NDIA Continues to Fight for Rigorous Digital Discrimination Rules

The National Digital Inclusion Alliance has warned policymakers about digital redlining, a discriminatory practice that prevents certain populations from having internet access, since 2017. Thanks in part to these warnings and advocacy efforts, the creation of digital discrimination rules was mandated in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) then spent two years working through a formal rule-making process culminating in the publication of official rules aimed at preventing and detecting digital discrimination in November 2023. However, there has been pushback from industry providers and associations claiming these mandates would be duplicative and burdensome. We disagree with these claims and offered the FCC alternatives to meet the needs of both industry and public interest.  

• The FCC should base economic feasibility on current economic variables.
• Annual reports of ISP projects’ size and type would provide several benefits to both industry and public interest.
• Include network performance, pricing, and demographic data in the annual reports.
• Require the reporting to be done at the location level using Broadband Serviceable Locations (BSL).
• Set the household amount trigger threshold lower than 500 households.
• Align and incorporate these reports into the biannual Broadband Data Collection (BDC) reports.
• Exclude no one from these reports.
• Make these reports available to the public.