The FCC commissioners' last meeting of 2025 will see votes on draft orders about robocalls and low-power TV (LPTV), Chairman Brendan Carr blogged Monday. He told reporters after the agency's meeting last week that the December agenda would likely be lighter than some previous months.
The FCC on Friday released the text of an order overturning a January ruling and NPRM addressing the Salt Typhoon cyberattacks, which were approved during the final days of the Biden administration. The reversal order was approved 2-1 Thursday, with Commissioner Anna Gomez dissenting (see 2511200047). It found that the January ruling was “an unlawful and ineffective attempt to show that the agency was taking some type of action on cybersecurity issues.”
The White House is pausing plans for President Donald Trump to finalize a draft executive order that would direct NTIA to potentially curtail non-deployment funding from the $42.5 billion BEAD program for states that the administration determines to have AI laws that are overly burdensome (see 2511190069), lobbyists told us. The Trump administration had appeared ready to formally issue the order Friday but was aware of renewed interest among some congressional Republicans in pursuing a legislative preemption of states’ AI laws. The White House didn't comment.
Affordability is a bigger problem than availability when it comes to closing the digital divide in home broadband, and NTIA stopping its BEAD efforts at deployment "means leaving most of the digital divide in place," the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation's Joe Kane wrote Thursday. NTIA should make clear that states can use BEAD to support home broadband affordability but not mobile service, said Kane, the organization's director of broadband and spectrum policy. He noted that limiting affordability support to home broadband wouldn't compromise BEAD's technology neutrality. Using BEAD money on home broadband, but not mobile, would take care of concerns that consumers will apply benefits to mobile service they already have, making affordability support ineffective at addressing home broadband.
The White House took a swipe at ABC again Wednesday, just a day after President Donald Trump called for the FCC to revoke the network’s broadcast license during a press conference with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Trump responded to a question Tuesday from ABC News White House correspondent Mary Bruce by saying Carr “should look at” taking away the network’s license “because your news is so fake and so wrong” (see 2511180045).
An estimated 6 billion people were online in 2025, up from a revised estimate of 5.8 billion in 2024, ITU said in a report released Monday. Some 2.2 billion people remain offline, fewer than the estimated 2.3 billion in 2024. Last year, 5G covered about 55% of people worldwide, “reflecting strong momentum in advanced mobile technologies.” But, ITU found, only 4% of people in low-income countries had access to 5G, compared with 84% in high-income countries.
FCC Commissioner Olivia Trusty emphasized the importance of cutting red tape for building infrastructure Monday in a speech to the ITU’s World Telecommunication Development Conference in Azerbaijan. “Connectivity flourishes under pro-market policies that foster mutually beneficial innovation,” she said.
The FCC announced new deadlines Monday for a host of filings and filing categories delayed by the federal shutdown. The public notice superseded previous deadlines, making Tuesday the new due date for most filings that had been due from Oct. 1 to Nov. 17, except those singled out with different dates.
New Verizon CEO Dan Schulman plans to cut about 15,000 jobs, which would be the carrier's largest ever layoffs, Reuters reported Thursday, citing an unnamed source. The report pointed to pressure on Verizon to cut costs as its customer pool shrinks. A spokesperson declined comment.
The telecom industry will see further consolidation of smaller carriers, similar to what happened 20 years ago, Recon Analytics’ Roger Entner said Wednesday during a webinar hosted by Georgetown University's Center for Business and Public Policy. There are still about 1,300 ISPs left in the U.S., which is “a staggering” number, Entner said. He cited examples of the deals being made, including T-Mobile’s purchase of stakes in fiber-based providers like Metronet and Lumos (see 2507090034). There’s a “tremendous amount of activity here underneath the surface" that only sometimes makes headlines.