CONTENTS
[1] Newsletter Highlights
[2] Computing Experts Tell Congress Paper Trails are Needed for E-voting
[3] USACM Member to Advise Government on Privacy Issues
[4] Competitiveness Legislation Stalls Before Congress Heads Home
[5] New Heath IT Legislation Moves Forward
[6] Additional Offshoring Research Mirrors ACM Globalization Report
[7] About USACM
[1] NEWSLETTER HIGHLIGHTS
September was a relatively busy month, as Congress prepared to recess for
the fall campaign season. Below are highlights of the top stories. There is
more detail on each below, as well as on our weblog at
http://www.acm.org/usacm/weblog:
* USACM members, Barbara Simons and Ed Felten, testified before the
Committee on House Administration about electronic voting machines and the
need for voter verified paper trails.
* USACM member Annie Anton is named to the Department of Homeland
Security’s Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory Committee.
* Senate Leaders introduce comprehensive competitiveness legislation,
while similar House legislation is shelved. Appropriations for science
agencies are stalled as well.
* Legislation moves forward that would require electronic health records
for federal workers.
* Other groups have weighed in (or will shortly) on offshoring,
reflecting several of the conclusions of the ACM Globalization Report.
[2] COMPUTING EXPERTS TELL CONGRESS PAPER TRAILS ARE NEEDED FOR E-VOTING
With just five weeks before an estimated one-third of voters will use new
technologies this Election Day, the Committee on House Administration held a
hearing on electronic voting systems and the benefits and drawbacks of Voter
Verified Paper Audit Trails (VVPAT or paper trails). USACM Members Barbara
Simons and Edward Felten testified before the committee. Also testifying
before the committee were: Gary Smith, Election Director, Forsyth County,
Georgia; Keith Cunningham, Election Director, Allen County, Ohio; James
Dickson, Vice President of Government Affairs, American Association of
People with Disabilities and Michael I. Shamos, Professor of Software
Research, Carnegie Mellon University.
Driving this hearing were two factors: First, Representative Rush Holt’s
(D-NJ) legislation, The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of
2005, which would, among other things, mandate that all e-voting machines
have a VVPAT system. Second, the new revelations by Dr. Felten
demonstrating how a voting system (the widely used Diebold Accuvote-TS) can
be compromised. Dr. Felten’s full demonstration can be found at:
http://itpolicy.princeton.edu/voting/
Dr. Felten emphasized that security flaws are found in both the hardware and
software of the machine, and that the implementation of security measures is
as problematic as the operation of the voting systems they are trying to
secure. As a short term measure, Dr. Felten advocated a properly designed
and engineered paper trail, not the kind that led to problems reported in a
recent Election Science Institute study of e-voting systems in Cuyahoga
County, Ohio. He argued that no system is perfect, but the electronic
systems and paper systems fail in different ways. By using them together,
the resulting system is more robust then either system alone.
Dr. Simons emphasized in her testimony not only paper trails, but paper
ballots that would be more secure that existing electronic voting machines.
They also provide a means to audit the election, something not easily done
with existing electronic voting systems. Simons noted it is not enough to
simply have the paper trails or paper ballots, or you would have the same
problems other witnesses noted (printer jams, misprints, difficult recounts,
etc.). They must be well engineered and the paper must be well secured,
with a strict chain of custody.
While all those testifying agreed that voting systems needed to be more
secure, reliable and verifiable, not everyone supported paper trails, or
were enthusiastic about them. Some of the criticisms resulted from the
poorly engineered paper trails from Ohio. Dr. Michael Shamos argued that a
federal mandate for VVPAT’s would chill innovation in other verification
methods currently under research. However, the alternative he discussed at
the hearing seemed more problematic than VVPATs.
There was a split in support for VVPATs among the Members of Congress
attending the hearing. The Chairman (Rep. Vernon Ehlers, R-MI) and ranking
Member (Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald, D-IL) were non-committal regarding
paper trails, but Millender-McDonald seemed interested in revisiting the
Help America Vote Act to address some of the concerns raised in the hearing.
Rep. Holt, Rep. Robert Brady (D-PA), and Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) were
supportive of paper trails.
More information on the hearing, including the archived webcast and
statements from the witnesses and Chairman Ehlers, can be found here:
http://cha.house.gov/hearings/hearing.aspx?NewsID=1389
[3] USACM MEMBER TO ADVISE GOVERNMENT ON PRIVACY ISSUES
The Department of Homeland Security recently appointed Annie Anton
(Professor of Software Engineering at North Carolina State University and
USACM-EC member) to serve on the Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory
Committee. She is the second USACM member to join the panel. Dr. Lance
Hoffman (George Washington University) was appointed to serve last year.
