Communications

The Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) supports the closing of the FCC’s business data services proceeding, and thus supports a vote to terminate the proceeding at the Commission’s April 20^th meeting.

Free-market oriented groups urged the FCC to reverse its ISP privacy rules, approved in October. The FCC posted thousands of public comments this week on the rules, many of them urging the agency to better align its rules with those of the FTC.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) should reconsider and withdraw its 2016 Privacy Order as an early step in undoing the many mistakes and overreaches made by the agency under its previous Chairman, and allow the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to take the lead over Internet privacy, said Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) president Tom Giovanetti.

If Congress passes the Email Privacy Act and sends it to President Donald Trump, it could be an "quick, easy bipartisan victory" for taxpayers and get the new administration and lawmakers off to a "positive" start, said IPI President Tom Giovanetti in an opinion piece in TechCrunch Wednesday.

Congress could chalk up a quick, easy bipartisan victory for taxpayers if both the House and Senate determined to pass the Email Privacy Act as early as possible.

IPI president Tom Giovanetti in a statement called it a "slam dunk" for President Donald Trump and Congress. "This legislation has nothing to do with preventing or prosecuting terrorism, but rather simply corrects lack of foresight in legislation passed 30 years ago, long before digital data became such a pervasive part of normal life," he said.

If the Act becomes law, digital data older than 180 days would still be considered active rather than ‘abandoned,’ and would still be subject to the normal requirements governing analog information.

McConnell would be "starting off on a very bad foot and confirming conservatives' worst fears about him" to reconfirm any Democratic commissioner before Wheeler's absence, IPI's Tom Giovanetti said.

It’s time to permanently rein in the FCC’s scope and authority by passing laws that limit its powers.