__   ___   ___   ___         ___   __
                 /    |   | |     |   |    /  |   | |  \  \  /
                |     |___| |___  |___|   /   |___| |   |  \/
                |     |         | | \    /    |     |   |  /\
                 \__  |      ___| |  \  /     |     |__/  /  \

______________________________________
____________________________________ /_________________________________________
Volume 6, #06                      /___________________________________________
                                                                   Aug 12, 1993

Table of Contents:

Section a: National/World News
[a 1] CPSR Asked to Play Key NII Role
[a 2] FBI Seeks Power for Credit Search Without Warrant
[a 3] Committee Looks Askance at Clipper
[a 4] CSPR Now Officially Hip
[a 5] Calendar


Section b: Metro/Northwest
[b 1] Do Not Adjust Your Set


__________________________                         
_________________________ /____________________________________________________
  ___                   /______________________________________________________
  ___|                                                                 CPSR/PDX
 |   | Section a:
 |__/| National/World News


[a 1] CPSR Asked to Play Key NII Role

At a recent meeting in Washington D.C., CPSR was challenged by top
level telecommunications policy experts to craft a public interest
vision of the National Information Infrastructure (NII).  The experts
at the roundtable discussion included Mike Nelson from the President's
Office of Science and Technology, Vint Cerf from the Internet Society,
Jamie Love from the Taxpayer's Assets Project, Ken Kay from Computer
Systems Policy Project, and Laura Breeden from FARnet.

"We were excited to discover that CPSR is in a position to play a key
role in shaping NII policy," said CPSR Board President Eric Roberts.
"The commercial sector is already in the thick of the debate, but
there has been little coordinated response from the noncommercial
constituencies.  After talking about the issues and CPSR's role, the
Board committed to meeting this challenge."

So far, the debate about the NII has centered around fiber versus
ISDN, cable companies versus telephone companies, research versus
commercialization, and so on.  These are real questions with important
implications.  However, CPSR believes that a better starting point is
a set of guiding principles as the context for all these more detailed
questions about "architecture," technical standards, and prime
contractors.  Before arguing over bits and bytes, it is crucial to
clarify the vision and values that underlie a major endeavor like the
NII.

As individuals in the computing profession, CPSR's membership
knows that new technologies bring enormous social change.
CPSR's goal is to help shape this change in an informed manner.
Key issues CPSR intends to raise include:

     - ensuring that the design remains both open and flexible so
       that it can evolve with changing technology

     - ensuring that all citizens have affordable network access and
       the training necessary to use these resources

     - ensuring that risks of network failure and the concomitant
       social costs are carefully considered in the NII design

     - protecting privacy and First Amendment principles in
       electronic communication

     - guaranteeing that the public sector, particularly schools
       and libraries, have access to public data at a reasonable cost

     - seeking ways in which the network can strengthen democratic
       participation and community development at all levels

     - ensuring that the network continues to be a medium for
       experimentation and non-commercial sharing of resources,
       where individual citizens are producers as well as consumers

     - extending the vision of an information infrastructure beyond
       its current focus of a national network, to include a global
       perspective

The national membership of CPSR brings a unique perspective to the
overall conception of the NII.  Throughout CPSR's history, the
organization has worked to encourage public discussion of decisions
involving the use of computers in systems critical to society and to
challenge the assumption that technology alone can solve political and
social problems.  This past year, CPSR's staff, national and chapter
leadership have worked on privacy guidelines for the National Research
and Education Network (NREN), conducted a successful conference on
participatory design, created local community networks, and organized
on-line discussion groups on intellectual property.

To ensure that its position is broadly representative, CPSR will work
in concert with other public interest groups concerned about the NII,
such as the newly established Telecommunications Policy Roundtable.
CPSR chapters are will be conducting a broad based public campaign to
reach out beyond the technical experts and producers -- to people who
will be affected by the NII even if they never directly log on.

___________________________                         
                          /____________________________________________________

[a 2] FBI Seeks Power for Credit Search Without Warrant

In early July, the Senate Intelligence Committee approved a provision
that allows for FBI access to credit reports using only a letter
instead of a judicial warrant in cases that they say involved national
security. There is concern that this will be subject to abuse and that
the necessity has not been proven.

