FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) Tuesday criticized carrier efforts to restore service in Florida after Hurricane Michael. Scott, who's trying to unseat Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Bill Nelson (D) in a tight Senate race, cited Verizon for its outage in Panama Beach. He urged telecom companies do more to help customers. Pai agreed carrier response could be better and asked the Public Safety Bureau to investigate.
The FCC is expected to vote 3-1 on Oct. 23 to adopt revised rules for the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band largely as circulated by Chairman Ajit Pai (see 1810020050). Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel is expected to dissent. A question remains whether she will be able to get a few changes that would allow her to vote for part of it. Rosenworcel voted for part of the wireless infrastructure order last month after getting a few concessions. Observers think a similar dynamic could develop here (see 1809260029). Interested parties got an extra day to lobby since the sunshine notice was delayed a day after the agency was closed Monday (see 1810150023).
The FTC needs a better understanding of “mass data surveillance” to decide whether current rules distort the competitive process, Commissioner Rohit Chopra said Monday during the agency’s third policy hearing (see 1810020061). Differing views were heard on the state of competitive tech markets.
With a commissioner vote next week on revised rules for the 3.5 GHz citizens broadband radio service band, CBRS advocates said Monday the band is poised to be a big deal regardless of the outcome (see 1810110068). The FCC fight has been over the priority access licenses to be sold in each market, but 80 MHz remains for general access, unlicensed use, a Monday webinar heard.
Consolidation is a satellite industry must, particularly in the earth station segment, said experts Monday at the VSAT Congress. Many urged pursuing convergence between satellite connectivity and terrestrial networks so there's a bigger audience for the huge amounts of bandwidth going into orbit in coming years. "We don't have five years" for that convergence, iDirect CEO Kevin Steen said, noting satellite data capacity is expected to grow fourteenfold by 2027. "We have to start now."
Supporters of the Streamlining the Rapid Evolution and Modernization of Leading-Edge Infrastructure Necessary to Enhance (Streamline) Small Cell Deployment Act took center stage at a Friday Senate Commerce Committee 5G deployment field hearing in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to extol the bill's virtues. FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr and other national and state stakeholders endorsed the bill in written testimony, as expected (see 1810090049). S-3157, filed in June by Senate Commerce Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., and Senate Communications Subcommittee ranking member Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, aims to implement a “reasonable process and timeframe guidelines” for state and local small-cell consideration (see 1806290063). The friendly panel was in contrast to opposition S-3157 faces from other state and local governments (see 1810040055).
Carriers and public safety groups disagreed on next steps for assuring the vertical accuracy (z-axis) of wireless calls to 911. CTIA said more time and testing is needed, but public safety groups urged the FCC to get tough. In September, the Public Safety Bureau sought comment on a z-axis test bed report submitted by CTIA on behalf of the nationwide carriers. Replies were due Thursday. The FCC approved an order 5-0 in January 2015 requiring carriers to improve their performance in identifying the location of wireless calls to 911 (see 1501290066). Then-Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said at the time the FCC wasn't being tough enough.
Administrator David Redl said Friday he's hopeful comments on NTIA’s privacy principles (see 1810100057) will show privacy and innovation can be maximized under a new federal privacy framework. NTIA met with more than 60 companies, groups and individuals before the comment solicitation, he said. One message the agency heard from the tech industry is that privacy and innovation are “not mutually exclusive goals,” Redl told the Brookings Institution.
The FCC said restoration of "light-touch" broadband regulation reflects the best read of the Communications Act and its goal of an internet "unfettered" by federal and state regulation. The "internet freedom" order is backed by the agency's "legal analysis, public policy concerns, and the extensive record," said the FCC/DOJ brief Thursday, responding to challenges (see 1808210010) in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Mozilla v. FCC, No. 18-1051. Though the decision reversed a 2015 Title II net neutrality order, the FCC "had ample discretion, following a 'change in administrations' to reevaluate its policies," it said, citing the 2005 Supreme Court Brand X deferring to the commission classification of cable broadband as a Title I information service.
There are no signs FCC action on the TV-station national ownership cap is coming soon. The expected busy agency schedule for the remaining months of 2018 means such action is unlikely this year, FCC officials, broadcasters, attorneys and analysts told us. Without any deals actively pending that push against the cap and the UHF discount not under threat, the national cap appears to be “on the backburner,” said S&P Global Senior Research Analyst Justin Nielson.