Consumer Federation of America Research Director Mark Cooper now will call unlicensed spectrum “public access” spectrum, at the suggestion of House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-California, said Cooper at a WiFiForward event Tuesday (CD May 7 p1). Cooper spoke Wednesday at a New America Foundation event. (See separate story above in this issue.) “I will never use the word unlicensed again,” Cooper said. “When CFA and Darrell Issa agree on something, that ought to be a no-brainer for the FCC."

CTIA praised the Rhode Island legislature’s decision to not move ahead with bills that would have required smartphone manufacturers to install a kill switch rendering the devices useless should they be stolen or lost. Referring to the Smartphone Anti-Theft Voluntary Commitment (CD April 17 p10) made by manufacturers to preload or enable downloadable anti-theft software, Jamie Hastings, CTIA vice president-external and state affairs, said in a blog post (http://bit.ly/1jBwL0T) the voluntary pledge, “not legislation,” was the way to handle the issue. A spokesman for Sen. Dominick Ruggerio, sponsor of S-2897 (http://bit.ly/1kNnzmS), said the senator did not plan to ask for committee hearings after the companies made the pledge. Rep. Mary Duffy Messier, sponsor of H-8115 (http://bit.ly/1j44346), withdrew her bill from consideration on Tuesday. Messier was not available for comment on Wednesday.

Certainty going in is key if the FCC wants to ensure a successful TV incentive auction, Verizon representatives said in meetings at the FCC with Chief of Staff Ruth Milkman and aides to Chairman Tom Wheeler and Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. “In the context of the incentive auction, Verizon stated that the more certainty the rules provide, the more broadcasters and wireless providers will participate, and the more spectrum will be repurposed for use by all providers to meet the needs of consumers and businesses for broadband,” said a Tuesday ex parte filing from the carrier. “Verizon stressed that the best way to promote a successful incentive auction is to ensure the widest possible participation from broadcasters and robust competition between wireless carriers.” Verizon also slammed a Sprint filing asking the FCC to scrap proposed spectrum aggregation rules in favor of a weighted spectrum plan (CD May 5 p4). “Sprint’s eleventh-hour proposal replacing its previous weighting scheme with an even more arbitrary one should be seen for what it is: a self-serving proposal designed to give Sprint preferential treatment in future transactions,” Verizon said. “It bears no semblance to rational spectrum policy and should be promptly rejected.”

The FTC updated its online complaint filing form for better compatibility with a mobile device, said a Tuesday news release (http://1.usa.gov/1nlKyJE). Mobile device users wishing to file a complaint will “be presented with a format that is simpler to navigate on a smaller screen and without a keyboard,” the FTC said. Consumers wishing to report an incident of identity theft will still be encouraged to do so through a desktop or laptop “due to the sensitive personal information required to file such a complaint,” the agency said.

T-Mobile needs more low-band spectrum to continue to play the disruptive role the carrier is now playing in the U.S. wireless market, T-Mobile said in a filing at the FCC. T-Mobile executives met with aides to the five commissioners, as well as Wireless Bureau Chief Roger Sherman, the carrier said in an ex parte filing. “Access to low-band spectrum and the economies of scale that greater access would enable represent two of the most pressing needs T-Mobile must satisfy if the company is to continue to play as disruptive a role in the market for the benefit of consumers as it has played over the last two years,” T-Mobile said. “Numerous studies … have demonstrated that low-band spectrum experiences significantly less path loss over wide areas than higher-frequency spectrum and less penetration loss when traveling through building walls, yielding improved consistency and reliability of coverage over wide-areas and indoors.” Meanwhile, T-Mobile Vice President Kathleen Ham responded Tuesday to comments by a second carrier official on why low-band spectrum is not a substitute for a denser network (CD May 6 p3). “On the one hand, they're arguing low-band doesn’t matter, but on the other they say that it does,” Ham told us. “If it doesn’t matter, go at it and bid in the AWS-3 auction. Get as much spectrum there as you want. Go for it.” Ham jabbed at AT&T in particular, which has been in a long-standing conflict with T-Mobile over spectrum aggregation rules. “It’s great for them to speak about how low-band is no big deal when they control so much of it,” she said.

Prospective members of the FirstNet board have until May 23 to make their desires known by filing an expression of interest with the Department of Commerce, NTIA said Monday in a notice. Four of 12 appointments to the board expire in August, NTIA said (http://1.usa.gov/1jvoNGD). “The Secretary of Commerce may reappoint individuals to serve on the FirstNet Board provided they have not served two consecutive full three-year terms. NTIA issues this Notice to obtain expressions of interest in the event the Secretary must fill any vacancies arising on the Board.”

