franken

Franken turns up heat on Holder, wants info on cell phone tracking

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) wants the Justice Department to hand over any information it might have about law enforcement agencies getting their hands on location data from cell phone companies.

Earlier in the year, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a case, United States v. Jones, that law enforcement agencies needed to first obtain warrants before using GPS devices to track people. In that case, the justices said law enforcement could not install tracking devices without a warrant, because that fell into the definition of a "search."

But in a letter yesterday to Attorney General Eric Holder (… Read more

Franken: Comcast thumbs nose at Net neutrality rules

Senator Al Franken says Comcast may be violating Net neutrality rules by exempting its own video service from a usage cap on its broadband network.

The Minnesota Democrat today sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice asking the agencies to take a closer look at a new service Comcast announced in March that will stream Xfinity on-demand content to Microsoft Xbox consoles.

The content that is streamed directly to the Xbox console will not be counted against subscribers' total bandwidth usage caps.Comcast now imposes a 250GB monthly data cap on its subscribers.

This … Read more

No joke: Al Franken rings alarm over Facebook, Google

Is Senator Al Franken spoiling for a fight with Silicon Valley over privacy?

"When a company is able to establish a dominant market position, consumers lose meaningful choices," Franken, a Democrat from Minnesota, told a gathering during a speech before the American Bar Association's Antitrust Section.

In particular, Franken, who also is the chairman of the Senate subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law, singled out Facebook and Google in a way that is not likely to warm many cockles on those two campuses.

For example:

If you don't want your search results shared with other … Read more

Senator presses wireless providers for Carrier IQ answers

Sen. Al Franken, who heads a Senate privacy panel, is asking wireless companies and hardware makers exactly how they're using Carrier IQ and what data they're collecting.

A Sprint spokesman confirmed to CNET this morning that the company received a letter from Franken, the Minnesota Democrat who wrote a similar letter to Carrier IQ last week.

Franken also sent letters to AT&T, HTC, Samsung, and Sprint Nextel, according to a report over the weekend in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

Carrier IQ is software created by an eponymous startup in Mountain View, Calif., that's used by … Read more

Senators aim to cut through 4G baloney

A bill introduced in the U.S. Senate on Wednesday would compel wireless carriers to be more forthcoming about what exactly customers can expect from services marketed as 4G.

The bill from Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken, along with Connecticut's Richard Blumenthal--all Democrats--is similar to the " Next Generation Wireless Disclosure Act," which was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives in June by Palo Alto Democrat Anna Eshoo.

Together the lawmakers are aiming to cut through the marketing mishmash that slaps the 4G label on a handful of next-generation network flavors such as LTE, … Read more

Franken pushes Apple, Google toward privacy policies for apps

U.S. Sen. Al Franken wants Apple and Google to require that apps clearly detail their privacy policies so users can better understand what information is being collected.

Franken (D-Minn.) sent a letter (PDF) to Apple CEO Steve Jobs and Google CEO Larry Page this morning thanking them for sending company representatives to his hearing on mobile privacy earlier in the month. Franken also followed up on a request made during that hearing to make privacy policies "clear and understandable," saying there was work to be done to get that information out there in the first place.

"Unfortunately, neither of your companies requires that apps on your stores have a privacy policy. As a result, a significant portion, and potentially a majority of apps, on your stores lack privacy policies," Franken wrote. Consumers "want more transparency and control about who is getting their information, how it is being used, and who it is being shared with."

Franken cited studies by TRUSTe and Harris Interactive, as well as The Wall Street Journal, which noted that many popular applications did not contain links to privacy policies, with others not having a policy to begin with.

"Requiring that each app in your stores have a clear, understandable privacy policy would not resolve most of the privacy concerns in the mobile market," Franken wrote. "But it would be a simple first step that would provide users, privacy advocates, and federal consumer protection authorities a minimum of information… Read more

Senate iPhone hearing preview: Don't single out only apps

New privacy laws should not single out only mobile app developers, a trade association representing small software companies is planning to tell a Senate committee tomorrow.

Jonathan Zuck, president of the Association for Competitive Technology, said in an interview with CNET this afternoon that any legislation arising out of the recent controversy over Apple iPhones and location tracking should be broad, not narrow. (See a list of related stories.)

"If you're going to put some privacy legislation in place, it shouldn't be some piecemeal regulation of some small portion of the technology industry because it's new … Read more

Al Franken seeks Net neutrality support at SXSW

AUSTIN, Texas--U.S. Sen. Al Franken wants tech savvy entrepreneurs to keep pushing Congress to protect Net neutrality.

Franken (D-Minn.), a comedy writer, author, and radio talk show host turned senator, spoke to attendees at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival (SXSW) conference here today where he urged them contact their representatives in Congress and let them know that protecting a free and open Internet is important. He also wants this community of creative business people to attend rallies and do all they can to raise awareness of the issue.

In his speech, he railed against big broadband service providers, … Read more

Black Hat D.C. wraps up

Breaking things--that's what the very bright and super curious do; they look beyond the obvious to see what's truly lurking beneath the surface. On Wednesday and Thursday, attendees at Black Hat D.C. 2008 got a window into the latest research being done on Web applications, wireless, and embedded technologies.

On Wednesday, researchers David Hulton and "Steve" showed how with about $1,000 with of equipment they can decrypt A5/1 cellular GSM traffic in less than a hour. Following that, Adam Laurie reprised his popular RFIDiots talk from last year's Black Hat briefings with … Read more