NTIA will host prenotice funding opportunity technical assistance webinars about the new broadband programs funded by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, says Friday's Federal Register. The webinars will be 2:30 to 4 p.m. EST March 9, and 2:30 to 4 p.m. EDT March 23, April 6 and 27, and May 11. Webinars will cover the broadband equity, access and deployment program, middle-mile infrastructure program and three digital equity programs.

E-commerce via YouTube is an “additional layer of opportunity” for Google, but an area “where it all feels very early to me,” said Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai on a Q4 call Tuesday. “We’re making it easier for viewers to buy what they see and simpler for advertisers to drive action with innovative solutions like product feeds and video action campaigns and emerging formats like live commerce.” YouTube’s commerce capability is focused on “onboarding merchants and all the back end so that we can have the broadest and the most comprehensive inventory available,” said Pichai. “Our partnership with other e-commerce platforms is a basic foundational layer we are putting in.” Though it’s “pretty early” in the initiative, “there’s a lot of pilots underway,” including “shopping livestreams” with brands like Walmart and Target, he said. “There’s a lot more to do,” he said, “but I find the opportunity space here pretty broad, and it’s exciting.”

Though 2021 was “one of the strongest years in PayPal’s history,” with 18% year-over-year revenue growth to $25.4 billion, “exogenous” factors “did impact our results,” said CEO Dan Schulman on a Q4 call Tuesday. “Supply chain issues disproportionately impacted our cross-border volumes and our small business merchants,” while inflationary pressures “impacted spending within certain segments of our user base,” he said. Rising threats from COVID-19's delta and omicron variants cut travel and event bookings, and the elimination of government stimulus “had an impact as well” on consumer spending, said Schulman. “E-commerce growth rates during the holiday season were lower than industry expectations despite a strong two-year growth rate of almost 50%, and we are also lapping some of the strongest quarters of growth in our history. Even so, we once again grew our market share and came within our revenue guidance for the quarter.” The stock plunged 24.6% Wednesday, closing at $132.57.

About 29% of U.S. internet households have adopted a smartwatch, up from 16% a year ago; 17% own an Apple Watch and 7% a Samsung wearable, said Parks Associates Tuesday. Samsung is on pace to overtake Google's Fitbit as the second-largest player in the U.S. wearables market this year, behind Apple, it said. Smartwatch owners are “a particularly enthusiastic core of the connected health market,” said analyst Kristen Hanich, saying smartwatch owners tend to own other connected devices including fitness products, weight scales and smart thermometers.

Verizon customers are already getting faster connection speeds as the carrier turns on its C-band spectrum for 5G, Ookla, which conducts speed tests, said Monday. Verizon’s average 5G download speed increased more than 50% to 116.29 Mbps after it launched the band, Ookla said: That's compares with 70.46 Mbps for AT&T, which had a more limited C-band launch, and 187.11 for T-Mobile with its 2.5 GHz spectrum. “This massive improvement in speed shows the power of Verizon’s widespread deployment of C-band spectrum and C-band’s ability to deliver fast speeds,” the firm said. “We also saw a large increase in testing for customers across the board, but especially Verizon customers who could have seen an ultra wide band icon show up on their phone for the first time after the launch.”

A Washington state committee cleared a proposed update to the state’s emergency communication law for next-generation 911. The House Appropriations Committee adopted HB-1703 by unanimous voice vote at a virtual hearing Thursday. Washington 911 “needs to stay up to date with modern technology,” said sponsor Rep. Cindy Ryu (D) at the hearing. The bill would also coordinate 911 with the state’s new 988 system, she said. The committee heard testimony but didn’t vote on digital equity and right-to-repair bills. CTIA opposed requiring carriers to participate in broadband adoption programs envisioned by HB-1723, which cleared another House committee earlier this month (see 2201180057). Such a mandate is preempted by federal law; legislators should make wireless participation voluntary, said CTIA lobbyist Jeff Gombosky. Seattle Digital Equity Program Manager David Keyes supported the adoption bill as a "critical companion to infrastructure support." Industry slammed HB-1810, which would require manufacturers to make documentation, parts and tools available to owners and independent repair providers on fair and reasonable terms. It passed another committee this month (see 2201190049). TechNet opposes requiring manufacturers to provide “unvetted third parties with sensitive diagnostic information and software, tools and parts without requiring the critical consumer protections afforded by authorized repair networks,” said Vice President-State Policy David Edmonson. The market gives consumers a wide range of repair choices, said CTIA Director-State Legislative Affairs Lisa McCabe. Adding a private right of action would reduce enforcement costs for the Washington attorney general’s office, suggested Consumer Protection Division Assistant AG Amy Teng.

Three Michigan men pleaded guilty to defrauding Amazon by leasing textbooks through Amazon’s rental program and selling them for profit on the internet and through local bookstores, said DOJ Wednesday. Paul Larson, 32, of Kalamazoo, and Gregory Gleesing, 43, and Lovedeep Singh Dhanoa, 25, both of Portage, participated with ringleader Geoffrey Mark Talsma, 36, also of Kalamazoo, in a scheme to create numerous Amazon accounts using fake names, multiple street addresses and multiple email accounts to circumvent Amazon’s limit of 15 textbook rentals per customer, said DOJ. Talsma is scheduled to stand trial April 5 in U.S. District Court in Lansing on mail fraud and other charges, it said. The other three are scheduled for sentencing in May and June, facing up to 20 years each in federal prison, said DOJ. All will also be ordered to pay restitution to Amazon, it said. Efforts to reach attorneys for the four Thursday were unsuccessful. Amazon didn’t comment.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology should establish coherence between its AI, cyber and privacy frameworks, the Information Technology Industry Council commented. NIST sought input on its AI Risk Management Framework through Tuesday to inform the first draft of the document. NIST plans a workshop this year and to release its AI RMF 1.0 in 2023. Privacy and cyber risks should be considered in context with managing AI risks so users can understand how all three frameworks can be used together, ITI said. It seeks standard international terminology and clarification for how risks differ for human-facing and non-human-facing AI.

There won’t be progress on the cyber front without collaboration between government and industry, state and industry officials agreed Wednesday at an Information Technology Industry Council event. “Self-preservation” often incentivizes companies not to seek government aid in breaches, said Florida Chief Information Officer James Grant. He cited industry’s fear of losing jobs, or shame over cyberincidents: “We have to establish trust that threat actors don’t care about branches or divisions of government, and we are only as strong as our weakest vulnerability.” Entities need to “get away from victim-blaming,” said Texas Chief Information Officer Amanda Crawford. “There is no silver bullet for any of this, so we need to understand there isn’t a shame to this. You need to be able to report and get back on your feet.” Texas successfully responded to a 2019 ransomware attack because it had a statewide cyber plan, she said, noting Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) declaration of a state of disaster, the first time a cyberincident triggered that. The ultimate goal should be statewide and citywide visibility of threats, consistent reporting and rapid response, said Cisco's U.S. Sled Systems Engineering Director Mike Witzman. “We really welcome that industry partnership with government.” He said government and organizations should implement multifactor authentication and zero trust architecture as standards.

House Oversight Committee leadership introduced legislation Tuesday to streamline federal government cyber roles. Introduced by Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and ranking member James Comer, R-Ky., the Federal Information Security Modernization Act would define operational and oversight roles for the national cyber director, OMB and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. It would require agencies to “keep inventories of all internet-accessible information systems and assets, as well as all software.” The bill would advance a “risk-based cybersecurity posture,” modernize “reporting requirements to enhance security through automation” and expand “inventories and information-sharing for improved security,” they said.