This week we had our the 2015 TechAmerica D.C. Fly-In organized by TechAmerica the public sector and public advocacy department of CompTIA, and the Technology Councils of North America (TECNA). Over 140 technology executives and business owners representing 29 states attended the two day event (February 10 and 11).
We kicked off the event with lunch and a keynote presentation on the Internet Tax Freedom Act (ITFA) with Stacy Sprinkle, VP of Tax Policy at Verizon. She said that since its enactment, ITFA has banned federal, state and local governments from taxing Internet access charges, as well as from assessing multiple or discriminatory taxes on electronic commerce. She talked about why it’s important during Fly-In to call on Congress to act swiftly to permanently extend ITFA this year. The moratorium, which has been extended five times since its enactment in 1998, is now set to expire on October 1, 2015. She said now is the time to make this ban permanent to avoid future uncertainty for all.
Tech Policy Summit Panels
The next event was the Tech Policy Summit which included several informative panels. The first was a Broadband Panel that focused on what can be done on both the federal and state levels to encourage high-speed broadband competition. The panelists included>Deb Socia, Executive Director, Next Century Cities;Staci Pies, Senior Policy Counsel, Google; and Nick Maynard, Assistant Director, Telecommunications Innovation, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Discussion took place on what government can do to improve broadband access. Socia from Next Century Cities recommended that city governments think of creative financial models and search for federal grant programs in order to get broadband capability. Pies from Google talked about local government providing access to publicly owned “rights of ways” including access to existing infrastructure—i.e. getting to utility poles to string fiber. “If cities can pass laws and regulations to make that easy,” Pies said, “Although simplistic, it would really help with broadband deployment.” She also discussed dig once policies as important at the federal level as well as making available accurate up-to-date data such as where all current utilities are located. Maynard discussed a private/public partnership called US Ignite that is accelerating the development and deployment of next-generation applications that capitalize on the potential for gigabit broadband networks ultimately improving education and workforce development.
The second was the Cybersecurity Panel which provided a holistic view of the cybersecurity landscape in 2015 and the reality of cybersecurity threats, what the Federal Government is doing to combat them, and how they impact the day-to-day operations of SMB companies. Panelist included Michael Seeds, Legislative Director, Office of Representative Mac Thornberry, Tom Kellerman, Chief Cybersecurity Officer, Trend Micro; and Tom Parker, CTO, Fusion X.
“Cybersecurity is not a new issue, however, the landscape of cyber threats has radically changed. Now, we’re dealing with professional criminals and radical groups who are leveraging cyber as a way to extort businesses. In fact, these new attacks are changing our perception of cyber threats,” said Parker from Fusion X.
Kellerman from Trend Micro stressed that website security should be paramount and that a business’ cloud strategy should be intertwined with a mobile strategy. “Although it’s difficult to quantify what your threat is going to be, it’s important to take measures to protect a business,” he stressed.
Seeds discussed the importance of working with other nations on cybersecurity as more standards get developed and put into place. He talked about the importance of Congress not legislating in distress but working to get laws now into place now including a national approach to data breach notification.
The third was the high skilled immigration reform panel that looked at what it would take to pass immigration legislation in a Republican-led Congress. Panelists included Scott Corley, Executive Director, Compete Coalition; Tom Jawetz, Democratic Chief Counsel for the Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security of the House Committee on the Judiciary; and Matt Sandgren, Senior Counsel to Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Senate Judiciary Committee.
There was discussion among the panelists of the Immigration Innovation Act, also known as I-Squared, which TechAmerica supports and urges Congress to enact. It was reintroduced with bipartisan support and addresses high-skilled immigration and domestic pipeline workforce challenges. Among other things, the bill increases the H-1B cap and establishes a market escalator so that the cap can be adjusted up or down in response to the demands of the economy. On that bill, Jawetz said that I-Squared may likely get broken apart and pieces of it may be worked on.
The panelists also talked about the impact of President Obama’s series of executive actions issued late last year that would modify our immigration system. Included in this series was a directive that would require DHS to take a number of administrative actions designed to streamline the high-skilled immigration system. In retrospect, panelists agreed that while comprehensive immigration reform started out as a process, it has become political resulting in very little movement. In fact, Corley stressed high skilled immigration reform will never pass on its own.
Corley also added that opponents of these bills say that high skilled immigration reform takes away jobs, but that’s not the case, he said, “It creates jobs—and if we don’t support and hire the best and the brightest, other countries will.”
