Today, Maria Pallante, the U.S. Register of Copyrights, released a report outlining the Priorities and Special Projects of the U.S. Copyright Office through 2013. The Report articulates 17 priorities in the areas of copyright policy and administrative practice, as well as 10 new projects designed to improve the quality and efficiency of the U.S. Copyright Office’s services in the 21st century. This is the first time in recent history that the Office has published such a document. It provides an excellent roadmap for the most significant legislative, international and administrative copyright issues facing copyright holders and the Office now and into the immediate future.

In other IP news, indications from House leaders are still that the rogue websites legislation is expected to be introduced this week, as early as today. There has been a recent push by opponents of the legislation to stall it’s introduction, including a meeting last week with Cmte. staff where concerns about the potential implications of the bill were discussed.

On the cybersecurity front, the White House held a classified briefing with key Senate leaders last week. The meeting, including representatives from the FBI, DHS, NSA and bipartisan leadership of the Senate committees with jurisdiction over cybersecurity, was part of a continued effort by the White House to advance comprehensive cybersecurity legislation this year. While the meeting participants broadly agreed about the urgent need to address growing cybersecurity threats, there are several key issues that remain unresolved. To state the obvious, the clock is beginning to run out on 2011.

The FTC staff report on privacy is scheduled for release before the end of the year, but it is possible, and even likely, that issuance will go to the beginning of next year. The final report is likely to be very similar to the draft report. It will not be a major overhaul and will not contain any earth-shattering departures from the structure set out earlier. The major issues in play appear to be the definition and role of commonly accepted business, the role of data minimization, the application of privacy framework to both the online and off-line contexts and the distinction between first party and third party providers of online advertising. The report is likely to touch on the multi-stakeholder process that the Commerce Department is looking to establish and be consistent with it, but will focus more on principles and implementation rather than the process of developing self-regulatory codes of conduct. It is not yet clear whether the report will recommend legislation.

And as of last week, “cloud computing” is officially defined. That is, after a long time of working and reviewing, NIST last week released a FINAL version of their official definition of cloud computing, also known as SP 800-145. SIIA has worked with NIST throughout this process, and concur that this is a very solid definition, one that is widely referenced around the world. Of course, it’s breadth underscores why “cloud computing” is so challenging to define for policymaking purposes.

David LeDuc is Senior Director, Public Policy at SIIA. He focuses on e-commerce, privacy, cyber security, cloud computing, open standards, e-government and information policy.