The Journal of Commerce reports that critics in the trade community have stated that U.S. Customs and Border Protection grossly underestimated the cost of compliance with 102, particularly for medium-sized and small importers, and Congressional homeland security committees question whether CBP has been thorough in its charge to work with the trade. (JoC, dated 03/17/08, www.joc.com)
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued an ACE Reports CSMS message announcing that the Authorized Data Extract (ADE), is now available to all Importer and Broker Automated Commercial Environment Portal Accounts.
At an April 2, 2008 hearing of a House Subcommittee on Homeland Security1, Deputy Commissioner Jayson Ahern testified on cargo and border security issues, including the Global Trade Exchange (GTX) pilot for which U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a Request for Quotation (RFQ) to eligible vendors in December 2007.
In early March 2008, U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a Truck Manifest CSMS message on the Automated Commercial Environment electronic manifest update that is currently scheduled to be implemented on April 5, 2008.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a revised version of its informed compliance publication entitled, What Every Member of the Trade Community Should Know About: Caviar.
The Los Angeles Times reports that Mexico's government is preparing to open bidding on the largest infrastructure project in its history, a $4-billion seaport on Mexico's Baja peninsula, that would link the Pacific Ocean to the U.S. heartland. Vessels bearing shipping containers from Asia would offload them at the new port where they would be taken over newly constructed rail lines to the U.S. (Los Angeles Times, dated 03/25/08, available at http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-mexport25mar25,1,5870690.story)
Discount retailer TJX and data brokers Reed Elsevier and Seisint settled FTC charges of not providing “reasonable and appropriate” security for consumer data, in unrelated cases. The companies must impose comprehensive information security programs and be audited by independent third-party security professionals every other year for 20 years. The commission said that TJX, with more than 2,500 stores worldwide, didn’t use “reasonable and appropriate” security measures to prevent unauthorized access to personal information on its computer networks. A cyberattacker exploited the failures, obtaining tens of millions of credit and debit payment card numbers that consumers used at TJX stores, along with personal information of approximately 455,000 consumers who returned merchandise to the stores (WID Jan 19 p3), the agency said. Reed Elsevier (REI), via its LexisNexis data broker business, and Seisint, acquired by LexisNexis in 2004, collect and store data on millions of consumers, including names, current and prior addresses, dates of birth, drivers license numbers and Social Security numbers. The companies relied on user IDs and passwords (or “user credentials") to control customer access to material in their databases. The FTC alleged that, among other failures, the companies let customers use “easy-to-guess passwords” to access Seisint “Accurint” databases holding sensitive consumer data. Identity thieves exploited these lapses, obtaining in multiple breaches access to sensitive data on at least 316,000 consumers, the FTC said. Thieves used the data to activate credit cards and open accounts, making fraudulent purchases. The breaches went on for at least nine months after REI acquired Seisint in late 2004, the commission said.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued a new informed compliance publication entitled, What Every Member of the Trade Community Should Know About: Classification of Coated and Water Resistant Apparel.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has issued its weekly tariff rate quota and tariff preference level commodity report as of March 24, 2008. This report includes TRQs on various products such as beef, sugar, dairy products, peanuts, cotton, cocoa products, tobacco, certain BFTA, DR-CAFTA, Israel FTA, JFTA, MFTA, SFTA, UAFTA (AFTA) and UCFTA (Chile FTA) non-textile TRQs, etc. Each report also includes the AGOA, ATPDEA, BFTA, DR-CAFTA, CBTPA, Haitian HOPE, MFTA, NAFTA, SFTA, and UCFTA TPLs and TRQs for qualifying apparel and/or other textile articles, the TRQs on worsted wool fabrics, etc. (CBP's weekly TRQ/TPL commodity report, dated 03/24/08, available at http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/import/textiles_and_quotas/commodity/)
World Trade reports that a proposal currently under consideration in New York City would charge truckers $21 for driving in certain high congestion zones in Manhattan during peak hours, but truckers would be offered an exemption if they are operating low emission vehicles. (World Trade, dated March 2008, www.worldtrademag.com)