Aug
30

Internet advertisers begin offering new do not track icon

Editor’s Note:  The story below states that the Center for Digital Democracy, an NGO, has filed a complaint this week with the FTC regarding the do-not-track mechanism discussed in the article.

From: USAToday

Privacy and consumer advocates are lambasting the online advertising industry’s version of a do-not-track mechanism, slated to take worldwide effect today.

Today is the deadline for members of the Interactive Advertising Bureau to embrace use of a turquoise triangle with a lowercase letter “i” at its center, referred to as the Advertising Option Icon.

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Aug
23

Trade Commission Challenges a Hospital Merger

From: NYT

By ROBERT PEAR

WASHINGTON — Obama administration officials have been roaming the country, talking up their vision of a future in which doctors and hospitals team up to provide better care at lower cost. But a starkly different picture is unfolding this summer in a courtroom here, where lawyers from the Federal Trade Commission have been challenging a hospital merger in Toledo, Ohio.

The lawyers have put the transaction under a virtual microscope, taking hundreds of hours of testimony intended to show that the merger would stifle competition and drive up health care costs. In the process, they are scrutinizing details of the Toledo health care market that might seem more appropriate for investigation by state legislators or county commissioners.

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Aug
17

Google must be wary of widening antitrust scrutiny

From: Financial Times
 
By Richard Waters in San Francisco and David Gelles in New York
 
Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility is likely to face protracted regulatory scrutiny that could delay completion until next year and force Google to agree to conditions about how it runs the handset business, according to antitrust experts.

Lawyers largely dismissed the risk that regulators would try to block the search company’s first foray into hardware. However, the acquisition touches on a number of issues already under review in wider investigations of Google in Washington and Brussels, and could present a way for regulators to extract concessions from the company in return for clearing the deal, they added.

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Aug
11

State defends security system against GAO

From: Federal Computer Week

By William Jackson

The State Department says its continuous monitoring and risk assessment program for its global unclassified network has reduced security risks to Windows-based hosts and clients by 89 percent over a recent 12-month period. But the Government Accountability Office has issued a critical report, acknowledging that State has been “at the forefront” of continuous monitoring, but the system is neither inclusive nor reliable enough to ensure security in a network that supports 260 embassies and hundreds of other offices around the world.

Department officials acknowledge that the system is imperfect, but said GAO is overreaching in some of its recommendations for improvement.

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Aug
05

FTC Mulls New Online Ad Regulations, So Why Is Tech Industry Uninterested?

From: BNet

By Erik Sherman

High tech companies are worried about the Federal Trade Commission’s interest in potentially regulating online marketing, and for good reason. After more than a decade of the online industry promising self-regulation, the FTC essentially said late last year that self regulation wasn’t enough. No wonder Google (GOOG) alone dropped more than $2 million last quarteron lobbying the feds on privacy and online advertising regulation.

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