Turning on existing FM radio functionality in iPhones would be easy for Apple if it wanted to, NAB Chief Technology Officer Sam Matheny blogged Wednesday. He said the company "has specifically chosen" not to offer FM functionality in the iPhone, having disabled the FM chips there, which also blocks app developers from offering FM apps. The company said it removed FM capability from its 7 and 8 series iPhones, but tear-down reports show the iPhone 8 contains a Broadcom 4357 chip family the manufacturer says includes an integrated FM radio core, Matheny said. Citing FM radio use after recent natural disasters, NAB urged the company to activate FM capabilities. At the NAB Show New York Wednesday, CEO Gordon Smith also urged Apple to activate the chips. Both NAB and Chairman Ajit Pai urged the company to activate the chip as a way to promote public safety (see 1709290002). Apple didn't comment.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai accused Commissioner Mignon Clyburn of partisan dissent on the $17.3 million USF settlement with Verizon to resolve an investigation into an E-rate bidding scheme in New York City, which the company blamed on a convicted city consultant (see 1710170057). Clyburn criticized the commission for recovering only a fraction of the "$50 million in harm" and not imposing a penalty, particularly given lawmaker concerns about a lack of more USF resources for high-cost support. Pai said Verizon also forfeited any right to obtain hundreds of millions of dollars in E-rate subsidies, and accused Clyburn of leaving key facts out of her dissent, including that the consent decree was negotiated by the Enforcement Bureau under the prior chairman, whose office briefed each commissioner’s office. "Commissioner Clyburn’s office expressed no concerns whatsoever about the agreement at that time -- and there is contemporaneous written evidence of this," he said in a statement Tuesday. "If the terms of a settlement that were just fine under a Democratic chair are now unacceptable under a Republican chair, FCC enforcement becomes little more than political caprice. I hope that that’s not the case going forward." A Clyburn spokesman emailed Wednesday: “It is curious that the Chairman claims that Commissioner Clyburn approved a document in 2016 that was not finalized until 2017. When she was presented with the text of the consent decree in 2017, she determined that she could not support the item as drafted. She negotiated in good faith, and was told that no modifications would be made to the consent decree.”

The FCC Media Bureau paused the nonbinding 180-day shot clock for Sinclair buying Tribune at Day 104 to give parties more time to comment by Nov 2, when the bureau will restart the clock, said a public notice Wednesday. The pause and additional comment round are intended to allow interested parties to react to Sinclair’s Oct. 5 responses (see 1710060055) to an FCC information request. “The Commission has a strong interest in ensuring a full and complete record upon which to base its decision,” the PN said. “Pausing the clock will ensure that commenters have additional time to review and comment on this new information.”

A fuller picture of broadcast operations in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands emerged in the FCC's Tuesday report on the impact of Hurricane Maria. In Puerto Rico, five TV stations were confirmed operational and nine out of service, compared with two operational and one out of service in Monday's report (see 1710160028). Eighty radio stations were confirmed operational and 51 out of service in Puerto Rico, compared with 72 operational and 33 out of service Monday. In the Virgin Islands, four radio stations were confirmed operational and four out of service, compared with two operational Monday, with no reports on TV stations. Information on wireless, wireline, cable and 911 operations was little changed; about 75.3 percent of cellsites were out in Puerto Rico and 55 percent of cellsites were out in the Virgin Islands. Puerto Rico's education secretary, the governor of Texas and the Texas Education Agency asked the FCC for urgent USF E-rate support to schools and libraries affected by hurricanes, in filings (here, here, here) posted Tuesday in docket 02-6.

The FCC and DOJ settled with Verizon over possible E-rate competitive bidding violations. The telco agreed to pay $17.325 million to the USF and $354,634 to the U.S. Treasury to resolve parallel investigations, said a commission release Tuesday. Commissioner Mignon Clyburn dissented, citing "over $50 million in harm." The company responded that New York City Department of Education consultant Ross Lanham was at fault, engaged in fraud without the telco's knowledge and the company worked to return money to the program.

Saying she's "deeply concerned" with the majority commissioners' priorities on localism, viewpoint diversity and communications services affordability, FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn criticized the agency's most-recent mobile wireless competition report, according to prepared remarks for a Tuesday Media Institute speech. She and fellow Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel slammed the report when adopted along party lines 3-2 at the September commissioners' meeting (see 1709260045). She said the report, narrower in scope than past years', doesn't offer a route for supporting policies that would help increase wireless connectivity in rural areas. She also cited a variety of complaints about the Lifeline program and related universal service issues and pushed for a rulemaking, though saying she didn't have ready ideas on how to tackle removing barriers to entry for new providers. The FCC didn't comment.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C Circuit ruled Tuesday that FCC policy of collecting information on multilingual emergency alert system notices without requiring such alerts is reasonable, denying (in Pacer) a petition for review from public interest groups including the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (see 1705110061). “If Congress intended to require multi-lingual communications in general, and multi-lingual emergency alerts in particular, we would expect Congress to have spoken far more clearly than it has done” said the majority opinion by Judge Brett Kavanaugh joined by Judge Karen Henderson. Judge Patricia Millett agreed with the majority in ruling the FCC hadn’t violated anti-discrimination provisions of the Communications Act, but said in a dissent the agency’s 11-year delay in deciding on multilingual EAS messages was arbitrary and capricious. “The problem of ensuring effective communication to the public during crises is too grave to be ensnared in seemingly interminable bureaucratic limbo,” Millett said. Despite ruling in the FCC’s favor, Kavanaugh needled the agency for operating on “bureaucracy standard time.” Communications Act provisions against discrimination don’t specifically compel the FCC to require emergency alerting in languages other than English, Kavanaugh said. The commission isn’t being arbitrary in not acting on multilingual alerts because there are legal and technical issues with enacting them, such as the lack of FCC authority over alert originators such as local governments, the majority said. It “would be reasonable for the FCC to flatly say that the alert originators (the federal, state, and local government entities) are the parties responsible for deciding whether and when to issue emergency alerts in languages in addition to English,” Kavanaugh said. The FCC plan to seek more information from EAS entities is a repeat of its previous information requests, and the court shouldn’t allow the agency to use it as a delaying tactic any longer, Millett said. “Choosing to repeat an inquiry that has twice been asked and answered, the Commission identified no reason to believe that round three of reporting would reveal new ways to address the multilingual problem.” The majority opinion suggested the agency cease delays. “The FCC should move expeditiously in finally deciding whether to impose a multi-lingual requirement on broadcasters, or instead to leave the issue with alert originators and others,” the opinion said. “At some point, the FCC must fish or cut bait on this question.” The League of United Latin American Citizens and the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council said the decision wasn’t a total loss. “One point of agreement by all three judges is that the FCC has taken far too long to act,” the groups said in a news release. “Calling the FCC’s delay ‘bureaucracy standard time,’ the panel majority called on the FCC to ‘move expeditiously.’”

