Bulk collection of telephony metadata began before 9/11, just as drones and cyberwarfare began long before the public knew about them, said former Qwest CEO Joe Nacchio Wednesday during a news conference on what he considers the USA Freedom Act's shortcomings. The intelligence community doesn’t advertise what it does and has never liked oversight, Nacchio said. The retroactive immunity granted to telecom companies after 9/11 was the first retroactive immunity ever given to the private sector, he said. There are at least 23 intelligence agencies in the U.S., he said, and USA Freedom is insufficient because it attempts to rein in the NSA’s activities by outsourcing bulk collection to the telecom companies, as well as Internet and social media companies, which have no choice but to cooperate, but doesn’t address activities at any other agency. Telecom or Internet companies that say no to the government will be subject to some sort of sanction such as an antitrust or FCC investigation, he said. Americans should be worried about the defense/intelligence complex and put nothing on the Web, he said. Social networking is a “dangerous trend” that immunizes individuals against the dangers of surveillance, he said. Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s disclosures are just a moment in time that shouldn't be fixated upon, but should be used to look at when developing policies that affect the future, Nacchio said. Nacchio couldn’t say whether the intelligence community will protest any actions to restrict Section 702 surveillance authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act when it sunsets in 2017. But even if intelligence agencies turn their attention to Internet and social media communications, that ISP traffic has to travel through fiber networks controlled by telecom companies, so telecom companies will continue to be affected, he said. The U.S. government has to be on the cutting edge of technology, but Americans don't have to give away their freedoms and liberties in the name of national security, Nacchio said.

The “NSA will destroy the Section 215 bulk telephony metadata upon expiration of its litigation preservation obligations,” the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said in a statement Monday. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court approved the NSA’s ability to resume the Section 215 bulk telephony metadata program so the government could transition the program to the telephone companies as directed by USA Freedom, it said. “As part of our effort to transition to the new authority, we have evaluated whether NSA should maintain access to the historical metadata after the conclusion of that 180-day period,” the statement said. The NSA will cease collecting bulk telephony metadata on Nov. 29, it said. Technical personnel will be allowed to continue to access historical metadata for an additional three months to verify the records produced under the “new targeted production,” it said. The NSA also will have a legal obligation to preserve metadata until civil litigation on the program is resolved or relevant courts “relieve NSA of such obligations,” it said. The data preserved solely because of preservation obligations “will not be used or accessed for any other purpose,” and will be destroyed as soon as possible, it said.

The Communications Workers of America said 86 percent of the Verizon employees it represents voted to authorize a strike if negotiations between the carrier and both the CWA and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) aren't successful by the time the current contract expires, a CWA news release said. The current contract is to expire at midnight Aug. 1, and covers 39,000 CWA and IBEW Verizon workers from Massachusetts to Virginia, the release said. "Our members are clear and they are determined," Dennis Trainor, CWA vice president-district one, said in a statement. "They reject management's harsh concessionary demands, including the elimination of job security, sharp increases in workers' healthcare costs and slashing retirement security." "Saturday's union vote was predictable and achieved nothing," a Verizon spokesman told us Monday. "As we move closer to this weekend's contract deadline, we hope the unions work with us on ways that will continue to ensure solid, upper middle-class jobs for our employees and exceptional services for our customers."

The Competitive Enterprise Institute intends to argue against the FCC net neutrality order, becoming the latest party seeking to file an amicus brief supporting petitioners challenging the order in court. The brief would focus on the FCC's claim that Section 706 of the Telecom Act gives the agency "affirmative legal authority" for all rules in the order, said CEI's notice to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which is reviewing USTelecom v. FCC, No. 15-1063. The free-market-oriented public interest group said it had sought to consolidate its brief with other potential amici, but none shared its particular Section 706 interest. Initial briefs by petitioners are due Thursday, while amicus briefs from supporters are due Aug. 6.

NAB wants a 21-day extension of the deadline for comments on the FCC’s proposal to preserve one TV channel for use by TV white space devices and wireless microphones, the association said in a motion posted online Monday. Comments in the proceeding are currently due Aug. 3, replies Aug. 31. Under the NAB proposal, those deadlines would move to Aug. 24 and Sept. 23. The extension is merited by the FCC’s delay in releasing a procedures public notice (see 1507150058), NAB said. “Because the vote on the Procedures Public Notice was delayed by three weeks, NAB respectfully submits that a three-week delay in the comment deadline in this proceeding would be appropriate,” the motion said. The FCC “will have a better, more informed record” if comments are filed after the procedures PN, NAB said.

