National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Anne Neuberger, deputy national security adviser-cyber and emerging technology, met with U.S. telecom executives Friday to discuss China’s “significant cyber espionage campaign targeting the sector,” the White House said. Senate Privacy Subcommittee Chairman Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., last week called for an FCC investigation of a Chinese hacking campaign, which in part allegedly targeted communications from Vice President-elect JD Vance and the presidential campaign for Vice President Kamala Harris (see 2411190073). “The meeting was an opportunity to hear from telecommunications sector executives on how the U.S. Government can partner with and support the private sector on hardening against sophisticated nation state attacks,” the White House said. Officials didn’t disclose what companies’ executives attended the meeting.
In an investors' note Monday, New Street’s Blair Levin discussed reasons why the U.S. Supreme Court may overturn the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' 9-7 en banc decision, which found the USF contribution factor is a "misbegotten tax.” Consumers' Research, a conservative group, challenged the contribution factor in the 5th Circuit and other courts.
Competition is a better guarantor of good customer service than FCC rules, multiple industry groups said as they pushed back against proposals floated in the FCC's customer service NOI. The NOI was adopted 3-2 in October along party lines (see 2410230036). In comments in docket 24-472, which were due Friday, some industry groups also argued that the agency lacks legal standing on customer service rules. "Careful consideration will confirm that the Commission lacks anything like the plenary authority" to adopt a single set of customer service rules, CTIA said. Disability advocacy organizations, meanwhile, made suggestions for customer service requirements.
The FCC has signed off on SpaceX providing commercial supplemental coverage from space services using its Starlink satellites. In an FCC Space Bureau order issued Tuesday, the bureau said the direct-to-smartphone service -- done in partnership with T-Mobile and using 1910-1915 MHz unlinks and 1990-1995 MHz downlinks on a secondary basis -- is likely to avoid causing harmful interference with in-band terrestrial operations. The bureau said it's in T-Mobile's "best interest to ensure that SpaceX will not cause harmful interference." It also said its own "rigorous analysis" of SpaceX plans indicate the satellite company can adjust its equivalent isotropically radiated power in a way that won't cause interference with Omnispace, which had raised interference concerns with the agency.
Jessica Greffenius will be FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez's acting legal adviser for wireline and public safety.
Oral argument in the legal challenge against the FCC’s collection of workforce diversity data is “tentatively scheduled” for the week of Feb. 3, said a notice from the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in docket No. 24-60219 Friday. The National Religious Broadcasters, the American Family Association and the Texas Association of Broadcasters have argued that the FCC’s February equal employment opportunity order is unconstitutional and outside the agency’s authority, while the agency has said collecting the data and making it publicly available will improve diversity in broadcasting (see2410210044).
T-Mobile asked that the FCC direct the Universal Service Administrative Co. to make Q-Link Wireless reimburse it for money it owes for using the T-Mobile network. Q-Link Wireless CEO Issa Asad faces prison time and a fine of more than $100 million after pleading guilty to fraud tied to the FCC’s Lifeline program (see 2410160029). Q-Link is required to provide restitution to the commission for Lifeline fraud, but there is no provision to compensate T-Mobile for unpaid bills, said a filing posted Friday in docket 09-197. “Q LINK has been able to retain over $500 million of USF support without fully compensating T-Mobile for the services it provided to Q LINK and indirectly to consumers,” the carrier said. “Re-directing the funds to T-Mobile would simply allow it to receive the Federal benefits for the service that it ultimately provided during the term of its agreement with Q LINK and for the services that it continues to provide to Q LINK’s Lifeline program customers,” T-Mobile said.
Lending Tree asked the FCC to change some of the one-to-one robotext consent rules commissioners approved last December (see 2312130019) before they take effect Jan. 26. Company representatives met with an aide to FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr and staff from the Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau, said a filing posted Friday in docket 21-402. “LendingTree urged the Commission to adopt a narrow exception to the 1-to-1 Consent Rule for curated comparison-shopping platforms in order to preserve the ‘value that comparison shopping offers to consumers who seek specific goods and services, and the value that lead generators offers to businesses, including small businesses, seeking new customers,’” the filing said. Lending Tree said a recent survey it conducted “showed that 73% of consumers who have applied for a loan or insurance policy expect to learn about service providers that they have never heard of when comparison shopping.”
EchoStar representatives met with FCC Space Bureau staff to urge the agency to move forward on higher-power fixed service use of the lower 12 GHz band. The officials refuted a recent SpaceX study warning of interference from fixed-wireless operations in the lower 12 GHz band (see 2409040035). “We explained that SpaceX’s study was designed to fail, because it employs unrealistic assumptions, and assumes interference scenarios that bear no resemblance to fixed 5G deployments designed to avoid interference and make sharing possible,” said a filing posted Friday in docket 20-443.
House China Committee Chairman John Moolenaar, R-Mich., and ranking member Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., are asking the FCC to examine Taiwan-based Foxlink’s purchase earlier this year of Dahua Technology’s U.S. arm. The lawmakers believe the sale is an attempt to evade federal agencies’ blacklisting of Dahua cameras destined for government facilities, critical infrastructure surveillance or other national security uses. “Publicly available information about the deal suggests Dahua’s firmware and software will still be developed in” China and “therefore controlled by” that country’s government, Moolenaar and Krishnamoorthi said in a letter to FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. “Outside analysts have noted that they ‘expect Dahua to use Foxlink ... [to] claim that they no longer manufacture or produce these products. And the argument will then become, if they no longer produce those products, that US government regulations such as the FCC new device authorization or [National Defense Authorization Act] government bans can no longer be applied.” The lawmakers asked the FCC for a briefing on its findings, including “the possibility that it may be an effort to circumvent statutory restrictions on Dahua cameras in the U.S., without addressing the underlying national security risks such restrictions seek to remedy.”