The Department created the panel two years ago to advise the Secretary of
Homeland Security and the Chief Privacy officer on the numerous privacy
issues the department faces. Given the scope of DHS’s activities – dealing
with data-intensive bureaucracies like Customs, Citizenship and Immigration
Services, and the Transportation Security Administration – the Committee
has a pretty broad mandate. Since it was commissioned, the Committee has
produced several reports for government managers and policy makers,
including:
* Framework for Privacy Analysis of Programs, Technologies and
Application
* Recommendations on the Security Flight Program
* The Use of Commercial Data to Reduce False Positives in Screening
Programs
These reports, along with other information about the committee, can be
found online at:
http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/interapp/editorial/editorial_0512.xml
[4] COMPETITIVENESS LEGISLATION STALLS BEFORE CONGRESS HEADS HOME
In the ongoing saga of the American Competitiveness Initiative (a
Presidential proposal to increase basic research funding, expand math and
science education programs, reform high-skilled worker immigration, and
extend R&D tax credits), Senate leadership recently introduced the National
Competitiveness Investment Act (S3936) intended to bolster domestic
competitiveness. This legislation breaks from the President’s original
proposal by melding several different Senate proposals, all of which are
more comprehensive than the ACI – the PACE-Energy Act (S2197), the American
Innovation and Competitiveness Act (S2802), and the PACE-Education Act
(S2198). (These bills have been covered on our blog at some point). This
comprehensive legislation now has programs that:
* Focus on supporting basic research programs at the Department of
Energy, and DoE efforts to support math and science education. The bill
would also establish an Advanced Research Projects Agency for energy, or
ARPA-E.
* Authorize increased funding for the National Science Foundation and
the National Institute for Standards and Technology, with a focus on grants
and programs aimed at national competitiveness, including studies by the
Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Academies. The
legislation would also close the Technology Administration in the Department
of Commerce, and establish the Innovation Acceleration Research Program,
which would be funded through a set aside of 8 percent of the R&D budgets of
each executive branch agency involved in STEM research.
* Provide new scholarships for students studying math and science to
serve as teachers, new research grants and promoting AP math and science
courses and study in critical foreign languages.
While the Senate was inching forward, the House was calling it quits.
During an event in Washington D.C., Congressman Sherwood Boehlert (Chairman
of the House Science Committee) said his competitiveness legislation would
not make it through the House by the end of the year. This legislation was
largely focused on trying to expand existing programs focused on getting
more math and science teachers in the K-12 system. It stalled, and
ultimately died, because some in the House Leadership and the White House
felt it expanded existing federal programs too much. It is worth noting
that the Senate legislation is a far more aggressive expansion of federal
programs in these areas than the House bill.
Making this issue even more confusing is that despite all this, Congress has
made some progress in actually funding this initiative. Congress is trying
to finalize appropriations for the this fiscal year, and both the House and
Senate have met the President’s increased targets for physical science
research funding. In many ways this component of ACI is the most important
for the computing community because it provides real funding increases for
research at the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of
Standards and Technology, and the Department of Energy’s Office of Science.
However, these bills, like many issues in Congress, remain stalled because
the House and Senate could not come to an agreement before they broke for
the November elections. Funding in this new fiscal year remains at previous
levels under a continuing resolution that expires in November.
Given the short legislative calendar for a post-election “lame duck” session
it is clear that the broader Senate proposed competitiveness legislation
will not reach the President’s desk. In fact, it may not even pass the
Senate. The appropriations bills that actually fund science agencies are
another matter. The election’s outcome will play a large role in
determining their fate. Some Washington watchers are predicting that
appropriations could be put off until January of next year or shelved
altogether in favor of continuing last year’s targets. Either scenario is
bad for those that are fighting for the increased funding contained in the
ACI, so many high-tech groups, including ACM, will spend November educating
Members of Congress on the value of funding research.
[5] NEW HEALTH IT LEGISLATION MOVES FORWARD
In September a key House subcommittee approved legislation to spur the
development of electronic health records for federal employees. The Federal
Family Health Information Technology Act (HR 4859) would establish
electronic health records through the Federal Employees Health Benefits
Program by requiring insurance carriers that contract with the program to
provide complete electronic health records within five years.
It is hoped that with this legislation electronic health records will become
widespread faster; with the federal employee initiative stimulating transfer
into the private sector. The measure also addresses individuals’ access to
their own records. Under the legislation people can request a portable copy
of their health records in a digital format.
This parallels other legislation that addresses electronic medical records
in the private sector (including HR 4157, the Health Technology Promotion
Act). USACM joined several other groups in raising concerns when that
legislation was introduced earlier in this Congress. This legislation
passed the House and Senate, but has stalled awaiting a conference committee
to reach a compromise between the bodies.
