Hack Attack: Options if Attacked in Cyberspace

For three weeks in 2007, the Republic of Estonia suffered a crippling cyber attack that left government, political and economic facets of the country helpless. This scenario provides a great template to examine the rights of a cyber attacked state in the context of international law. Estonia’s options were limited for numerous reasons including difficulty of attribution, lack of international standards, and the current political environment. Ultimately, unless a cyber attack causes undisputable damage and loss of human life, and it can be traced back to a source with high certainty, it is highly unlikely that a state will conventionally respond in self-defense.

Currently, there are no clear international laws that govern the rights of any sovereign state in the event of a cyber attack absent the direct loss of human life or significant physical damage. The current approach is to take the existing laws and treaties and interpret them to fit the activities in the cyber domain. However, unlike a conventional attack, there are many more factors that blur the line in cyberspace. Attribution is much more difficult because there is limited physical evidence and usually is spread across different sovereign states. Without a common (and agreed upon) definition of what constitutes a cyber attack, how can nations defend themselves without risking the ethical, legal and moral obligations that should reign over states? The fundamental dilemma a state faces is to balance its retaliatory options with the requisite legal justifications if they cannot be confident of the source for the attack.


Date of Report: April 30, 2013
Number of Pages: 33
Order Number: G1371
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United States Fire Administration: An Overview

Lennard G. Kruger
Specialist in Science and Technology Policy

The United States Fire Administration (USFA)—which includes the National Fire Academy (NFA)—is currently housed within the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The objective of the USFA is to significantly reduce the nation’s loss of life from fire, while also achieving a reduction in property loss and non-fatal injury due to fire.

P.L. 112-74, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, FY2012, provided $44.038 million for USFA in FY2012. The FY2013 budget proposal requested $42.52 million for USFA, a 3.4% reduction from the FY2012 level. Of the requested total appropriation, $13.327 million would be allocated to the National Fire Academy.

The Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2013 (P.L. 113-6) funds USFA at $44 million. Additionally, the United States Fire Administration and Training budget account is subject to a 5.0% sequestration cut, putting the FY2013 level for USFA at $42 million (according to an estimate from the Congressional Fire Service Institute).

The FY2014 budget proposal requests $41.306 million for USFA. Of the requested total appropriation, $12.267 million would be allocated to the National Fire Academy, $11.205 million to National Fire Programs, and $17.834 million to National Emergency Training Center (NETC) Management, Operations and Support.

On January 2, 2013, the President signed P.L. 112-239, the FY2013 National Defense Authorization Act. Title XVIII, Subtitle B is the United States Fire Administration Reauthorization Act of 2012, which authorizes USFA at an annual level of $76,490,890 for FY2013 through FY2017.

Concerns in the 113th Congress over the federal budget deficit could impact future funding levels for the USFA. Debate over the USFA budget has focused on whether the USFA is receiving an appropriate level of funding to accomplish its mission, given that appropriations for USFA have consistently been well below the agency’s authorized level. An ongoing issue is the viability and status of the USFA and National Fire Academy within the Department of Homeland Security.


Date of Report: April 10, 2013
Number of Pages: 11
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The Federal Communications Commission: Current Structure and Its Role in the Changing Telecommunications Landscape

Patricia Moloney Figliola
Specialist in Internet and Telecommunications Policy

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent federal agency with its five members appointed by the President, subject to confirmation by the Senate. It was established by the Communications Act of 1934 (1934 Act) and is charged with regulating interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable. The mission of the FCC is to ensure that the American people have available—at reasonable cost and without discrimination—rapid, efficient, nation- and world-wide communication services, whether by radio, television, wire, satellite, or cable.

Although the FCC has restructured over the past few years to better reflect the industry, it is still required to adhere to the statutory requirements of its governing legislation, the Communications Act of 1934. The 1934 Act requires the FCC to regulate the various industry sectors differently. Some policymakers have been critical of the FCC and the manner in which it regulates various sectors of the telecommunications industry—telephone, cable television, radio and television broadcasting, and some aspects of the Internet. These policymakers, including some in Congress, have long called for varying degrees and types of reform to the FCC. Most proposals fall into two categories: (1) procedural changes made within the FCC or through congressional action that would affect the agency’s operations or (2) substantive policy changes requiring congressional action that would affect how the agency regulates different services and industry sectors. Nine bills have been introduced during the 112th Congress that would change the operation of the FCC.

For FY2014, the FCC has requested a budget of $359,299,000. The FCC’s budget is derived from regulatory fees collected by the agency rather than through a direct appropriation. The fees, often referred to as “Section (9) fees,” are collected from license holders and certain other entities (e.g., cable television systems) and deposited into an FCC account. The law gives the FCC authority to review the regulatory fees and to adjust the fees to reflect changes in its appropriation from year to year. It may also add, delete, or reclassify services under certain circumstances.

