Congressional Research Service Reports - 24 Matching Results
Search Results
- FCC Media Ownership Rules: Current Status and Issues for Congress
- This report provides information about Current Status and Issues for Congress on FCC Media Ownership Rules. FCC modified five of its media ownership rules easing restrictions on the ownership of multiple Television stations.
- Data Security: Protecting the Privacy of Phone Records
- This report provides a brief discussion of efforts to protect the privacy of customer telephone records
- Wireless Privacy and Spam: Issues for Congress
- This report provides an overview of the issues for congress on wireless privacy and spam.
- Emergency Communications: The Emergency Alert System (EAS) and All-Hazard Warnings
- This report summarizes the technology and administration of EAS and the NOAA/NWS all-hazard network, new programs in DHS, and some of the key proposals for change.
- Open Access Publishing and Citation Archives: Background and Controversy
- This report begins with an inventory of basic information: definitions and guides to histories of the growth of open access publishing and citation archives and descriptions of selected major open access activities. It moves on to summarize major points of difference between proponents and opponents of nongovernmental open access publishing and databases, and then highlights federal, including National Institutes of Health (NIH), open access activities and contentious issues surrounding these developments. The report also briefly describes open access developments in the United Kingdom (where a number of governmental and nongovernmental initiatives have occurred) and in the international arena. Finally, controversial issues which could receive attention in the 109th Congress are summarized.
- Changing Postal ZIP Code Boundaries
- This report discusses the changing of ZIP Code system and the implications of such an action. The process places responsibility on district managers, rather than local postmasters, to review requests for boundary adjustment, to evaluate costs and benefits of alternative solutions to identified problems, and to provide a decision within 60 days.
- FCC Media Ownership Rules: Current Status and Issues for Congress
- This report analyzes each of the areas that has changed as a result of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) actions and Court decisions. The various positions in the debate also are summarized.
- The Federal Communications Commission: Current Structure and its Role in the Changing Telecommunications Landscape
- This report provides information about The Current Structure and Its Role in the Changing Telecommunications Landscape on the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC is an independent agency directly responsible for congress.
- FCC Media Ownership Rules: Current Status and Issues for Congress
- This report provides information about the Issues for Congress on FCC Media Ownership Rules. The media ownership rules strongly influences both the structure of the media sector and the relative negotiating power of individual companies and entire sector.
- Communications Act Revisions: Selected Issues for Consideration
- This report provides an overview of selected topics which the 109th Congress may address in its examination of telecommunications issues. The issues included in this report cover: broadband Internet regulation and access; broadcast indecency; digital television transition; Federal Communications Commission structure and reform; intercarrier compensation; media ownership rules; municipal deployment of broadband; public safety communications, the “savings clause” and monopoly issues; spectrum auctions; and universal service fund reform.
- Digital Surveillance: The Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act
- This report provides information about The Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act on Digital Surveillance. CALEA is intended to preserve the ability of law enforcement officials to conduct electronic surveillance effectively and efficiently.
- Free Mail for Troops Overseas
- Members of the armed forces on duty in designated combat areas can send personal correspondence, free of postage, to addresses in the United States. There has never been a comparable provision of free postage for letters or packages sent from family members in the United States to loved ones in wartime service overseas. This report discusses two bills (H.R. 923 and H.R. 2874) that were introduced in the 109th Congress that would have allowed family members and, in the case of H.R. 2874, certain charities to send letters and packages to servicemen and women in combat zones free of postage.
- Open Access Publishing and Citation Archives: Background and Controversy
- This report begins with an inventory of basic information: definitions and guides to histories of the growth of open access publishing and citation archives and descriptions of selected major open access activities. It moves on to summarize major points of difference between proponents and opponents of nongovernmental open access publishing and databases, and then highlights federal, including National Institutes of Health (NIH), open access activities and contentious issues surrounding these developments. The report also briefly describes open access developments in the United Kingdom (where a number of governmental and nongovernmental initiatives have occurred) and in the international arena. Finally, controversial issues which could receive attention in the 109th Congress are summarized.
