The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions said this week that the FCC's further NPRM seeking comment on tougher call ID rules gets the facts wrong on the issue of Stir/Shaken and the role that rich call data (RCD) could play. Other industry commenters said handing down rules now could chill industry progress addressing caller ID issues. In addition to proposed rules on caller ID, the FNPRM, approved in October, also seeks input on requiring labels for calls that originate outside the U.S. (see 2510280024). Comments were posted this week in docket 17-59.
House Antitrust Subcommittee members were sharply divided during a hearing Wednesday on concerns about the potential impact of dueling Netflix and Paramount Skydance proposals to buy Warner Bros. Discovery. The subpanel's Democrats opposed both proposals but appeared to have stronger misgivings about a Paramount Skydance purchase, given the company's recent interference with CBS’ news content. Republicans were far more muted about the WBD proposals and in some instances chided Democrats for using the hearing to criticize the Trump administration’s media regulatory actions, including FCC Chairman Brendan Carr’s handling of Skydance’s $8 billion purchase of Paramount Global last year (see 2507240079).
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said Wednesday that the agency will vote at its Jan. 29 meeting on an order that increases the level at which 6 GHz devices can operate while seeking to protect incumbents through geofencing. A second order on the agenda would establish new attestation and disclosure requirements for holders of agency licenses and other approvals.
The Center for American Rights is wrong to argue that the FCC is obligated to enforce its rules even when they're based on judicial precedents that are now widely seen as poorly decided, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation said Tuesday. CAR argued last month that the agency is bound by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1969 Red Lion Broadcasting v. FCC decision, in which the court ruled that broadcasters have reduced First Amendment protections because of spectrum scarcity.
The FCC doesn’t have the authority to alter or waive the national TV ownership cap, and trying to work around that by redefining the term “national audience reach” to approve the Nexstar/Tegna deal would be “fraught with peril,” said the Phoenix Center’s Lawrence Spiwak in a blog post Sunday for the Yale Journal on Regulation. The ownership cap prevents a single TV broadcaster from owning stations with a combined national audience reach of more than 39% of U.S. households. The FCC “would have to engage in some very creative economics to come up with a plausible formula that would allow the major broadcast license owners to merge and still satisfy the 39% cap,” Spiwak wrote.
The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau on Tuesday ordered the extension to Jan. 31, 2027, of the effective date of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) requirement for callers to treat any called party's revocation of consent as applicable to all future robocalls and robotexts from that caller on unrelated matters. The bureau said the extension of the waiver of that rule will give more time to review the record compiled in response to the TCPA further NPRM adopted by commissioners in October (see 2510280024).
Comments are due Feb. 4, replies March 6, on Gigapower’s petition asking the FCC Wireline Bureau to preempt local pole-attachment requirements in Rock Hill, South Carolina, to allow the company to provide telecommunications services, said a public notice in Tuesday’s Daily Digest. Due to a prior agreement with provider Comporium, Rock Hill “is requiring Gigapower to rearrange attachments to City-owned poles or to replace poles to obtain access, despite the existence of adequate available space” on existing poles, Gigapower told the agency. Rock Hill’s actions “are tantamount to a de facto moratorium that the Commission should preempt,” the petition said.
Comments are due Feb. 5, replies Feb. 20, on Tango Networks' request for a waiver of the FCC's numbering access rules, according to a Wireline Bureau public notice Tuesday. Tango wants the agency to waive the requirement that an applicant for initial numbering resources must show that it's authorized to provide service in the requested area, the notice said.
The FCC Wireline Bureau asked for comment Tuesday on the National Exchange Carrier Association’s proposed revisions to formulas used for average schedule interstate settlement disbursements. Comments are due Feb. 5, replies Feb. 20, in docket 25-339.
Senior Senate Commerce Committee member Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., told reporters Tuesday that she’s “seriously considering” running for governor after incumbent Democratic Gov. Tim Walz announced that he won’t seek reelection to a third term. Klobuchar has been active on rural broadband and other communications policy matters. She was among several Senate Commerce Democrats who criticized FCC Chairman Brendan Carr during a December hearing over his mid-September comments against ABC and parent Disney, which were widely perceived as causing the network’s since-reversed decision to pull Jimmy Kimmel Live! off the air (see 2512170070).