TechAmerica Champion Award Dinner
On Tuesday evening, the TechAmerica Champion Awards Dinner took place where we recognized several individuals who exemplify leadership in the technology sector; and who have championed policies that advance the country’s IT industry.The 2015 award recipients included U.S. Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA 5th District), U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Aaron Woods, director of Strategic Partner Programs at Xerox Corp.
Capitol Hill Speaker Series
We had a very informative Day 2 of the 2015 TechAmerica D.C Fly-In which began with the Capitol Hill Speaker Series in the Cannon House Office Building. Speakers that morning included Marsha Blackburn, U.S. Representative (R-TN); Ryan Burke, Policy Advisor, National Economic Council; Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA); Commissioner Ajit Pai, Federal Communications Commission (FCC); Commissioner Julie Brill, Federal Trade Commission (FTC); and Zoe Lofgren, U.S. Representative (D-CA).
Blackburn started the morning with a discussion of data security and privacy and the need for businesses to be increasingly vigilant about protecting their data. “It’s no longer a question of if, but when will your company be a victim to a security breach.”
She discussed her work on data security breach legislation, specifically the Secure IT Act designed to improve America’s ability to respond to our escalating cybersecurity challenges. She said it includes five main components: allowing the government and the private sector to address cyber threat information in a more transparent fashion; reforming how our government manages its own information systems; creating new deterrents for cyber criminals; prioritizing research and development for cybersecurity initiatives; and streamlining consumers’ ability to be notified when they are at risk of identity theft or financial harm.
Blackburn also said she opposes net neutrality regulations. “The Internet is not broken and doesn’t need to be classified as Title II with regulations that will lead to billions of dollars in new fees and taxes. The Internet doesn’t need to be taxed, government doesn’t need to be involved and we don’t need an activist FCC that wants to put the Internet under control.”
Our next speaker was Ryan Burke, Policy Advisor, National Economic Council (NEC). She spoke about the council’s initiative for filling in demand IT jobs. She said that this spring NEC will be announcing a program that will focus on three areas 1) job readiness vs. pedigree 2) high quality training (ie coding boot camp) 3) job matching with more than 20 communities across the country. She said NEC is looking for partners for this program.
Next was Chairman Goodlatte who provided an update on several tech sector bills including the Innovation Act that would fight patent trolls— this bill was introduced last year and was passed by the House but was never passed by the Senate. Goodlatte plans to re-introduce the Innovation Act this year. Goodlatte also said he continues to work on high skilled immigration reform. “The immigration system is broken, status quo is unacceptable. The President’s actions make it very difficult to do immigration reform. We need legislation passed that supports high skilled immigrants who will help our economy grow and create jobs.”
Our next speaker was FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai who is one of two Republicans on the five-member commission opposing Chairman Tom Wheeler’s net neutrality plan. He spoke about net neutrality and the open internet. He even held a 332 page Net Neutraility plan from President Obama that will be made public later this month. While he wouldn’t reveal what was in the report, he did say he opposes heavy-handed Title 2 internet regulations. He also discussed the need to open up broadband competition and to push for more broadband-friendly policies.He said he’d like to see more licensed and unlicensed spectrum be made available for the marketplace and is in favor of a 5 GHz Spectrum Band as test bed for wireless innovation.
Next was FTC Commissioner Brill who discussed data privacy and the new FTC staff report on the “Internet of Things.” She highlighted that the report calls for self-regulation by companies that gather data and recommends equipping more devices with security measures, updating security with patches as needed, and limiting the amount of information companies gather. She also said popular devices that gather and transmit information about exercise, eating and sleep patterns increasingly threaten privacy and security. She also has concerns about consumer segmentation, as well as consumer notification. She stressed wanting to have conversations with industry on how to implement best practices and felt that a Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights is necessary in these times.
Our last speaker of the morning was Rep. Zoe Lofgren who is not optimistic that immigration reform will succeed in this Congress and noted high-skilled immigration proposals — including Sen. Orrin Hatch’s “I-Squared” Act — would overcome opposition. Still, Lofgren said she is working on a bill to extend an immigration program aimed at bringing in foreign investors. That EB-5 visa program is set to expire in September. “I think there is bipartisan support for the program,” she said.
The remainder of the day was devoted primarily to visits with Congressional offices. We called on Congress to enact a permanent ban on multiple and discriminatory taxes on access to the Internet, as provided in H.R. 235, the Permanent Internet Tax Freedom Act. This legislation supports economic accessibility to the Internet by making permanent the current and temporary ban on taxation of Internet access charges by federal, state and local governments.