Major concerns over the legislation, as with other health IT bills, have to
do with privacy. USACM’s privacy policy is quite applicable here, because
the information in health records is very personal and sensitive. It
requires a very careful engineering of the system, and equally careful
consideration about the storage, security, retention and reliability of the
information. There are additional concerns about costs being passed on to
employees and about successful implementation within the five year
timeframe. Finally, the legislation does not speak to a particular standard
for health records, and without such a standard, there could easily be
interoperability issues as people move to different locations and/or change
health plans.
[6] ADDITIONAL OFFSHORING RESEARCH MIRRORS ACM GLOBALIZATION REPORT
We wrote in last month’s edition of the newsletter about the House Democrats
forcing the release of parts of a Technology Administration report on
offshoring. In the first part of September, the General Accounting Office
(GAO) released a report on offshoring as well, focusing on the semiconductor
and software industries. The National Bureau of Economic Research also
released a paper on offshoring, but it is written more generally, and
addresses the political fallout of a previous outsourcing report. Like the
Technology Administration report, we find the GAO report resonates with the
ACM globalization report.
The GAO report is, not surprisingly, focused on U.S. interests. Here are
some of the top-level highlights:
* Offshoring from the US continues to grow, creating deeply
interconnected global markets.
* As technical sophistication of offshoring partners continue to
develop, offshoring is tending to move up the value chain
* Despite this trend, the United States continues to be a leading
producer of both software and semiconductors. U.S. firms are leaders in both
industries, and foreign companies have also established the own operations
in the United States in order to access talent, technology, and markets.
* The U.S. software industry has largely rebounded since the tech bubble
burst fairing better than the semiconductor industry, which has seen revenue
rebound but jobs remain flat.
* Even in the face of offshoring, jobs and wages in the software
industry have recovered since the tech. bubble burst (discussion of this is
on page 32 of the report).
* Lower cost labor is an important factor in offshoring decisions, but
increasingly US companies are looking for high-quality talent and access to
local markets. Further, foreign governments are increasingly using
incentives to attract global investment.
* Offshoring firms face risks from geopolitical events, uneven quality
of infrastructure and intellectual property protection.
The report does a particularly good job of providing some context and
implications for these industries. Semiconductors and software are key
components of the broader information and communication technology (ITC)
sector. Although this sector is only about 4 percent of the overall U.S.
economy, it accounted for about 11 percent of the total economic value-added
growth in 2004. Further, the sector is once again rapidly growing with a
12.9 percent real growth rate in 2004. Advances developed by the sector are
also responsible for driving overall productivity, which, in turn, drives
economic growth.
Growing global competition, fueled partly by offshoring, has implications
for this important sector. The report clearly outlines that investments in
“innovation infrastructure world-class universities and research centers, a
talented labor pool, and high levels of spending on research and
development” have led to U.S. dominance in the software and semiconductor
field. It concludes:
“As numerous recent studies have reported, the ability of the United States
to continue to compete at the most advanced levels in high technology
industries depends on a range of reinforcing factors: high-level R&D
investment by companies and government, innovative academic environments
attracting and training the highest-skilled researchers, a competitive
business environment that fosters development and commercial application of
new technologies, and a flexible and skilled workforce. These factors are
being nourished in China, Taiwan, and India, as these countries seek to move
further up the value chain and to “leapfrog” advanced country capabilities
where possible. The United States is an integral part of this dynamic world
economy in which it will be important for U.S. businesses and policymakers
to keep alert to technological changes, to anticipate competitor countries’
strategies, and to preserve and enhance the elements of the innovation
environment that helped make the United States a model.”
You can find the GAO report at:
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d06423.pdf
In addition, the National Academy of Engineering is conducting a study on
offshoring as it relates to engineering. They are holding a workshop titled
“Offshoring of Engineering: Facts, Myths, Unknowns, and Implications” on
October 24-25 at the Academies building on C Street by the State Department.
You can find more information on the workshop here:
http://www.nae.edu/nae/engecocom.nsf/weblinks/PGIS-6SKKDZ?OpenDocument
The ACM Globalization report is available at:
http://www.acm.org/globalizationreport
[7] ABOUT USACM
USACM is the U.S. Public Policy Committee of the Association for Computing
Machinery (ACM). ACM is an educational and scientific society uniting the
world’s computing educators, researchers and professionals to inspire
dialogue, share resources and address the field’s challenges. ACM
strengthens the profession’s collective voice through strong leadership,
promotion of the highest standards, and recognition of technical excellence.
ACM supports the professional growth of its members by providing
opportunities for life-long learning, career development, and professional
networking.
For more information about USACM and ACM, see:
http://www.acm.org/usacm/about.html
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