Sytel, which sells dialer and contact center products, urged FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to rethink the agency's Telephone Consumer Protection Act rules to focus on “dialing outcomes” rather than the dialing method used. “Current TCPA interpretations focus on the capability of dialing systems rather than their actual use,” said a filing Friday in docket 02-278. “This has led to complex enforcement challenges and continuing legal uncertainty. As the FCC appreciates, it has led to an interpretation of the TCPA that the only safe dialing process is a manual one, eschewing the benefits that proper automation can bring.” Neither manual nor hybrid dialing methods, with people “trying to emulate predictive dialers, can achieve anything like the performance of automated predictive dialers,” the U.K.-based company said. “The idea that humans can by themselves dial and profitably manage predictive campaigns of any size, without causing considerable levels of nuisance calls to consumers, is unfounded.”
The FCC Wireless Bureau is seeking comment by March 13 on an application by Hawks Ear Communications to serve as a contraband interdiction system (CIS) operator to help address contraband phones in correctional facilities. In a notice Monday in docket 13-111, the bureau noted a change to the usual protective order provisions being adopted for this proceeding. “Under this Protective Order, experts employed by wireless providers participating in the proceeding will be permitted to have access to Confidential Information,” while experts “employed by other commercial entities” won't.
T-Mobile disputed arguments by EchoStar, parent of Dish Wireless, that T-Mobile’s proposed buy of spectrum and other assets from UScellular is designed in part to keep other companies from adding to their 600 MHz holdings (see 2501290019). EchoStar is wrong that T-Mobile is pursuing “a foreclosure strategy” as part of the transaction, said a heavily redacted filing posted Monday in docket 24-286. The transaction would include T-Mobile gaining only a “put/call option” to use a small number of 600 MHz licenses, it said. “As EchoStar well knows, a put/call option is not a cognizable interest under well-established FCC precedent, nor a plausible foreclosure strategy given the very small amount of spectrum subject to the option.”
NCTA, major cable companies and other groups met with an aide to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to oppose proposed changes to rules for the citizens broadband radio service band, including higher power levels and relaxed emission limits. The lobbying reflects arguments a larger group of associations and companies made last week in a letter to Carr (see 2502060050). Those changes would “fundamentally alter the longstanding nature of CBRS, result in massive harmful interference to existing deployments" and "undermine existing and planned investments," said a filing posted Monday in docket 17-258. The changes could also "damage the trust in federal/commercial collaboration and sharing that has led to successful protection of national security operations while enabling innovative and competitive commercial use, and immediately halt America’s global momentum in private wireless networks,” it said. Others represented at the meeting included Spectrum for the Future, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and the Wireless ISP Association.
The FCC Wireline Bureau on Monday approved vCom's application to sell its operations, including FCC licenses, to AppSmart. The bureau noted that it sought comment last month (see 2501100041), and none were filed. “Applicants claim that the public interest benefits associated with the transaction include providing Licensees with access to Transferee’s and its affiliates’ financial and operational expertise and their larger client base, and permitting Licensees to continue to provide robust communications solutions to their customers and to better compete in the U.S. communications marketplace,” said the notice in docket 24-657. “We find that grant of the Application will serve the public interest, convenience, and necessity.”
The FCC doesn’t have as much power as Chairman Brendan Carr thinks it does and is likely to be corrected by the courts, former FCC Chief Counsel Robert Corn-Revere wrote in a column for the Columbia Journalism Review last week. Framed as a letter to Carr, the column is called “A Plea for Institutional Modesty.” Now chief counsel for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, Corn-Revere served under acting FCC Commissioner James Quello, a moderate Democrat. “If I were your adviser, this is not how I would want history to remember you,” Corn-Revere wrote, calling Carr’s first weeks as chairman “jarring” when compared with his past statements as a commissioner on free speech and the role of the FCC. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the FCC’s rules don’t give it authority over the types of programming broadcasters can offer, Corn-Revere noted. “In 2025, any aggressive action by the FCC to regulate broadcast programming would provide an opportunity to challenge whatever remains of the public interest standard as a reason to treat broadcasters differently from other media,” he said. “FCC meddling in editorial decisions regarding political coverage and news judgment would provide an easy case for limiting the FCC’s authority.” Corn-Revere also wrote that Carr can’t get around the limits on FCC authority by exerting informal pressure on entities or “jawboning.” The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit “is keenly aware that the FCC can abuse its authority in this way and has limited ‘raised eyebrow’ tactics in past cases,” he said, adding that SCOTUS has also recently reaffirmed that government officials violate the First Amendment by using threats to restrict speech. “Bottom line, given your position, writing threatening letters may be enough to get you into constitutional hot water.” Governmental officials “who have tried to use their power to muzzle the press for short-term political gain have not been treated well by history.” You swore an oath "to uphold the Constitution and laws of the United States, and you know very well how these things work. You might at least consider not actively reinforcing uninformed social media rants.” The FCC didn’t comment.
Verizon urged the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to overturn a $46.9 million penalty from the FCC for not adequately protecting subscribers’ real-time location information that commissioners approved on a 3-2 vote last year (see 2404290044). Last week, the 5th Circuit heard AT&T's oral argument against a $57 million fine the commission imposed (see 2502030050). The government defended the order in the 5th Circuit even though current FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and Republican Commissioner Nathan Simington had dissented.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday scheduled oral argument for March 26 in the government’s challenge of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' 9-7 en banc decision last year that sided with Consumers' Research and found that the USF contribution factor is a "misbegotten tax.” SCOTUS agreed in November to hear what some see as the most consequential FCC case in years (see 2412100060). Members of Congress, former FCC commissioners, ISPs and public interest groups are among those urging SCOTUS to overturn the 5th Circuit decision.
The Competitive Carriers Association challenged parts of the FCC’s 5G Fund order in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, seeking changes to the rules the agency adopted under former Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel (see 2408290041). Current Chairman Brendan Carr voted against the order, arguing that the fund should be launched only after the BEAD program plays out and money is awarded. CCA and the Rural Wireless Association voiced concerns when the order was approved in August.
Minority Television Project has reached a $25,000 settlement with the FCC over filing violations by KMTP-TV San Francisco, its noncommercial educational station, said a consent decree in Friday’s Daily Digest. KMTP filed its issues/programs list late, failed to report that violation to the FCC, and then was also untimely in filing its license renewal application, the consent decree said. Under the terms of the decree, the agency has granted KMTP’s license renewal for two years, during which time the station is required to implement a compliance plan and new training procedures.