will likely turn from friends…
The White House will host a Twitter town hall with President Barack Obama on July 6. The president will answer questions submitted via Twitter, which limits messages to 140 characters. The town hall will focus on jobs and the economy, and a video feed of Obama’s answers will be streamed…
Introduction On December 1, 2010, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) released its highly anticipated consumer privacy protection framework titled “Protecting Consumer Privacy in an Era of Rapid Change” (“Privacy Report”). A copy of the Privacy Report may be obtained on the FTC website: http://www.ftc.gov/os/2010/12/101201privacyreport.pdf. The FTC seeks public comment on…
Earlier, a post on this blog noted the jurors in the corruption trial of former Governor Rod Blagojevich had informed the judge they had only reached a decision on two of the 24 charges in the case. Now, the news comes that the jurors have reached a final verdict: on…
Visa Inc., the world’s biggest payments network, fell as much as 5 percent after saying the U.S. Department of Justice may sue the company over a policy that bars merchants from charging extra to customers who pay with credit cards. “The department has indicated that it is considering filing a…
On January 22, 2010, the Supreme Court of the United States granted unlimited corporate spending on elections. The justices overturn a century of U.S. electoral law by a 5-4 vote. Millions of extra dollars are expected to start flowing from big business to Republican candidates. Overturning a century-old restriction, the…
Redmond’s top legal mouthpiece Brad Smith is calling on US lawmakers to overhaul rules on cloud computing, just as the company ramps up its efforts to belatedly step on other vendors’ toes in that marketplace. He asked Congress yesterday to legislate cloud computing, in a move to protect business and…
FTC BEGINS COMPREHENSIVE PRIVACY REVIEW THROUGH PUBLIC ROUNDTABLES On December 7, 2009, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) began the first of three public “Exploring Privacy” roundtables. To an extent, the FTC is at a similar stage as it was in 1989 when it held its conference on online profiling (now…