Congress should authorize funding to restart the Office of Technology Assessment (see 1904300193), nearly 100 groups and individuals wrote appropriators Thursday. Without it, Congress doesn’t have the capacity to address issues concerning emerging technologies, the groups wrote. Lincoln Network, TechFreedom, R Street Institute, DuckDuckGo, Mozilla, Engine, American Civil Liberties Union, Center for Democracy and Technology, Open Markets Institute and Public Knowledge signed.

Facebook’s co-founder called CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s power “unprecedented and un-American,” and said it's time to break up the company. In a 6,000-word New York Times opinion online Thursday, Chris Hughes, who left the company in 2007, called Zuckerberg’s influence controlling Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, “staggering, far beyond that of anyone else in the private sector or in government.” Government “must hold Mark accountable,” said Hughes, who called Zuckerberg’s “unilateral control over speech” the “most problematic aspect of Facebook’s power.” Government should break up Facebook just as it did such monopolies as Standard Oil and AT&T, said Hughes, co-chairman of the Economic Security Project and a senior adviser at the Roosevelt Institute. He called on Congress to create an agency to regulate tech companies that would protect privacy, guarantee basic interoperability across platforms and create guidelines for acceptable speech on social media. Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., agreed that “in retrospect, the FTC should not have approved Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram & WhatsApp in 2012. I believe the way forward is to heavily scrutinize future mergers and to ensure no company has anti-competitive platform privileges,” he said in a statement. Vice President-Global Affairs Nick Clegg responded that Facebook acknowledges the need for accountability. He said that "you don’t enforce accountability by calling for the breakup of a successful American company. Accountability of tech companies can only be achieved through the painstaking introduction of new rules for the internet."

The FTC should investigate Amazon for Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act violations related to its Echo Dot Kids Edition, senators wrote the agency Thursday. Ed Markey, D-Mass.; Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.; Dick Durbin, D-Ill.; and Josh Hawley, R-Mo., cited alleged evidence Amazon is failing to meet COPPA’s notice standard and parental consent requirement and not allowing parents to properly delete children’s data. The FTC confirmed it received the letter. Nineteen consumer and public health organizations led by the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and Center for Digital Democracy called for an investigation, in an FTC complaint. They cited a review by the CCFC and Institute for Public Representation at Georgetown Law. “Amazon retains children’s data even after parents believe they have deleted it,” they wrote, citing overly complicated privacy policies. Color of Change, the Electronic Privacy Information Center and Public Citizen were among others joining the complaint. FreeTime on Alexa and Echo Dot Kids Edition are compliant with COPPA, an Amazon spokesperson said Thursday, citing the company's privacy practices.

Three unrelated companies violated federal law by using contractual gag clauses to bar customers from writing honest, negative reviews about their products or services, the FTC alleged Wednesday. Waldron Electric Heating and Cooling; National Floors Direct and Las Vegas Trail Riding violated the law, the FTC said in its first enforcement action under the Consumer Review Fairness Act. Commissioners voted 5-0 on three separate settlement orders, which dictate that future violations carry penalties of about $42,000 each. “Many online shoppers use customer reviews and ratings to get information, but these companies used gag clauses in their form contracts to stop customers from posting honest but negative feedback,” said Consumer Protection Bureau Director Andrew Smith. National Floors Direct included non-disparagement language in its purchase order agreement before the law was in effect, and removed it thereafter, an attorney for the company said, citing no admission of liability. Attorneys for the other defendants didn't comment.

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are making progress providing notice and appeal options for content takedowns but falling short in delivering comprehensive statistics on moderation activity, New America’s Open Technology Institute reported Tuesday. Guided by its Santa Clara Principles from a year ago (see 1805070057), OTI graded the platforms on notice, appeals and numbers. All three platforms provide users information on terms violations that are “relatively detailed and either fully or partially include some key pieces of information,” the group said. The companies showed the greatest “success” with appeals processes, meeting at least three of four recommendations, the organization said. The platforms fell well short of meeting 20 recommendations for “numbers,” and should provide “a more granular level of transparency and accountability around their content takedown decisions,” OTI said.

Google made the Pixel smartphone more affordable Tuesday with introduction of the $399 5.6-inch Pixel 3a at its I/O developer’s conference; the new 6-inch 3a XL version is priced at $479. CEO Sundar Pichai referred to the phones, along with a new Google Assistant-enabled digital screen, as the intersection of artificial intelligence, software and hardware. The first product from a newly formed Nest-Google team, the Nest Hub Max, is a Google Assistant-powered digital photo frame with a 10-inch HD screen and smart camera, said Pichai. Google positioned the $229 device, formerly Google Home Hub, as “the kitchen TV you’ve always wanted” that also shows how-to cooking videos, plays music and displays who's at the front door. Highlighting privacy, Pichai noted the Hub Max has a green light indicator on its front panel that indicates when the camera is streaming: “Nothing is streamed or recorded unless you explicitly enable it.” Users can access multiple controls to disable camera features such as Nest Cam, including a physical hardware switch that also shuts off the mic.

Control4 unveiled a Wi-Fi access point for improved wireless network performance Monday. An advanced chipset is said to deliver faster speeds, lower latency and “seamless roaming” across the network as end users add to the number of bandwidth-intensive applications in the home such as 4K video streaming, multiplayer gaming and VoIP calling.

DOJ’s chief information officer should complete an assessment of “all IT investments for suitability for migration to a cloud computing service,” GAO recommended Monday. In a report concluding that cost and savings data need better tracking, GAO provided recommendations for 17 agencies. DOJ’s CIO should also establish “a consistent and repeatable mechanism to track savings and cost avoidances from the migration and deployment of cloud services,” GAO said.

Even the FCC's revised broadband deployment data is potentially relying on inaccurate coverage data, Microsoft emailed us Friday. The agency said revised data still points to a closing digital divide in rural America (see 1905010205). Microsoft said there's "strong evidence" -- including the company's data and FCC subscription data -- that broadband isn't available to millions of people "even though the FCC's data says that it is." It said the agency "didn’t create this data collection problem but [has] an opportunity to fix it." Microsoft has urged changes to Form 477 and use of both availability and actual usage and/or subscription data as a benchmark for progress.

NCTA defended its shapefiles-centric broadband mapping plan Friday, in response to complaints by Broadband Coalition members USTelecom, ITTA and the Wireless ISP Association (see 1904150059). “The heart of NCTA’s proposal is a transition from the current requirement to report a list of census blocks where broadband is available to a new regime where providers would submit shapefiles representing the area where they make service available,” NCTA said in docket 11-10. “Rather than waiting around for a theoretically perfect approach to broadband data collection to materialize, the Commission should move forward with structuring a program that is tolerant of the imperfections that are inherent in any data exercise of this magnitude.”