The FCC should include time frames when making predictive judgments and adopting interim rules, FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly said in a blog post Monday. Such procedures are used when the FCC is pressed for time, but then rarely are followed up with more considered rules, O’Rielly said. “That means those offering or receiving communications services in the marketplace are forced to adhere to rules based on stale decisions or outdated information.” The FCC’s predictive judgments are afforded deference by the courts, O’Rielly said, but “can endure for years without being revisited.” Such judgments are “typically reexamined only when the agency has a desire to reverse prior decisions,” O’Rielly said. The commission should include a time frame to revisit predictive judgments in its rulemakings, the commissioner said. “The exact duration will depend on the circumstances. However, it is not unreasonable to expect that a predictive judgment not be allowed to last for more than three to five years without affirmative review,” O’Rielly said. A similar solution would also work for interim rules, and prevent them from becoming permanent by default, O’Rielly said. Interim rules have been used by the FCC to “lock in a policy preference for an extensive period of time, free from significant legal challenge,” O’Rielly said. “Any interim rule should be accompanied by a timeframe for completing the final rules. Here, the presumption should be that an interim rule not last for more than 18 months,” he said.

The FCC Electronic Comment Filing System experienced a minor processing delay Thursday and Friday that has since been fixed, a commission spokeswoman told us. The delay was responsible for a very low number of filings being timely posted online, she said. No filings from entities outside the commission appeared in ECFS Thursday, but Friday afternoon some filings were posted.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation consolidated multicircuit petitions for review of the FCC declaratory ruling and order on the Telephone Consumer Protection Act in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, a Friday panel order said. The panel randomly chose the D.C. Circuit as the circuit of record, acting on a notice of petitions for review filed there and in the 7th Circuit, the order said.

Sprint urged the FCC to throw out objections to agency sharing of the sensitive carrier data it collected as it reviews its special access business service rules. "Tellingly, none of the objecting parties even attempts to allege that the release of confidential or highly confidential information to any of the Filers would violate the terms [of] the October 1, 2014 Protective Order," said Sprint, an advocate of Bell special access regulation, in a filing posted in docket 05-25 Wednesday. Brown County C-LEC, Jason Tole, JSI, Parker FiberNet, Service Electric Cable, Transworld Network, US Signal Co. and Vantage Point Solutions objected to sharing of their business data -- or the data of their clients, including scores of RLECs -- with other parties, even subject to the protective order's safeguards (see 1507210027). Some said they would be harmed in a competitive market by such sharing with parties that would include their rivals (through outside counsels). But Sprint said the objecting parties "oppose any disclosure of commercially sensitive information and demand additional protections beyond those adopted by the Wireline Competition Bureau last October -- in essence challenging the Protective Order itself." Sprint said those objections are untimely because the deadline for challenging the protective order passed last October, and it urged the bureau to dismiss the objections and make the special access data available to all appropriate reviewing parties. Noting some objections that cited the need for additional information about parties seeking to review the data, Sprint said each requesting party "appears to have completed, without omission, the template Acknowledgement adopted in the Protective Order." Some of the objectors had said the FCC failed to follow through on assurances it would provide details about the requesting parties and their reasons for viewing the data.

The General Services Administration issued a presolicitation notice for office space for the FCC, according to a post Monday on the GSA’s FedBizOpps.gov website. The FCC’s lease at its current location at the Portals buildings ends in 2017 (see 1501090040), and GSA and FCC officials have told us the commission is examining plans for either moving or using a smaller space in its existing building. “It is anticipated the incumbent Lessor(s) may compete for this procurement,” Monday’s post said. A Washington Business Journal report on the solicitation said the FCC’s relatively large space needs are going to be of special interest to some of Washington’s largest developers. The presolicitation seeks between 394,000 and 473,000 square feet of office space -- the FCC leases 537,812 square feet in the Portals. The commission’s budget request mentioned the need to consolidate space. The presolicitation notice seeks a 15-year lease, with a five-year option, and specifies that the new location should be in Washington’s Central Employment Area, which means it won’t be in Virginia or Maryland. The new site must also be “within 2,640 walkable linear feet of a metrorail station.” The FCC also needs a minimum first-floor ceiling of 11 feet 6 inches, and the right to fully control and secure the roof, which must be “free from signal interference as determined by the FCC.” If the current building remains the FCC’s home, it’s going to need some renovations, the GSA posting said. “The Government is seeking to improve their current occupancy efficiencies and it is anticipated that most of the existing space will need to be redesigned and renovated.” The GSA is being represented by real estate broker CBRE, and expressions of interest in the presolicitation are due Aug. 3, while offers are due in September. The FCC is expected to take occupancy “no earlier than October 17, 2017 and no later than December 31, 2019,” the GSA notice said.