About 74 percent of cellsites remain out of service in Puerto Rico (slightly down from Sunday) and 55 percent of cellsites remain out of service in the U.S. Virgin Islands (same as Sunday), the FCC reported Monday in its Hurricane Maria communications update. It said both Puerto Rico public safety answering points are reported operational, as are the 911 call centers in St. Croix and St. Thomas. Amid continued widespread power outages, the FCC "has received reports of large percentages of consumers are without either cable or wireline service." Two TV stations are confirmed operational in Puerto Rico and one TV station is confirmed out of service in the Virgin Islands; and 72 AM and FM radio stations are confirmed operational in Puerto Rico and 33 are out of service, while two AM radio stations are confirmed operational in the Virgin Islands. Meanwhile, Telrite asked the FCC to increase Lifeline monthly per-subscriber support by up to $25 for six months in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands to help with recovery, conditioned on providers supplying enhanced voice and data offerings. Telrite filed the emergency petition on Oct. 6 but the FCC electronic comment filing system "encountered significant technical issues and disruptions" that day, so Friday the provider resubmitted the petition with a request it be accepted as filed on Oct. 6.

Commenters disagreed on proposed FCC rule changes to curb slamming and cramming -- when providers make unauthorized changes to consumers' preferred telecom providers or add unauthorized charges on phone bills -- as replies were posted Monday and Friday in docket 17-169. Filing for the first time in the rulemaking, ATIS, CenturyLink and Incompas voiced concerns about some proposals (see 1707130054), while the Communications Workers of America and Pennsylvania Public Utilities Commission were supportive. Saying burdens outweighed benefits, ATIS opposed an FCC proposal to make an optional preferred interexchange carrier (PIC) freeze "the default so that consumers are automatically afforded this protection against slamming" without having to opt in. CenturyLink called slamming proposals "unwarranted" and "disproportionate," urging the FCC to focus on "targeted regulation only when" the benefits clearly outweigh costs, though it agreed with many cramming proposals. Saying competition could be harmed and choice limited for all-distance services, Incompas asked the FCC to reject the default PIC freeze and a proposal to require executing carriers to "double check" with customers to verify they wanted to change providers. CWA backed "strong protections against slamming and cramming that apply to all voice providers, whether traditional landline, interconnected VoIP, or wireless," and criticized telecom carriers' "unrealistic sales quotas" as "inconsistent" with anti-cramming efforts. PPUC said "regulatory experience," including of the FTC, "would seem to bely" industry arguments against new rules, "especially with respect to cramming." It said a "cramming prohibition should be codified and extended to all providers of voice communications, regardless of technology," and suggested slamming rules should also extend to all voice providers. Billing Services Group North America, CTIA and consumer groups filed replies after also filing initial comments (see 1709140023). BSG opposed proposals "to eliminate or require certification" of third-party verifications, to impose a default PIC freeze, and to block third-party billing. CTIA said the record showed that in mobile wireless "slamming does not exist and cramming has all but disappeared." Consumers Union and six other consumer groups said "enhanced cramming and slamming protections should apply to all voice customers."

The National Hispanic Media Coalition pressed the FCC to put consumer complaint materials into the open internet docket and seek comment. Though the commission released many documents in response to an NHMC Freedom of Information Act request for complaint materials, "a significant number of carrier responses, consumer rebuttals, emails, and email attachments were omitted from those productions," said the group in a filing posted in docket 17-108 Monday on a meeting with Wireline Bureau and Office of General Counsel officials including Bureau Chief Kris Monteith. NHMC representatives including ex-Commissioner Gloria Tristani made similar but shorter filings (here, here, here) on meetings with aides to Commissioners Brendan Carr, Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel. NHMC said the FCC also apparently hasn't produced any consumer-commission interactions through an ombudsman email address since the prior ombudsman stepped down. "These omissions, which represent a clear failure by the Commission under its FOIA obligations, also make it impossible to conclude how the underlying complaints were ultimately resolved," said the group, which cited arguments for opening a new comment cycle. NCTA and USTelecom opposed (see 1709290049) a motion by NHMC and others (see 1709200033).