Epic Systems, not the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), sent a representative to Wednesday’s Senate AI forum (see 2311010045).

Mobile supplemental coverage from space, while promising, "must be treated as a supplement, not a substitute, to terrestrial wireless services" and shouldn't be allowed to present any risk to terrestrial wireless, AT&T representatives told Wireless and Space Bureau staffers, per a docket 22-271 filing Wednesday. SCS service should only be authorized if it can comply with "robust technical safeguards" in the form of Wireless Bureau waivers, the carrier said, adding that the Wireless Bureau is the best overseer of SCS deployments because of its exclusive-use terrestrial licensing expertise.

Congress "handed over its taxing power without statutory limits" to the FCC, an agency "constrained only by its own precatory 'aspirations', and then for good measure let the agency redefine its own scope of taxing authority," Consumers' Research told the U.S. Supreme Court in a cert petition Friday (docket 23-456) challenging the FCC's USF contribution factor (see 2308030071). The group warned that the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision upholding the 2021 Q4 contribution factor and the 5th Circuit's rehearing of the Q1 2022 USF contribution factor were "portending" a circuit "split." It asked SCOTUS to "grant review and reverse" the lower court's decision upholding the contribution methodology, calling USF the "poster child for the problems that result from the delegation of constitutionally vested authority."

Faith-based internet policy advocacy group Restore Us Institute has closed its doors, it said Monday. The 2-year-old nonprofit said its "Internet accountability research" will remain available on its website.

To close the digital divide, the government must decrease the risk broadband network operators face in building in rural areas, but the FCC's net neutrality rulemaking is "a regulatory roadblock ... that will worsen a hard problem and discourage participation among the entities needed to wire America," NCTA President Michael Powell blogged Tuesday. "Revived [net neutrality] rules will destabilize the regulatory environment as challenges drag on for years in the courts," and the lack of clarity "is a challenging environment to take on risky builds," he said. The FCC's regulatory power over broadband provision, including the ability to set prices, "will erode interest in investing the large sums of private money required to match government funds," he said. "While reviving net neutrality will check a partisan political box, it risks blowing our once-in-a-lifetime chance to get all Americans the internet access they deserve."

Amazon, the International Center for Law & Economics, New America's Open Technology Institute and the Digital First Project have jointly launched the Alliance for Satellite Broadband to push for updates to satellite power limit rules at the 2023 World Radiocommunication Conference. The coalition said Tuesday that equivalent power flux density limits reduce the availability and increase the cost of broadband via non-geostationary orbit satellite systems. The group is calling for adoption of a future agenda item committing to the study and potential update of those power limit rules, and said an Americas region delegation has submitted a proposal for such an agenda item to WRC-23.

Low-income households and populations of color point more to lack of interest and affordability concerns than to lack of access as being the big drivers of broadband non-adoption, so digital discrimination rules won't go as far as improving the efficacy of the Affordable Connectivity Program in closing the adoption gap, the Phoenix Center said Tuesday in a paper. The draft digital discrimination rules provide no evidence of digital discrimination, "probably because this lack of evidence conflicts with its aggressive regulatory agenda,” says study author Phoenix Chief Economist George Ford.

The FTC is sending nearly $100 million in refunds to about 389,000 consumers it says were victimized when Vonage imposed junk fees and created obstacles to those who tried to cancel their subscriptions, said the agency Monday. The FTC’s November 2022 complaint alleged Vonage used “dark patterns” to make it difficult for consumers to cancel their service and often continued to charge them illegally even after they spoke to an agent directly and requested cancelation, it said. U.S. District Judge Georgette Castner for New Jersey in Trenton signed an order Dec. 9 (docket 3:22-cv-06435) directing Vonage to pay the FTC a $100 million monetary judgment within seven days to settle allegations it committed unfair acts or practices by failing to give consumers a “simple method” to cancel their telephone services (see 2212120007). The agency also accused Vonage of failing to disclose “material transaction terms” before obtaining consumers’ billing information, and alleged the company imposed fees without customers’ consent. The court ordered Vonage to install a “simple mechanism” for consumers to avoid being charged for goods and services and to immediately stop any recurring charges. The mechanism must be easy to find and use, and “not require the consumer to take any action that is objectively unnecessary” to cancel a charge, said Castner’s order.

While Affordable Connectivity Program enrollment numbers are growing rapidly, "there is more work to do" given the gap between the number of households on federal housing assistance eligible to enroll and the number of those enrolled, FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks said last week at Housing and Urban Development's ConnectHomeUSA virtual summit, per posted prepared remarks.

Laser communications company Aalyria Technologies and HICO Investment Group, which specializes in maritime products and logistics, have signed a memorandum of understanding that has them partnering on a deployment of up to 200 Aalyria laser communications platforms across commercial ships worldwide. Aalyria's eventual goal is thousands of vessels outfitted with its Tightbeam laser communications terminals, creating a mesh network for ground-based fiber-speed connectivity far into open water without use of satellites, the two said Thursday.