Attending today – presented by Techonomy Media
http://techonomy.com/conf/policy/program/
Simone Ross & David Kirkpatrick is kicking the event off – talking about networks taking power from older institutions and the Personal Democracy Forum (PDF) recently held in NY; who controls technology and how the IoT is developing; Bitcoin and the Blockchain; one-way view of sharing of data and personal information; “Google” self-driving cars; tech industry needs to be in Washington, DC and listening more; D5 – UK, Israel, S Korea, Estonia, New Zealand; live streaming at Techonomy.com and #TechonomyPolicy
First panel – Steve Case, David Edelman, Vinton Cerf & David Kirkpatrick (moderator)
Steve – opportunity but no guarantee we will remain leaders of the Internet, need to double-down on entrepreneurship; David – reviewing how tech has slowly grown to get the attention of senior officials in the government, first State Dept “tech” hire, recruitment of Megan Smith, the President “gets” technology, policy focused and “We The People” platform and how online petition about un-locking cellphones lead to snowball in the press and rapid Congressional and Industry action; Vint – freedom of choice, self-fixing problem with youth, DNA meets DNS, collaboration and cooperation can avoid the competitive zero-sum game problem, Europe and Asia don’t seem to be as willing to take risks and to reward risk takers, failure as a source of education; Steve – Rise of the Rest tour getting outside of Silicon Valley, need to fix disfunction in Washington, VC funding needs to be better distributed, JOBS act, immigration problem and how we need to win the battle for talent; Vint – government as innovator, move lab results far enough along that VC will take it the rest of the way, long-term R&D; David – education tech and who will benefit from it, $10B pulled together without Congress; Vint – broadband to Internet that needs to be open, gov’ts interfering, need security
Second panel – Fadi Chedade (ICANN), Steve DelBianco (NetChoice), Miriam Sapiro (Brookings), Gordon Goldstein (Silver Lake – moderator)
Steve – community comments on Congressional action regarding the transition from US control to ICANN; Fadi – fundamental reason the US government is stepping back as other governments step back, govs only have an advisory role at ICANN Board, need to update and strengthen the ICANN bylaws so they cannot easily be changed, multi-stakeholder approach; Steve – stress-testing the accountability measures will work in the multi-stakeholder model of governance; Miriam – how did ICANN improve? through measures designed to prevent capture of the Board; Fadi – bright light – how many people were involved in the multi-stakeholder approach and how well it is working, potential problem – that things might be turned upside down by various governments, make sure everybody understands ICANN’s role
Briefing with Arun Sundararajan regarding “on demand” workers
crowd-based capitalism, Uber cars, Kiva, AirBnB, on-demand labor expanding from consumers in the corporate world, his focus is consumer protection, institutions to “communities” and how sustainable is this process? consumerization of digital, digitization of physical world, socioeconomic drivers, feedback from others as a digital signal and digitaization of trust, invisible infrastructure, blurring of lines between personal and professional worlds, sharing-economy leads to issues about possible lack of professionalism, new self-regulatory opportunities and platforms, information failures: adverse selection and moral hazard, 2 narratives of the sharing economy – empowered entrepreneurs vs the race to the bottom (hollowed out middle class?), research – providers tend to be more entrepreneurial than average person, worker cooperatives vs shareholder corporations, US social safety net assumes full-time employment with an employer
Briefing – Kitty Parry, the Social Media Charter
Financial institutions are behind but have the resources to catch up, financial regulations are the problems, we need to bring industry and regulators together to innovate better regulations, what is the framework? advocating for institutions to sign-up for social media charter as a common sense approach, support for more practical regulation, the Charter will be informed by best practices, regulators should promote greater transparency, framework is only the start, regulators moving to tighter interpretations, costing more in compliance expenses, need the new age of collaboratory compliance, archiving data,
Global Pushback Against American Tech
Erich Anderson (Microsoft), Andrea Gloriosa (EU), Yael Weinman (ITIC), and Bob Boorstin, Albright Stonebridge