LG Electronics USA got FCC equipment authorizations for what appears will be a broad lineup of car infotainment products destined soon for U.S. introduction, filings at the FCC website show (http://bit.ly/1fInTax). Little is disclosed in the filings that pinpoints whether the products will debut in the consumer electronics aftermarket or will be supplied on a factory original equipment manufacturer basis to major automakers, or both. LG asked for and got permanent confidentiality on the products’ block diagrams and other technical materials because they “contain trade secrets and proprietary information not customarily released to the public,” LG’s application said. “The public disclosure of these matters might be harmful to the Applicant and provide unjustified benefits to its competitors.” Public disclosure of product photos and user manuals has been barred for 180 days to Sept. 10 to give LG “temporary confidentiality of commercially sensitive information prior to product release,” it said. The authorizations are for a lineup of 44 derivatives of eight basic product models, the LG filings show. Of the 44 derivatives, about half have external “aux” jacks, the rest internal ports, it said. All but 12 have USB functionality, while 13 have built-in CD transports, and 20 sport digital radio tuners, they show. Bluetooth functionality is built into 24 of the derivatives, and nine have connectBlue wireless firmware support, they show. Searching any of the listed model numbers (for example, L41SK2) yields listings of identical models under a “Car Infotainment” heading on the OpenSource Code Distribution page of LG’s global support website (http://bit.ly/1mrWQyH). LG didn’t comment.

C Spire said it’s modifying shared data plans to include a four-line version with unlimited voice and text and 10 GB of data for $160 per month. AT&T and Verizon Wireless began offering similar four-line plans for $160 per month earlier this year. C Spire also reduced the cost of smaller data allocations, with 1 GB costing $25 and 2 GB costing $40, $20 less in both cases than before. A new 3 GB level costs $60. All plans cost between $15 and $40 per line, depending on how much data are bought and whether the subscriber is paying for the smartphone on an installment plan, C Spire said in a news release Monday. The carrier also recently began offering an unlimited data plan for $65 per month, which is only available to customers not on a contract plan and who either paid in full for their device or are paying for it in installments (http://bit.ly/1fMKIKa).

AT&T fired back at Competitive Carriers Association arguments that the FCC should tweak its spectrum aggregation rules to accommodate the low-band holdings of CCA members, while restricting bidding by Verizon and AT&T. CCA has proposed that the FCC look at the national positions of a carrier in addition to the spectrum it has in an individual market before imposing bidding limits in the TV incentive auction (CD April 30 p1). “The FCC has now proposed a set of restrictions that basically gives CCA exactly what it has demanded -- it is proposing to restrict a carrier’s participation in the 600 MHz auction based on the amount of low band spectrum it holds in its portfolio,” said AT&T Vice President Joan Marsh (http://bit.ly/1kQ7j7w). “One would think CCA would be cheering from the stands, but they are not. Why? Because the FCC’s proposal has finally forced CCA to acknowledge that there are ‘multiple examples’ ’throughout the country’ of incidences where their members already have a significant portfolio of low band spectrum. Those members would therefore be restricted under the FCC’s current proposal.” CCA wants to tilt the table to suit its purposes, Marsh said. “So, this is the world according to CCA: -- Where their members have significant low band holdings and are subject to auction restrictions, it’s an ‘unintended consequence,'” she wrote. “Where AT&T or Verizon have the same amount of low band holdings and are subject to auction restrictions, it’s because our low band holdings are ‘excessive.'"

Rules for the TV incentive auction must be clear going in for all parties, CTIA officials said in a meeting with Renee Gregory, aide to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler. “While the auction raises novel challenges, it is important that the rules be clear and easy to understand, and that they promote participation by both wireless providers and broadcasters,” said an ex parte filing on the Wednesday meeting posted the next day in docket 12-268 (http://bit.ly/Rbikpz). “CTIA also emphasized that a well-reasoned band plan is essential for the proposed incentive auction to achieve the critical goal of unleashing necessary additional spectrum for mobile broadband, and voiced support for a band plan that focuses on pairing as much spectrum as possible in a technically feasible manner that provides guard bands and a duplex gap no larger than required to protect licensed services from interference in accordance with the law, and that promotes bidder confidence.”