News briefs

Congress does what it's elected to do

It seems Congress sometimes really does have better things to do than track the activities of White House interns. Several technology-related proposals were tacked on to the huge federal budget bill, which was signed into law by President Clinton just before the legislative session ended. Here's a sampling of industry-related items that will take effect in 30 days:

The American Competitiveness Act temporarily increases the number of foreign technology worker permits, called H-1B visas. For the next two years, 115,000 such visas will be permitted rather than the 65,000 allowed previously. In 2001, the number of H-1B visas drops to 107,500, and will return to 65,000 in 2002.

The Digital Millennium Act's basic intent is to implement World Intellectual Property Organization treaties related to copyrights of digitally transmitted and stored material. The act makes it a criminal offense to circumvent copyright protection measures and forbids the manufacture, import, distribution or sale of devices or services that could circumvent copyrights.

The Internet Tax Freedom Act prohibits new Internet taxes for three years. The act also calls for a commission to review options for taxing online commerce.

In banking we trust

Eight major banks last week formed a trust company to develop a global businesses standard for secure electronic commerce. The participating banks - ABN AMRO Bank NV, Bank of America, Bankers Trust, Barclays Bank, Chase Manhattan, Citibank, Deutsche Bank AG and Hypo Vereinsbank AG - will issue digital certificates to end users. Businesses can use the certificates to identify users for Internet transactions. The certificates guarantee the identities of the parties involved and will save users the trouble of having to set up different digital certificates with each business.

Mind your own beeswax

IBM last week announced a new privacy consulting service, offered in partnership with the Privacy Consulting Group (PCG). IBM and PCG will work with customers to create, assess and monitor their information privacy policies and procedures.

IBM and PCG will also show companies what privacy statements they can include on their Web sites - and what underlying policies they can adopt - to allay customer concerns about privacy. While the service will help your privacy concerns, it won't help your wallet: Consulting service charges run from $25,000 to $100,000.

DSL gets lite

The International Telecommunication Union last week officially blessed the G.Lite Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line standard. The G.Lite standard is expected to accelerate the rollout of high-speed Internet access to customers over existing telephone lines. DSL-Lite supports 1.5M bit/sec downloads and 500K bit/sec uploads. Final ratification of the G.Lite standard is anticipated at an ITU meeting in June 1999, but this vote provides the specifications manufacturers and service providers need in order to begin bringing compatible products to market. A number of leading vendors backed the DSL-Lite specification, including Intel, Compaq, Microsoft, Ameritech, Bell Atlantic, BellSouth, British Telecommunications, Deutsche Telecom, France Telecom, GTE, MCI WorldCom, NTT, SBC Communications, Singapore Tel, Sprint and US WEST.