Yael – what keeps tech companies up at night – data localization and uncertainty; Andrea – digital single market (DSM) document could be a little clearer – believes the US and EU are grappling with similar questions, Brussels “above my paygrade” answer, Europe is more risk adverse than the US, friction is not always bad if it enables you to stop when you want to; Erich – broad laws as frameworks for technology, DSM initiative is a good one, can help cut down on data silos, details make it complex but tech companies want to see progress, in Asia (Sue Decker article) Korean IP and anti-trust intersection, & Chinese governments – taking fresh looks at this area, each nation can pass its laws without it being protectionism if they do so thoughtfully, industry given the opportunity to provide input and to have dialogues with these countries, Bob – used to be with Google and wanted no regulation rather than US, EU, Asian, etc versions of regulations; Yael – tech neutrality is needed in quickly developing regulatory world; Andrea – EC has been respecting net neutrality – focus is on what actually gets proposed, do we need global laws and rules? would be good for global tech companies, EU and the US have many of the same problems and objectives, keep the discussion going; Erich – create technologies that meet the minimum bar, – Snowden question – issues were already bubbling and doubts the $35B loss to US tech companies figure that was published by ITIF
Jerry Brito (Coin Center) – Briefing on how the blockchain could change everything – how everything is based on ledge concepts, issues of how these ledgers interact or not, blockchain is like a shared Google spreadsheet, it an append only record so it keeps a record of what has gone before, no gatekeepers such as banks, domain name registries, just uses open source software, what can you do with a universal open ledger – managing money is the obvious first use case, next is copyright (DRM) universal ledger is basically a new Internet protocol, crowdfunding (onename), DNS, notary services, open source, permissionless
Andrew Rasiej (Personal Democracy Forum) – the 20th century’s war on the 21st centory – money vs information and it is getting worse with the IoT – jail break your car? house? DRM issues in all the software, thinks the NSA is the Federal Reserve of information, very concerned about privacy, broken democracy, too much money in politics, “information is the currency of democracy” Thomas Jefferson
Alex Hawkinson (SmartThings – acquired by Samsung) How the IoT will connect shoes, cars, doctors and power plants – 50B connected devices & 7T in market value by 2020, in homes – energy and security connections, trying to cut down on the silos and promote greater openness in these IoT
Jessica Rosenworcel @JRosenworcel & Michael O’Rielly @mikeofcc (FCC Commissioners) and Craig Mundie (Mundie & Associates) – FCC (R&D) on spectrum and the policy future for ubiquitous tech – Craig opens the discussion with review of wireless communications evolution, PCAST report on spectrum utilization, April passage of new rules; Jessica – repurposing spectrum for further usage, PCAST report was a jolt; Michael – 3.5 Gigahertz initiative, thinks the Commission may have thrown so many different things at the initiative that they cannot tell what is or is not working, marine radars and uses in the middle of the country, more ways to subdivide these things, the Navy is finding ways to co-exist and allow usage by geography, World Radio Conference every 4 years, division between commercial and government usage, federal usage is roughly 60% and clearly they are looking for a better way to transfer spectrum from gov to commercial sector, PCAST recommended a way to value government spectrum usage – synthetic currency, short-term vs long-term incentives as it relates to the carrot and stick model of encouraging government transfers of spectrum, licensed and unlicensed differences – unlicensed was a small, experimental chuck of spectrum 30 years ago, special case in cellular operators shifting data to the wifi network and their hybrid solutions, the influence of software in the networks will be dramatic and will impact usage when a user is not fully using licensed spectrum, purchase rights in real-time access system – starting this experiment in the 3.5GH band, if you are not using your priority access then someone else can use it until you are ready to reclaim your priority rights, spectrum is a limited resource, JMOS just a matter of software, 7 in 10 teachers assign homework that requires Internet access,
Philip Zelikow @marklefdn (Markle Foundation & UVA) – The digital revolution and America’s economic future – is the iPhone and import or export? is it a sale of a good or a service? CEO group called Rework America, economic revolution of a new kind – decentralized, pushes things out to the users, Starbucks & ASU deal, don’t think about robots taking jobs – imagine the new jobs that will use the robots, we are entering a “no collar” world, the credential system is no longer transparent enough, America’s Moment
Why everybody cares about the blockchain
Jerry Brito (Coin Center), Jinyoung Lee England (Digital Currency Council), Brian Forde (MIT Media Lab), Brad Burnham (Union Square Ventures), and Paul Vigna (Wall Street Journal – moderator)
