Senators gave mixed praise to the Senate Cybersecurity Act Tuesday, both commending the bill for addressing cyberthreats to the U.S. and citing a lack of procedural cohesion over its development. The Cybersecurity Act (http://xrl.us/bmr4rs) gives the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) the authority to lead the nation’s cybersecurity response and fortify the nation’s critical infrastructure and federal networks. The legislation provides a framework for sharing cyberthreat information between the federal government and the private sector, amends the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA), strengthens the partnership between DHS and the Department of Defense (DOD), increases cybersecurity research and development and cybersecurity recruitment and training.

Legal online gambling could have harmful effects on American Indian tribes who depend on local gambling revenue to support their communities, witnesses said at a Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearing Thursday. The Justice Department’s recent opinion concerning the federal Wire Act’s implications for online gambling could open the door for states to legalize Internet gambling, which in turn could deplete the demand for tribal brick and mortar gambling operations, they said. But the Poker Players Alliance said Internet poker is not a threat to tribal operations because Internet poker is fundamentally different from other online gambling.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., “compromised” on governance in negotiations with the House on spectrum legislation, the Senate Commerce Committee chairman said Tuesday. Rockefeller agreed to put NTIA in charge of deploying the public safety network, Rockefeller told reporters after Democratic senators’ weekly policy lunch. Rockefeller’s original spectrum bill, S-911, proposed setting up a federal entity called the Public Safety Broadband Network Corp. to govern the network. The corporation would have included federal, state, local, tribal, public safety and private sector members. Meanwhile, the House GOP bill had proposed a state-by-state approach involving a third-party administrator. The House-Senate conference on the payroll tax cut extension is expected to include spectrum auctions as a pay-for provision in the bill due by month’s end. Staffers from the House and Senate Commerce committees are separately negotiating the spectrum piece (CD Feb 7 p9). While not a conferee, Rockefeller has signaled he’s willing to compromise on the spectrum bill as long as the end result is a national network for public safety, a Commerce Committee spokesperson said. The House Commerce Committee didn’t respond to a request for comment. Committee Democrat Doris Matsui of California said she hopes “that any final deal will have a strong governance structure in place.” Matsui didn’t comment specifically on the NTIA approach cited by Rockefeller, but warned that “the lack of a strong governance structure could threaten the achievability of a nationwide public safety network.”

Native American issues have gained increasing prominence in Washington and the Obama administration understands the importance of improving communications in Indian country, but more remains to be done, former FCC Commissioner Michael Copps said Thursday in a speech to the Tribal Telecom 2012 Conference in Phoenix. “There is “a new feel for your issues in Washington nowadays,” Copps said. “There is concern from the top down. The FCC is an independent agency, of course, but it can better do what it is capable of doing when other branches of government are of a similar mind. I don’t think I need to assure this crowd that the president is paying attention to you and your issues. Many of you have met with him and know that first-hand.” Copps said he learned early on as a commissioner the importance of tackling the issue of improving communications in Indian country. The National Broadband Plan, changes to the Universal Service Fund, various broadband grants through the Agriculture and Commerce departments, all have helped, but much more needs to happen, Copps said. He noted that a “staggering” 90 to 95 percent of Native American households still don’t have broadband. “How will all this get done?” he asked. “First of all, let me tell you how we will not get it done. We will not get it done if government leaves it to business or business leaves it to government. ‘Going it alone’ is not how we met the infrastructure challenges of the past. That’s not how this country built its bridges and harbors and railroads and interstate highways and rural electricity. We built those things by the public sector and the private sector working together -- the private sector being the locomotive bringing its tools and expertise to the job and the public sector providing a vision for where the country needed to go and real incentives to bring critical infrastructure to places where business alone had neither the means nor the reason to go."

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued the following news releases related to commercial trade and related issues:

The FCC approved an order Tuesday rewriting the rules for the Universal Service Fund Lifeline program. Commissioners Robert McDowell and Mignon Clyburn found aspects of the order lacking, but both voted to approve the order as a whole. McDowell dissented in part and concurred in part. Clyburn issued a concurrence on one part of the order.

On January 30, 2012, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano gave her second annual address on the state of homeland security in the U.S. She highlighted the Department's progress in 2011, emphasizing the major steps DHS took to enhance America's capabilities to guard against terrorism; secure the nation's borders; engage in smart enforcement of immigration laws; safeguard and secure cyberspace; prepare for, respond to and recover from disasters; and to mature and strengthen the homeland security enterprise. Napolitano’s high-level overview also touched on trade and cargo.

"We are hopeful” that Congress will take rapid action to pass spectrum legislation as part of the payroll tax cut extension bill, outgoing White House Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra (see separate report in this issue) said during the Minority Media & Telecom Council’s conference Thursday. Spectrum is likely to be part of the House-Senate conference negotiations over the payroll tax cut legislation, he said. Meanwhile, NTIA has focused its efforts on evaluating the 1755-1850 MHz band for potential repurposing to commercial use, said Anna Gomez, deputy administrator. The agency completed its technical review of the band and is now collaborating with OMB and the federal agencies to finalize its recommendation, which is expected to be available in the coming weeks, she said. It’s a complex inquiry because “we are dealing with large systems, such as air combat training systems,” that would be expensive and time-consuming to relocate, she said. NTIA is also working on its online privacy report that would provide more certainty for business and consumers, she said. The agency also seeks to promote interoperability among governments to help U.S. business operate across borders, she said. RUS is focusing on implementing the Substantially Underserved Trust Area (SUTA) provisions of the 2008 farm bill, Administrator Jonathan Adelstein said. The SUTA provisions offer RUS new tools to finance telecom infrastructure in underserved tribal communities, he said.

The Fish and Wildlife Service has announced that the Obama Administration has released the first draft of a national strategy to help decision makers and resource managers prepare for and help reduce the impacts of climate change on species, ecosystems, and the people and economies that depend on them. The Wildlife Adaption Strategy is the first joint effort of three levels of government (federal, state, and tribal) that have primary authority and responsibility for the living resources of the United States to identify what must be done to help these resources become more resilient, adapt to, and survive a warming climate. The draft, "National Fish, Wildlife and Plants Climate Adaptation Strategy," available for public review and comment through March 5, 2012, is available here, and fact sheet here.

The White House has issued its “National Strategy for Global Supply Chain Security”¹ which focuses on the global network of transportation, postal, and shipping pathways, assets, and infrastructures by which goods are moved from the point of manufacture until they reach an end consumer, as well as supporting communications infrastructure and systems. The two goals of the Strategy are to: (i) promote the efficient and secure movement of goods and (ii) foster a resilient supply chain.