House passes bills aimed at cutting tech, science red tape

The House today passed two bills aimed at making it easier for scientists, researchers and tech companies to work together and with the government.

HR 1736, the International Science and Technology Cooperation Act of 2009, is designed to create a new committee under the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) to coordinate international science and technology activities across federal agencies. Today, international partnerships between research and technology companies are evaluated on a case by case basis and without a coordinated approach. One government agency might approve an international partnership, for instance, but a separate agency might not approve. As a result, witnesses told Congress, a lot of significant collaboration opportunities are missed.

The second bill, HR 1709, the STEM Education Coordination Act, is designed to improve the coordination of federal funds spent on science, technology, engineering, and math (thus the STEM acronym) education activities that involve a bunch of other federal government acronym agencies - such as NASA, NOAA, DOD and DOE.

“There are already many valuable programs being funded through the federal agencies that could play an important role in sharing knowledge and passion for STEM with students, teachers, and the general public,” said bill author Bart Gordon (D-TN). "while the federal government can play an important role in STEM education at all levels because of the richness of the science and technology resources at our research agencies, one key recommendation we’ve heard repeatedly was the need for interagency coordination of federal STEM education activities, and improved dissemination of these activities to practitioners.”

Now only if Congress could figure out a way to keep all the acronyms straight...

New domain names, more openness from ICANN?

The folks responsible for Internet domain names came to Washington Thursday to pitch their ideas for new Web root names. Some they threw out for example were ".nyc" and ".sport." But ICANN's honchos also got called a few names themselves - like secretive.

As the Washington Post's Mike Musgrove points out, ICANN got heat from both members of Congress and outfits like domain name seller Go Daddy Group Inc.

ICANN's secrecy, of course is nothing new. The quasi-private, non-profit group that's based in a big building overlooking a beautiful harbor in Marina del Ray, Calif. has been accused for years of being less than transparent when deciding who can get which domain names, where its funding comes from and where it goes.

As Musgrove reported, Rep. Anna G. Eshoo (D-Calif.) praised the openess of the Web, but said "it seems to me that the way ICANN operates does not match that."

Of course anytime a single entity control something as big and far-reaching as the Internet, it's likely to upset more than a few people.

Cybersecurity: What the Prez Says

There wasn't much detail in the White House's 60-day review of cybersecurity, but President Obama's speech about the review spoke volumes about how important he thinks it is to make the Internet and everything connected to it more safe and secure. Read his remarks here.

Of particular note is Obama's mention of investing more money into research and development, working more closely with private industry and the cybercrime he personally experienced when his campaign email, schedules and policy papers were breeched last year. Companies involved in this space should keep their eyes on the potential for new federal work.

Also notable is the list of of 120 or so high-level honchos who were asked to be present at the President's presentation in the East Room of the White House last week. Among them where his top national security advisers, top officials of the departments of homeland security, energy and treasury as well as the head of the FBI, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of the National Economic Council.

President George W. Bush made it seem like cybersecurity was important in the days after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, but that stance rapidly faded away in the walk-up to the war in Iraq and other issues.

Though the substance has yet to come from the White House (it will), Obama is making it clear that cybersecurity - and cybersecurity policy - will be a big and important topic under his watch.

After a 60 day review, White House cybersecurity experts have made a list of recommendations that read a lot like past national cyber recommendations:

1.Appoint a White House czar; 2. Increase education about cybersecurity; 3. Share responsibility with private firms; 4.Create effective incidence response within the government; 5. Encourage innovation.

The President is about to discuss the findings - and hopefully provide more detail - momentarily here in the East Room of the White House.

Cyber Security 2.0 (or is it 3.0 or 4.0 now?)

The White House has scheduled an 11 a.m. EDT Friday press conference where President Barack Obama is expected to announce details of a major overhaul of the government's technology infrastructure protection program - something he's been promising since last year's campaign . Obama also is expected to give some more details about what the nation's forthcoming new "cyberczar" will be doing when he or she is named, probably in the next couple of days.

This isn't the first time the federal government has said it's going to start paying attention to cybersecurity, of course. Shortly after the Sept.11, 2001 terrorist attacks, then President Bush flew Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and his lieutenant Richard Clarke to Silicon Valley where they announced the National Strategy To Secure Cyberspace.

Several cyberczars later, government cybersecurity policy went absolutely nowhere.

What might make it work better this time? More emphasis from the boss, for starters - and more power for whomever he puts in charge. So far, it looks like Melissa Hathaway, the acting White House cyber security chief, is the front runner, although the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Scott Charney, Microsoft Corp's vice president for security and Maureen Baginski, who held top jobs at the National Security Agency and the FBI, might also be in the running.

In another sign that Obama's putting more importance on the role, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is scheduled to be at the announcement Friday, indicating that the new cyber policy will reach beyond the nation's borders - something that's absolutely necessary when you have hackers and crackers from Russia, China and other places responsible for most cyber attacks these days.