Brian – impacted by the Chinese hack of the Federal employee data, better phishing attacks, we could authenticate ourselves to the blockchain (Joel analyst at Union Square Ventures good article), SSA could authenticate us to the blockchain; Jinyoung – decentralized and distributed information is less hackable, open; Brad – public data controlled by a key; Jinyoung – criminals think bitcoin and the blockchain are anonymous but this is not the case, law enforcement can literally follow the money on the public ledgers; Jerry – company Onename (lookup) says that the blockchain will always be there; Brian – rubber-stamp authentication protocol – he was in Federal gov for 3+ years, ink based stamps, authentication theater based on thousands of years, need a cultural change, need technologists to be working with the politicians but pols are scared but tech fails, his MIT lab is beta testing these new systems to make them safer and more acceptable; Brian – context in the US we don’t quite understand but in Iraq where they don’t have ATM’s on every corner they got it much quicker, if the government is in crisis you can see the people being much more willing to adopt and use technologies, M-Pensa in Kenya; Brad – invested in Mine, Coinbase, etc; Jerrry – bitcoin is regulated, NY bit license recently published, Coinbase and Circle will survive but it will be burdensome, worries about the start-up that cannot afford to get licensed in every state, bit license has a money laundering requirement at the state level; Brad – regulators try to avoid all risk, regulate entry into the market, keeps the start-up world out of the bitcoin platform, thinks the NY bit license is an overstep; Jerry – we have had private currencies for many years, airline miles, etc; Brad – Mine uses machine learning techniques to re-associate identity information related to copyrights, etc; Jerry – the blockchain could go way but in the way that the web could go away, their hopefully are sufficient incentives to keep things going; Brian – increasing the block size from 1MB to 20MB and have a large increase in transactions; Jerry – 5 people have the keys to change the code at GitHub.
Privacy collides with data in a transparent world
Julie Brill, Federal Trade Commission, Brad Burnham, Union Square Ventures, Horacio Gutierrez, Microsoft, Robert Quinn, AT&T Services, and David Callaway, (USA Today – moderator)
Brad – 2-3,ooo years to understand physical property, decades with intellectual property and just scratching the surface with data; Julie – is privacy a fundamental right or just a consumer issue, lots of issues where we and Europe are working towards the same goals, data brokers, figure out how you are using your data, don’t be an ostrich, consumers attention is a resource; Bob – privacy and security are not the same thing, security is 24/7; Horacio – litigation with US regarding warrant seeking data concerning an Irish citizen; Julie – extra-territoriality, FTC can protect US and European citizens, safe-harbor for data flow; David – quotes John Chambers saying that data breaches will get much worse
Briefing: Why drones are dive-bombing the FAA – Lisa Ellman (McKenna, Long & Aldridge) – Drone demonstration, uses for agriculture, package delivery, power line inspections, medicines to rural areas, internationally several countries are ahead of the US in using drones for commercial purposes, in Japan most crop-dusting is done by drones, FAA is working hard on the regulations, February they put out a notice of proposed rule making, Section 333 petition for exemption, 500+ petitions approved so far, platform neutral rules and Presidential Memorandum on usage, policy makers and innovators should be working together, geo-fencing to keep drones out of places where they shouldn’t go, Chris Anderson left Wired to start a drone company
Briefing: Doing business in DC – Don Baptist & Tony Costello (Bloomberg Government) – Washington is changing, cyclical, information isn’t what it used to be, Bloomberg Government study regarding 10K reports of 60 companies, the government risk factor section increased dramatically between 2005 and 2012; improving government affairs metrics, quantification of interactions with governments, more data driven, leverage technology to analyze data, Washington office government affairs can significantly impact business results, disproportionate results for lobbing expenditures
Europe’s Digital Mission – David O’Sullivan (European Union to the USA) and David Kirkpatrick (Techonomy Media) – David says the digital pervades almost everything, tech is huge driver of change, argues that EU and US wrestling with same issues, goal of EU to create the Digital Single Market (DSM), EC is responsible for proposing and implementing legislation, required regulatory breaking down of borders, purpose is to liberate the digital economy across Europe, so much depends on data flows, could have impacts on the US and the rest of the world, 28 countries coming together in the DSM, 5-10 year project for the 16 actions listed in the most recent DSM document, much will happen in the next 5 years, nuances in regulation, minority of protectionist agenda people, attempt of French government to build a French “Google” that failed, not upset that US companies are leading tech in Europe, says they fine many more companies in Europe than in the US, there is not the VC to enable EU companies to grow to greater scale, too many EU companies sell-out to US companies, very private and not wanting to talk about data breaches like happens here in the US
Militarization of the Internet: Expanding the boundaries of cyberwar
