The American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI) has issued a press release announcing that it has been commissioned by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to conduct a Border Efficiency Assessment on the Automated Commercial Environment's (ACE) e-Manifest initiative and its use by motor carriers.
The Transportation Security Administration has issued a final rule, effective October 23, 2006, which amends its regulations at 49 CFR Parts 1520, 1540, 1542, 1544, 1546, and 1548 in order to require airport operators, aircraft operators, foreign air carriers, and indirect air carriers (e.g., air freight forwarders) to implement security measures in the air cargo supply chain, including security threat assessments (STAs) for persons with unescorted access to air cargo, as directed under the Aviation and Transportation Security Act (ATSA, P.L. 107-71).
The European Court of Justice (ECJ) Tues. voided a pact demanding that European nations give U.S. Customs airline passengers’ phone number, credit card and other data within 15 min. of departure for the U.S. The move may have broad implications for privacy rights and data transfers in other contexts, including communications traffic data retention, experts said.
The Cal. PUC adopted rules for allocating capital gains when telecom and other utilities sell land, buildings and other property no longer needed for utility services. Under the adopted rules, ratepayers will get all capital gains from depreciable property such as buildings. Gains from sale of non-depreciable assets like land will be split 50-50 between company and ratepayers. The allocation rules (Case R-04-09- 003) will apply to all telephone providers except for AT&T, Verizon, SureWest and Frontier. They were excluded because allocation of capital gains is one of the issues in the PUC’s pending case to develop a uniform regulatory framework for these 4 carriers. The rules will apply on transactions involving a sale price under $50 million and a gain of under $10 million, which the PUC said covers the vast majority of utility asset sales. It won’t apply to routine retirement of minor obsolete utility assets like poles and vehicles.
The European Court of Justice (ECJ) Tues. voided a pact demanding that European nations give U.S. Customs airline passengers’ phone number, credit card and other data within 15 min. of departure for the U.S. The move may have broad implications for privacy rights and data transfers in other contexts, including communications traffic data retention, experts said.
SES Global said it will use Land Launch to orbit AMC 21 in mid-2008. Land Launch, part of Sea Launch, will launch the satellite from the Baikonur Space Center in Kazakhstan aboard a Zenit-3SLB vehicle, SES officials said. AMC 21 is being built by Alcatel Alenia Space, using Orbital Science’s small STAR-2 platform, they said. The craft will carry 24 Ku-band transponders for service from 125 degrees W, with coverage of the U.S. and Carribean. SES Americom will operate and market the satellite, SES official said.
Another land rush will start June 7 at the Brussels- based registry for .eu domain names, this one to allow registration of names sought during .eu sunrise periods but not allocated. These number 50,000 names, Eurid spokesman Patrik Linden said. After talks with registrars, Eurid decided to list the names, despite fear of aiding cybersquatters. Starting today (Wed.), Eurid will publish domains’ status in the Whois, permitting onlookers to check a name’s availability. By April 30, U.S. registrars registered nearly 180,000 .eu domains, 2nd only to German registrars, who registered around 507,000. By Tues., Eurid had registered 1.8 million domain names. A week after the April 7 rush, .eu had overtaken .biz and made it to 9th on the list of prevalent TLD zones after .com, .de, .net, .uk, .org, .info and .nl. Eurid is studying abusive registration, Linden said. Between 1,000 and 10,000 names were registered to persons or firms not eligible for the eu-domains -- mainly because they don’t reside in the EU.
During the May 16, 2006 meeting of the Departmental Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (COAC), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and Treasury officials discussed a variety of trade issues with COAC, highlights of which are provided below:
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued what it terms "important" guidelines for carriers participating in the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) electronic truck manifest (e-manifest) program. Preceding the guidelines is information on CBP's timeline for e-Manifest as well as its explanation of the need for this guidance, which is highlighted below.
BALTIMORE -- EarthLink will launch a nationwide municipal wireless partnership program with small ISPs to better meet various cities’ deployment schedules, said company Vp-Corporate Development Bill Tolpegin. Keynoting at ISPCON here Tues., Tolpegin described the program, which the company is calling EarthLink Network Alliance, as a way to expand its service territory and advance muni wireless without stretching too much financially. Though dial-up, voice and other services will remain prominent parts of EarthLink’s business, he said, this move signals the increasing importance of municipal wireless to the company.