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<br>
<br>Oh really? Although both the Commission and Eckert assured the <i>FT</i> there was no possible conflict of interest, the entry in the Commission's internal Guide des Services for Eckert's unit of DGIS (Directorate General, Information Society) includes, in that case, numerous baffling entries.
<br>
<br>Two of the staff reporting to him specifically cover "competition cases," and if you include economic analysis (some considerable overlap here, surely), then out of a total of eleven (excluding support staff), four have posts that would appear to have some considerable relevance to competition policy. And if they're not doing approximately what their job descriptions say, then one wonders what they <i>are</i> doing.
<br>
<br>The listing for the rest of Eckert's little empire illustrates what an unfeasibly large pile of unimportant stuff can reside under the banner 'broadband rollout.' We have:
<br>
<br><b>- Policy and technical aspects of information security, cryptography and related subjects
<br>- Encryption policy, export controls of information security products and services, notification procedures, interception of telecommunications, third pillar activities, Internet. Informatics coordinator
<br>- Electronic commerce, international aspects - Global Business Dialogue (GBDe), alternative dispute settlement, digital management
<br>- e-Signature directive
<br>- Information and network security, e-signature directive</b>
<br>
<br>Not forgetting "Employment and the Information Society," and of course <a href="http://europa.eu.int/information_society/eeurope/action_plan/index_en.htm"; target="new">eEurope,</a> which does indeed have the goal of bringing "the benefits of the Information Society to all Europeans."
<br>
<br>None of that little lot is likely to be of the slightest interest to Microsoft, of course, and nor is responsibility for issues such as open source software and patenting of computer-implemented inventions, which our sources assure us he also had.
<br>
<br>But we're told he's only taking leave of absence from the Commission for a period of up to three years, during which time he can always come back. So maybe he's a spy. ® </DIV> <BR></DIV> <DIV><IMG SRC='/images/reg_bullet.gif' BORDER='0'> <FONT SIZE="-1" FACE="arial, helvetica"><A HREF="http://www.clickandbuild.com/cnb/shop/cashncarrion";>Cash'n'Carrion Reg Shop</A></FONT> <IMG SRC='/images/reg_bullet.gif' BORDER='0'> <FONT SIZE="-1" FACE="arial, helvetica"><A HREF="http://194.203.155.78/minisites/theregister/jobsearch.asp";>Register Recruitment — Real jobs for real people</A></FONT></DIV></TD></TR></TABLE></TD> <TD ALIGN="right" WIDTH="150" VALIGN="top"><TABLE CELLSPACING="0" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="2" WIDTH="134"><TR><TD ALIGN="left" CLASS="advert"><TABLE CELLSPACING="0" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0"><TR><TD VALIGN="top"><NOLAYER><IFRAME SRC="http://ad.uk.doubleclick.net/adi/theregister.co.uk/softhome;area=softhome;pos=2;sz=120x600;tile=1;ord=100004?"; width=120 height=600 marginwidth=0 marginheight=0 hspace=0 vspace=0 frameborder=0 scrolling=no><A HREF="http://ad.uk.doubleclick.net/jump/theregister.co.uk/softhome;area=softhome;pos=2;sz=120x600;tile=1;abr=!ie4;abr=!ie5;ord=100004?";><IMG SRC="http://ad.uk.doubleclick.net/ad/theregister.co.uk/softhome;area=softhome;pos=2;sz=120x600;tile=1;abr=!ie4;abr=!ie5;ord=100004?"; WIDTH=150 HEIGHT=600></A></IFRAME></NOLAYER><ILAYER id=ad2 visibility=hide WIDTH=120 HEIGHT=600></ILAYER></TD></TR></TABLE></TD></TR></TABLE></TD></TR></TABLE><TABLE CELLSPACING="0" WIDTH="100%" CELLPADDING="0"><TR><TD></TR></TABLE><LAYER SRC="http://ad.uk.doubleclick.net/adl/theregister.co.uk/softhome;area=softhome;pos=1;sz=468x60;tile=1;ord=513829?"; visibility=hidden id=a1 width=468 onload="moveToAbsolute(ad1.pageX,ad1.pageY);a1.clip.height=60;a1.clip.width=468;visibility='show';"></LAYER></BODY></HTML>