- Open Access Publishing and Citation Archives: Background and Controversy
- This report begins with an inventory of basic information: definitions and guides to histories of the growth of open access publishing and citation archives and descriptions of selected major open access activities. It moves on to summarize major points of difference between proponents and opponents of nongovernmental open access publishing and databases, and then highlights federal, including National Institutes of Health (NIH), open access activities and contentious issues surrounding these developments. The report also briefly describes open access developments in the United Kingdom (where a number of governmental and nongovernmental initiatives have occurred) and in the international arena. Finally, controversial issues which could receive attention the 110th Congress are summarized.
- Free Mail for Troops Overseas
- Members of the armed forces on duty in designated combat areas can send personal correspondence, free of postage, to addresses in the United States. There has never been a comparable provision of free postage for letters or packages sent from family members in the United States to loved ones in wartime service overseas. Two bills (H.R. 923 and H.R. 2874) have been introduced that would allow family members and, in the case of H.R. 2874, certain charities to send letters and packages to servicemen and women in combat zones free of postage. H.R. 923 in amended form as a bill that would allow service members overseas to send vouchers to family or loved ones that would be redeemable for the postage expenses of one letter of 15-pound package per month is included in the FY2007 Defense Authorization Act, which is now awaiting action in the Senate.
- Free Mail for Troops Overseas
- Members of the armed forces on duty in designated combat areas can send personal correspondence, free of postage, to addresses in the United States. There has never been a comparable provision of free postage of letters or packages sent from family members in the United States to loved ones in wartime service overseas. Two bills (H.R. 923 and H.R. 2874) have been introduced that would allow family members and, in the case o H.R. 2874, certain charities to send letters and packages to service men and women in combat zones free of postage.
- Open Access Publishing and Citatation Archives: Background and Controversy
- This report begins with an inventory of basic information: definitions and guides to histories of the growth of open access publishing and citation archives and descriptions of selected major open access activities. It moves on to summarize major points of difference between proponents and opponents of nongovernmental open access publishing and databases, and then highlights federal, including National Institutes of Health (NIH), open access activities and contentious issues surrounding these developments. The report also briefly describes open access developments in the United Kingdom (where a number of governmental and nongovernmental initiatives have occurred) and in the international arena. Finally, controversial issues which could receive attention in the 109th Congress are summarized.
- The Federal Communications Commission: Current Structure and its Role in the Changing Telecommunications Landscape
- This report provides information about The Current Structure and Its Role in the Changing Telecommunications Landscape on the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC is an independent agency directly responsible for congress.
- FCC Media Ownership Rules: Current Status and Issues for Congress
- On June 2, 2003, the Federal Communications Commission modified five of its media ownership rules, easing restrictions on the ownership of multiple television stations and on local media cross-ownership, and tightening restrictions on the ownership of multiple radio stations in local markets.
- Technology Transfer: Use of Federally Funded Research and Development
- Report on government spending for research and development of technology, with a focus on how that R&D can be transferred to other areas, including recent developments, background issues, the rationale behind federal activity, and more.
- Protection of Security-Related Information
- No Description Available.
- Constitutionality of Proposals to Prohibit the Sale or Rental to Minors of Video Games with Violent or Sexual Content or "Strong Language"
- It has been proposed that Congress prohibit the sale or rental to minors of video games that are rated “M” (mature) or “AO” (adults-only) by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board. This board is a non-governmental entity established by the Interactive Digital Software Association, and its ratings currently have no legal effect.
- Balancing Scientific Publication and National Security Concerns: Issues for Congress
- There is a lack of consensus regarding the best method of balancing scientific publishing and national security. The current federal policy, as described in National Security Decision Directive 189, is that fundamental research should remain unrestricted and that in the rare case where it is necessary to restrict such information, classification is the appropriate vehicle to do so. Other mechanisms restrict international information flow, where Export Administration Regulations (EAR) and International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) control export of items and technical information on specific lists. Both EAR and ITAR contain a fundamental research exclusion, but this exclusion is lost if prepublication review of research results for sensitive information occurs.
- "Sensitive but Unclassified" Information and Other Controls: Policy and Options for Scientific and Technical Information
- This report traces the evolution of "sensitive but unclassified" or SBU-related controls; summarizes actions taken to protect certain types of scientific and technical information; describes critiques of some control policies; and summarizes proposals and actions, including congressional, executive and other initiatives, to clarify these issues and develop policies that serve various stakeholders. It also raises issues that may warrant further attention.