* Also: Google won't do Silicon Valley Wi-Fi; Democrats introduce 'Net neutrality bill
The FCC reaffirmed the May 14, 2007, deadline for facilities-based broadband Internet access and interconnected VoIP providers to comply with the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) for electronic surveillance. The deadline was first established under the FCC’s First Report and Order, dated Sept. 23, 2005. This week’s order concludes that this deadline gives providers of these services sufficient time to develop compliance solutions, and notes that standards developments for these services are already underway. CALEA has come under fire from higher educational institutions that say compliance will cost them billions of dollars, jeopardize research and open their networks to further hacker attacks. By providing facilities to access the Internet, universities and libraries fear they fall under the umbrella of the CALEA compliance order.
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Google is steering clear of a wireless competition to cover a large region just outside its planned San Francisco Wi-Fi project. IDG News Service reports that the company won’t respond to an RFP by the Wireless Silicon Valley Task Force. The task force, backed by city and county governments all around Silicon Valley and surrounding Google’s hometown, is seeking one or more vendors to finance and build a wireless network that would go into service by early next year.
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After failing to add a provision to a telecommunications reform bill, Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced a bill aimed at preventing broadband carriers from discriminating against competing Web content or services. IDG News Service’s Grant Gross reports that the bill would create a ‘Net neutrality law banning phone and cable companies from charging Web sites for faster data transmission, or blocking their online competitors’ content and services. The Democrats’ amendment failed, on a vote of 34-22, largely along party lines, when the House Energy and Commerce Committee approved a wide-ranging telecom reform bill two weeks ago.
