Last week, SIIA welcomed Mark MacCarthy as our new VP for Public Policy. Mark brings with him more than 30 years of public policy experience, where he has played a leading role in both the public and private sectors, as well as a thought leader teaching on communications and technology for many years.

The heavy emphasis on IP issues continued last week, with a key House Judiciary Sbcmte. conducting a hearing on Patent Reform, and Cmte. Chair Lamar Smith (R-TX) and IP Sbcmte. Chair Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) making personal commitments to move “fast out of the gate” on the issue — the House legislation is currently being drafted. Earlier in the week, President Obama issued an executive order establishing two intellectual property enforcement advisory committees designed to improve the Federal Government’s intellectual property enforcement efforts. This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee will proceed with a hearing on online infringement.

Last week also saw the highly anticipated introduction of multiple privacy bills, including one from Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL) reintroducing the “BEST Practices Act” with only minor changes from last session. Also, consumer advocate Jackie Speier (D-CA) introduced two privacy bills last week, one focused on “do not track,” and the other on financial information privacy.

Also of note last week, Federal CIO Vivek Kundra released a detailed Federal Cloud Strategy. The paper is a follow-up to the cloud-first policy announced in late 2010, providing a USG strategy for migration and outlining how the Fed. Gov. can accelerate the safe and secure adoption of cloud computing.

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