Shane Harris (Daily Beast), Alan Marcus (World Economic Forum), Michael Cote (Dell SecureWorks), Craig Mundie (Mundie & Associates), and Cory Bennett (The Hill – moderator)
Craig – lots of energy is expended at the Federal level to figure out attribution of cyber attacks, what is a war? aggressive movement that is not espionage; Alan – Saudi Aramco was taken off line by a cyber attack; Craig – questions about what we should do in response to a cyber attack; Cory – is a Chinese hacker being directed by the Chinese government? the North Korea attack against Sony, nation state responsibility for actors in that country; Craig – China and US economies are so intertwined that it severs as a deterrent, problem of a viable asymmetric attack; Alan – not clear what agencies are looking at what aspects of the various problems, 4 years ago it took representatives of 18 agencies, today it would be fewer but still not down to 1; Craig – continuity between military (DOD), homeland security and police, some countries do better because they don’t hamstring themselves the way we do, need a new way of organizing cyber responses; Alan – mission of blue navy keeping ships safe, if cyberspace is a trade route then shouldn’t the military be keeping it safe? Shane – FBI dealing with criminal agencies from international sources, made a deal with NSA to create an operational team, more creative thinking; Craig – state vs non-state actors and then criminal groups, software was built not thinking that there would be outside attacks, we are developing a different and more hybridized architecture to address cyber security issues; Alan – change in CEO thinking about cyber security after Target attack; Shane – great distrust of government after Snowden disclosures; Alan – business leaders understand they are under greater and greater pressure of attacks of various types; Michael – such a massive problem that the government is telling companies they have been hacked but there is little else they can do because there are so many hacks
Parting Shots – Kate Jackson @McKinsey and Rik Kirkland @rikthekirk (McKinsey & Company)
Rik – noted how PDF talked about Panopticon dystopia and SmartThings guy showed family friendly video, drones being better used in other countries, blockchain usage will be huge, need to spur continued innovation and better utilize spectrum, Kitty’s example of the UK social media charter, make policy makers and innovators sit at the same table, create more freedom of choice
Technology, Innovation and American Progress
Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ), Senator Deb Fischer (R-NE), Sean Parker (Economic Innovation Group (EIG) & Brigade), and David Kirkpatrick (Techonomy Media – moderator)
Both Senators – very complimentary of each other and suggesting how much they are working together with respect to technology; Sean – very bipartisan donations, 3 year process to catalyze a few novel ideas through EIG, doesn’t agree with people he supports on every issue but that is true whether they are in politics or not; Sen Fischer – invited trucking folks from Nebraska who had great conversations with Sen Booker, listening and exchanging information, came to DC to find solutions, not hold press conferences, didn’t worry about the gridlock, just came to work rather than fight; Sean – going into 2010 there was the dysfunctional view that wanted to burn DC down, today he sees the Senate as more ready to make things happen, companies he is creating that aim to use tech to improve government, tech leads in society and government needs to catch up, moving into life and bio sciences; Sen Booker – again complimenting Sen Fischer because she focuses on delivering solutions, we are in danger of losing our dominance in global commerce to China and others, problems with FAA not implementing regulations fast enough to allow innovation to flourish in this country, we need a bi-partisan technology council that deals with immigration, patent trolls, etc that chokes innovation, comes from city hall, Senate cannot grab best minds like an Internet company; Sean – national technology agenda? precedents in prior generations, building economic growth, EIG got started regarding the uneven economic recovery, build up manufacturing capacity, capitalization issues and robots as a tool of automation, trying to keep us as the world leader in bio research, we need to just not screw it up, EIG created to get capital to flow to distressed regions such as Detroit; Sen Booker – we lead the race to the moon but we may not be winning the race to cure cancer, could that happen in Europe or China? we need a national sense of urgency; Sean – if we don’t fix the FDA we will have to get drugs from China, problems with the patent office, China drone company example, Brigade is rolling out about 7 tools to help people organize online; Sen Booker – patent office problems; Sean – maybe we need a different type of patent for software; Sen Booker – question about getting social security and similar funds to the poor with greater efficiency, safety, technological security, etc, immigration may be the issue with the greatest need to be solved, need for much greater approach to apprenticeships