Add New America's Open Technology Institute (OTI) to those unhappy with Sen. Maria Cantwell's decision to scheduled a second nomination hearing for Democratic Federal Communications Commission nominee Gigi Sohn.

Sohn's confirmation vote had been scheduled for this week but has been delayed after Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) suffered a stroke and could not participate. Sohn's was one of three nominations delayed because Republicans are expected to oppose them and every Democratic vote is needed.

That delay allowed Cantwell (D-Wash.), chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, to grant the request by ranking member Roger Wicker for a second Sohn hearing he argued was needed due, in part, to Sohn's offer to recuse herself from some issues due to her former advocacy role at Public Knowledge and elsewhere.

But scheduling that hearing has not sat well with Sohn fans, who see it as helping her opponents delay or derail her confirmation.

Also Read: Cantwell Targeted Over Second Sohn Hearing

While conceding the Sohn confirmation vote probably needed to be delayed, OTI made clear that should have not have extended to a second hearing.

“Senator Lujan is a dedicated public servant and we wish him well in his recovery. While his absence necessitates a pause on some of the Commerce Committee’s work, we are dismayed to see what has been added to the agenda," said Joshua Stager, deputy director for broadband and competition policy, at OTI.

"The hearing that chair Cantwell noticed last night is a gift to AT&T, Comcast and the other companies that have worked for years to weaken the FCC’s authority and who benefit from a deadlocked agency," said Stager.

Stager argues Sohn should not be recusing herself anyway, so Cantwell should ask for the recusal to be withdrawn.“The Senate’s role here is to advise and consent, not obstruct and delay,” he said. “Gigi Sohn is an exceptionally qualified nominee and it’s time to confirm her. We need a fully functioning FCC."

The FCC is currently at a 2-2 tie, with decisions on partisan issues like net neutrality and broadcast regulation needing Sohn's third Democratic vote to be taken up. One of the other two nominations delayed due to Lujan's stroke is a third Democrat for the Federal Trade Commission so it, too, can take up issues with partisan divides.

One source familiar with the thinking of the committee majority said: “[W]e’re all frustrated that Republicans will literally do anything — including boycotting a markup of qualified, critical nominees like Gigi Sohn, Alvaro Bedoya [the fifth Federal Trade Commission member], Mary Boyle [to the Consumer Product Safety Commission] and countless more — in order to hamper the president’s agenda.” ■

New America's Open Technology Institute condemned President Trump's signal he was pulling the plug on stimulus bill negotiations until after the November election.

OTI has been pushing to make broadband funding part of that stimulus bill, a Democratic version of which also includes small business money for TV and radio stations.

“Millions of people are suffering through the pandemic without internet access, yet the federal government has failed to do anything over the past seven months to meaningfully close the digital divide," said OTI senior counsel Joshua Stager. "We've been urging Congress and the Trump Administration to enact many policies to address the connectivity crisis, including a measure to expand E-Rate funding to help students connect at home, a ‘No Shutoffs’ mandate for broadband and other utilities, and an emergency broadband benefit to assist low-income people. We needed these measures seven months ago, and still do today," he said. "It's unfathomable that the White House is pulling the plug on any relief bill while this crisis still rages.”

The Open Technology Institute and Electronic Frontier Foundation want the UK to clarify just how they are going to regulate online content, concerned a proposal to do so is too broad and not sufficiently clear.

OTI and EFF teamed up on comments Wednesday (July 3) to the British Department for Digital Culture, Media and Sports on the department's proposed Online Harms Framework outlined in a White Paper back in April.

The public comment period was up this week, after which the UK government will publish its response here. 

The White Paper talked of the importance of protecting free expression online, but also said the country had to take "decisive action" to make people "safer" online, including establishing a statutory "duty of care."

Going what it said was far beyond self regulation, the paper outlined a "system of accountability and oversight for tech companies" overseen by an independent regulator setting clear safety standards, requiring reporting and having effective enforcement powers.

OTI and EFF praised the commitment to safeguarding free expression--transparency and an appeal process--they suggested more clarity was needed on how the framework would guard against abuse, and perhaps how it could be used to incentivize self-regulation "without pushing [companies] to adopt practices that might ultimately harm user rights. They urged the British government not to crate rules requiring internet platforms to "interfere" with encrypted messaging services since encryption is "vital" to protecting privacy and free expression.

That means no rules that mandate social media or tech companies to "re-filter" or monitor privacy communications.

Explaining what it meant by abuse, the pair said that those complaining about certain content could "organize to present a complaint in the worst light possible, or complain in such numbers, or so frequently, that an unjust takedown of a particular victim’s account or their content may inevitably occur."

OTI backers represent an eclectic mix, from Google and the U.S. State Department to Walmart and former MTV president Tom Freston. EFF advisers include lawyers, academics and technologists focused on online content and digital rights issues.

Yet another front has opened in the tug-of-war among computer companies, Congress and the Obama Administration over cybersecurity versus privacy.

Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) were feeling the love from tech companies and others Thursday (May 19) for introducing the Stopping Mass Hack Act, which is targeted not at shady offshore Web denizens but U.S. law enforcement.

The senators introduced the bill to block recently approved changes to government surveillance rules that would allow the government, with a single warrant, to "hack an unlimited number of computers" if those computers had been "affected by criminals," even without letting the computer owners know the government was accessing their computers. Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), Steve Daines (R-Mont.) and Jon Tester (D-Mont.) are original co-sponsors of the bill.

The senators say those changes should have been debated by Congress. They go into effect Dec. 1 unless Congress steps in.

The Justice Department requested the change to Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which the Supreme Court approved. The main changes, according to the Senators, are the single warrant for multiple -- potentially millions -- of searches, and allowing remote searches when law enforcement doesn't know the location of a device.

“The government hacking proposal that will automatically go into effect unless Congress passes the Stopping Mass Hacking Act represents a serious expansion of law enforcement powers," said Kevin Bankston, director of New America’s Open Technology Institute, "yet Congress has never had a chance to consider the complex issues raised by such a significant change to the law. Unless Congress acts now, these new government hacking rules will grant the Justice Department dangerous and unprecedented authority to hack millions of Americans, many of whom may only be guilty of being the victim of a malicious cyber attack themselves.”

Ross Schulman, Open Technology Institute senior counsel, added, “We thank Senators Wyden and Paul for introducing this important bill." New America funders include Google, Netflix, Comcast and Dish.

“We welcome Senators Wyden and Paul’s efforts to prevent this highly controversial rule change from taking effect," said Computer and Communications Industry Association president Ed Black. "They recognize that the far-reaching implications of the government’s proposed changes merit the full attention of their colleagues in Congress. There are constitutional, international, and technological questions that ought to be addressed transparently before such a broad rule change.

CCIA's members, in addition to Google, Netflix and Dish, include Amazon, Yahoo, eBay, Microsoft, and Sprint.