In the 113th Congress, one hearing has been held on FCC oversight and two bills have been introduced that would affect the manner in which the FCC conducts its business.


Date of Report: April 17, 2013
Number of Pages: 17
Order Number: RL32589
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Regulation of Broadcast Indecency: Background and Legal Analysis

Kathleen Ann Ruane
Legislative Attorney

During the 2012 Super Bowl Halftime Show, the rapper M.I.A. (stage name for the artist Mathangi “Maya” Arulpragasm) made an indecent gesture during her live performance, reigniting the debate over whether the FCC could punish broadcasters for fleeting indecency. M.I.A.’s performance echoed two other prominent television events that have been the subject of ongoing litigation. The airing of an expletive by Bono (stage name for the artist Paul David Hewson) during the 2003 Golden Globe Awards, as well as the “wardrobe malfunction” that occurred during the 2004 Super Bowl halftime show, gave broadcast indecency prominence at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and in the 109th and 110th Congresses. These incidents resulted in the enactment of P.L. 109-235 (2006), which increased the penalties for broadcast indecency by tenfold. They also resulted in protracted litigation that was the subject of two recent Supreme Court decisions that eventually reversed the fines the FCC had issued in these cases.

Federal law makes it a crime to utter “any obscene, indecent, or profane language by means of radio communication” (18 U.S.C. §1464). Violators of this statute are subject to fines and imprisonment of up to two years; the FCC may enforce this provision by forfeiture or revocation of a broadcaster’s license. The FCC has found that for material to be “indecent,” it “must describe or depict sexual or excretory organs or activities,” and “must be patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium.” The federal government’s authority to regulate material that is “indecent” but not obscene was upheld by the Supreme Court in Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Foundation, which found that prohibiting such material during certain times of the day does not violate the First Amendment.

In 1992, Congress enacted P.L. 102-356 (47 U.S.C. §303 note), Section 16(a) of which, as interpreted by the courts, requires the FCC to prohibit “indecent” material on broadcast radio and broadcast television from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Under P.L. 109-235, “indecent” broadcasts are now subject to a fine of up to “$325,000 for each violation or each day of continuing violation, except that the amount assessed for any continuing violation shall not exceed a total of $3,000,000 for any single act or failure to act.” Fines may be levied against broadcast stations, but not against broadcast networks. The FCC appears to have the statutory authority to fine performers as well (up to $32,500 per incident), but has taken the position that “[c]ompliance with federal broadcast decency restrictions is the responsibility of the station that chooses to air the programming, not the performers.”

The federal restriction on “indecent” material applies only to broadcast media. This stems from the fact that there are a limited number of broadcast frequencies available. The Supreme Court, therefore, interprets the First Amendment in a manner that allows the government to regulate speech via broadcast media to a greater extent than via other media. This report discusses the legal evolution of the FCC’s indecency regulations, and provides an overview of how the current regulations have been applied. Two recent cases have considered to what extent broadcast indecency can be regulated before First Amendment rights are impermissibly infringed. Fleeting expletives and images like those in the Golden Globes and Super Bowl halftime show cases have been subject to government enforcement action, and those enforcement actions have been challenged as violations of the First Amendment. The Supreme Court in Pacifica left open the question whether broadcasting an occasional expletive, as in the Bono case, would justify a sanction. As noted above, the Supreme Court has recently agreed to hear a case that may decide this question.


Date of Report: April 16, 2013
Number of Pages: 24
Order Number: RL32222
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America COMPETES Acts: FY2008-FY2013 Funding Tables

Heather B. Gonzalez
Specialist in Science and Technology Policy

Major provisions of the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010 are set to expire in 2013. As such, the 113th Congress will have the opportunity to reconsider this act and its policy contributions. Those contributions include, among other things, funding authorizations for certain federal physical sciences and engineering research programs, as well as selected STEM (i.e., science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education programs.

To aid Congress in its deliberations over future funding for these policies, this report tracks historical federal funding associated with the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-358) and its predecessor, the America COMPETES Act (P.L. 110-69). This report includes two tables summarizing authorizations and funding status for selected provisions of these acts over the course of their respective authorization periods. (See Table 1 and Table 2.)

This report has been updated to reflect FY2013 enacted funding levels—as contained in P.L. 113- 6 (Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2013)—for specified COMPETESrelated accounts. The FY2013 enacted funding levels contained herein do not account for the effects of sequestration, or other legal determinations made by OMB that may affect the final appropriations levels. This report will be updated to reflect actual funding for specified COMPETES-related accounts when that information becomes available to CRS.


Date of Report: April 15, 2013
Number of Pages: 15
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