A national security letter gives the FBI the authority to obtain
records without judicial approval and without providing notice to the
individual that his or her records have been obtained by the Bureau.
Similar FBI proposals were rejected in previous years after
Congressional leaders expressed concern over the civil liberties
issues raised.

Although the current draft proposal is more comprehensive than those
circulated in previous years, the changes and additions do not alter
significantly the central character of the proposal. The
Administration's 1993 proposal includes explicit limits to
dissemination of obtained information within the government, penalties
for violations including punitive damages, and reporting requirements.
These provisions are positive changes from the legislation put forward
in previous years, but they do not save the proposal from its
intrinsic flaws.

___________________________                         
                          /____________________________________________________

[a 3] Committee Looks Askance at Clipper

By David Banisar

On June 9, 1993, Congressman Edward Markey, Chairman of the House
Subcommittee on Telecommunications and Finance held an oversight
hearing on "encryption and telecommunications network security" and on
the "Clipper chip," a device to allow encrypted telephones to be
tapped by the government.

Panelists were Whitfield Diffie of Sun Microsystems, Dr. Dorothy
Denning, Steven Bryen of Secure Communications, Marc Rotenberg of the
CPSR Washington Office and E.R. Kerkeslager of AT&T.

Congressman Markey, after hearing this testimony, noted that the
Clipper proposal had raised an "arched eyebrow among the whole
committee" and that the committee viewed the proposal skeptically.
This statement was the latest indication that the Clipper proposal has
not been well received by policy makers.  Last Friday, the Computer
Systems Security and Privacy Advisory Board of NIST issued two
resolutions critical of the encryption plan, suggesting that further
study was required and that implementation of the plan should be
delayed until the review is completed.

___________________________                         
                          /____________________________________________________

[a 4] CSPR Now Officially Hip

Recently, concerns have been expressed on-line that CPSR isn't a "hip"
organization.  Those concerns ring a bit hollow in light of the
mention of CPSR in the most recent issue of bOING bOING ("number 10:
Sex Candy for Happy Mutants!"), in an interview with Brenda Laurel.
bOING bOING, a magazine for capitalizationally challenged, very hip
people, has provided new and highly suggestive evidence of CPSR's
hipness.

Additional evidence comes from MONDO 2000 issue 10, where CPSR is
favorably mentioned by none other than Captain Crunch.

___________________________                         
                          /____________________________________________________

[a 5] Calendar

10/16/93      CPSR Annual Meeting
              Envisioning the Future: 
              The National Information Infrastructure and Local Access.
              Oct 16 - 17
              University of Washington, South Campus Center
              Seattle, Washington
              Contact: anamioka@atc.boeing.COM

10/22/93      International Symposium on Technology and Society '93
              October 22-23, Washington DC
              Deadline for submission: February 28
              Contact: m16805@mwvm.mitre.org

3/23/94       Computers, Freedom and Privacy
              March 23-26, Chicago, Il.
              Sponsored by ACM and The John Marshall Law School
              Contact: CFP94@jmls.edu

7/2/94        5th Conference On Women Work And Computerization
              "Breaking Old Boundaries: Building New Forms"
              July 2-5, UMIST, Manchester, UK
              Abstracts by 10/1/93
              Contact: clement@vax.ox.ac.uk



________________________________
______________________________ /_______________________________________________
                             /_________________________________________________
 |                                                                     CPSR/PDX
 |___
 |   | Section b:
 |___| Metro/Northwest


[b 1] Do Not Adjust Your Set

Yes, CPSR/PDX did disappear without explanation during June and July.
A very heavy travel schedule for the editor has affected CPSR/PDX's
publication schedule.

_____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________ /_________________________
                                                   /___________________________
Editor:      Erik Nilsson                             Contributing Editors:
Copy Editor: Andrea Rodakowski                          
                                                        
_______________________________________________         
_____________________________________________ /________________________________
CPSR/PDX is published approximately monthly /__________________________________
by CPSR/Portland. Subscription to CPSR/PDX   Copyright 1993, CPSR/Portland.
is free.  No advertising is accepted. For   Permission to reproduce part or all
correspondence or subscription requests,   of CPSR/PDX is granted to non-profit
e-mail: erikn@goldfish.mitron.tek.com.    publishers, as long as material is 
______________________________________   properly attributed to CPSR/PDX.   
____________________________________ /_________________________________________
                                   /___________________________________________