Legislation

Mayors endorse emerging technologies at annual conference

City leaders staked out positions related to drones, public safety, broadband, renewable energy, blockchain technology and more at their 90th annual conference.

  • By Shourjya Mookerjee

FBI seeks to expand wiretap law to social networks, IM, webmail

The FBI has drafted a proposal that would require social networking, webmail and IM sites, as well as voice-over-IP providers, to make their sites wiretap-ready, and it is asking those companies not to oppose the measure.

  • By Donald White

Stop playing politics with cybersecurity

The no-regulation stance of Senate Republicans opposing the new cybersecurity bill lessens the chance of getting meaningful legislation passed.

  • By William Jackson

It's time to shelve SOPA, PIPA

Pending bills to address online piracy and counterfeiting are technically irresponsible and err by making third-party service providers responsible for enforcement.

  • By William Jackson

Powering and empowering the virtual worker in 2012

As 2012 takes off, agencies are shifting their focus to telework technologies and tools in an effort to foster greater collaboration between the virtual and physical work environment.

  • By GCN Staff

LiveBallot gets overseas votes to the polls on time

Voters living overseas from Florida, Virginia and California can now get absentee ballots via a secure Web portal powered by Microsoft's Azure cloud platform.

  • By Rutrell Yasin

Patent pending: New law could help or hurt IT innovators

Proponents say it will lower costs by reducing litigation. Opponents say it puts small organizations and individuals at a disadvantage and won't stop patent trolls.

  • By Kathleen Hickey

How a decency law protects online prostitution ads

A group for state attorney generals is appealing to a Craigslist-like publisher to stop hiding behind a 1996 law that allows the site to post what amounts to personal ads for prostitutes.

  • By GCN Staff

Texas tries again to criminalize some TSA pat-downs

The Lone Star state is close to putting restrictions on how and when TSA agents can conduct pat-downs when travelers can't or won't pass through security scanners.

  • By Michael Protos

Protect IP Act would create a lot of criminals

Sen. Patrick Leahy's copyright and trademark protection bill would impose draconian remedies and treat the entire Internet infrastructure as accomplices to online pirates and counterfeiters.

  • By William Jackson

Administration to shutter 1,000 federal websites

The Obama administration is sharpening the blade for duplicative federal websites.

  • By Alyah Khan

Privacy battles move to the fore, but who are the good guys?

Sens. John Kerry and John McCain have introduced a bill to put limits on what companies can do with customers' personal information, but it's just one front in the ongoing debate.

  • By Kevin McCaney

What shutdown? Get to work.

An 11th-hour deal averts a government shutdown and furloughs for about 800,000 federal workers that would have come with it. But down the road, a bigger budget battle looms.

  • By Kevin McCaney

Shutdown would highlight government's IT dependence, experts say

Many crucial IT systems would halt and leave the government in unchartered territory in the event of a shutdown -- and history provides no guidance for how to respond.

  • By Alyah Khan
Featured eBooks

Who gets hit when the government shuts down?

More than 800,000 federal employees will be affected when funding for the government expires April 8.

  • By Alyah Khan

Federal telework to-do list

The Telework Enhancement Act is calling agencies to set up telework policies and programs by June 9.

Proposed laws on ID tech take privacy to the extreme

You have to be careful in handling personal information, but legislation that would prohibit most uses of biometric data and RFID would throw the baby out with the bathwater.

  • By William Jackson

DHS extends states' Real ID compliance deadline

The deadline for states to comply with the controversial Real ID Act of 2005 has been pushed back to early 2013.

  • By Alice Lipowicz

Government shutdown averted, temporarily

Congress has approved a continuing resolution to fund the government until March 18, temporarily staving off fears of employee furloughs resulting from a government shutdown this Friday.

  • By Alyah Khan

Shutdown could be on the shelf, for now

It now appears unlikely that the government will shut down at the end of this week, as Senate Democrats have reportedly accepted a Republican measure to immediately slash $4 billion in federal spending by cutting programs that President Barack Obama targeted for elimination in his latest budget proposal.

  • By Alyah Khan

Will e-rulemaking catch on?

Getting more people involved in federal rulemaking is not easy, but the Regulation Room website is seeing some interesting results.

  • By Alice Lipowicz