The FCC Wireline Bureau has ordered seven phone companies to repay a total of over $9 million to the USF after audits showed insufficient recordkeeping and noncompliance with accounting requirements related to the companies' efforts to fulfill their USF obligations, according to orders and a news release Wednesday. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said in the release that the agency needs “to closely scrutinize USF support payments” to “ensure funding is used to efficiently connect rural households and businesses.”
The FCC’s newly launched Consumer Protection and Accessibility Advisory Committee (CPAAC) will focus on two particularly pressing consumer issues: promoting accessibility in modern communications and “the scourge of illegal robocalls,” Chairman Brendan Carr said Wednesday. Speaking at the inaugural meeting of what he called the "renamed and refocused" advisory group, Carr promised increased FCC enforcement efforts aimed at illegal robocalls, including "actions that effectively prohibit voice service providers from connecting or maintaining their connections" to U.S. telephone networks.
Some top lawmakers indicated in recent interviews that they lack a clear plan to fund next-generation 911 tech upgrades, months after Congress decided against allocating future spectrum auction revenue for them in the budget reconciliation package, previously known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (see 2507080065). NG911 advocates said they expect that the lack of an alternative will come up during Tuesday's House Communications Subcommittee hearing on public safety communications issues. The hearing is also likely to address a looming legislative renewal of FirstNet that must happen before the existing mandate expires in February 2027 (see 2509030058).
FCC commissioners are expected to take up an item next month that will reopen the agency’s prison-calling rules, approved last summer (see 2407180039), it said in a filing Sunday at the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The court is considering the order's legality and in July declined to hold the case in abeyance (see 2507160027).
Comments are due Oct. 6, replies Oct. 21, about the transfer of various Cox Communications licenses and authorizations to Charter Communications as part of Charter's proposed $34.5 billion purchase of Cox (see 2505160060), the FCC Wireline Bureau said Friday (docket 25-233).
The FCC Wireless Bureau is seeking comment by Sept. 17 on Viaero's requested waiver of citizens broadband radio service rules, said a Friday notice in docket 25-274. The company hopes to buy 10 priority access licenses from Citizens Band License Co. in seven counties in Colorado. FCC rules allow a company to own only four such licenses in a market, but with the purchase Viaero would have six in three of the counties and five in the others, the notice said.
A broad group of tech and auto industry associations urged the Trump administration to forgo imposing rules for connected vehicles that are different from those set by the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (see 2508290051). The FCC is examining whether to change its rules for its “covered list” of unsecure companies to take into account connected vehicles. The groups addressed their letter, posted Friday in docket 18-89, to Jeffrey Kessler, Commerce undersecretary for industry and security, and FCC Chairman Brendan Carr.
Comments are due Oct. 6, replies Oct. 20, on the business data services NPRM that FCC commissioners approved 3-0 last month (see 2508110054), said a Wireline Bureau notice Friday in dockets 21-17 and 17-144.
The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau has given ClearCaptions the go-ahead to forgo the volume-control reset requirement for wireline phones. People with hearing loss won't have to turn the volume back up on ClearCaptions phones covered by the waiver before using them again, said the order (docket 18-307).
The FCC has been asking broadcasters about ATSC 3.0’s use of digital rights management (DRM) encryption and concerns that it could squeeze out some device manufacturers, said officials from ATSC 3.0 consortium Pearl TV and 3.0 device maker Tolka in an interview.