Internet/Broadband

The Biden-Harris Administration announced new actions to further promote responsible American innovation in artificial intelligence (AI) and protect people’s rights and safety:

After four years at the helm, Francella Ochillo announced that she will move on from her role as Executive Director of Next Century Cities (NCC), an organization committed to bringing connectivity within reach for every resident in every community. Since joining Next Century Cities in 2019, Ochillo has been recognized as one of the most impactful digital rights advocates in the country.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) proposed changes to the agency’s 2020 privacy order with Facebook after alleging that the company has failed to fully comply with the order, misled parents about their ability to control with whom their children communicated through its Messenger Kids app, and misrepresented the access it provided some app developers to private user data. As part of the proposed changes, Meta, which changed its name from Facebook in October 2021, would be prohibited from profiting from data it collects, including through its virtual reality products, from users under the a

North Carolina-based broadband provider Brightspeed has caught the eye of Abu Dhabi sovereign investor Mubadala, which will invest $500 million into the operator. The investment, subject to regulatory approvals and conditions, would make Mubadala a minority shareholder alongside Apollo Global Management, Brightspeed’s parent company.

Lumen Technologies reported results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2023. The company:

• Increased its Quantum Fiber-enabled location pacing, deploying approximately 120 thousand fiber locations during the first quarter of 2023;
• Increased Grow revenue to $1.128 billion for the first quarter of 2023, compared to $1.091 billion for the fourth quarter of 2022;
• Reported Net Income of $511 million for the first quarter of 2023, compared to reported Net Income of $599 million for the first quarter of 2022.

Consolidated Communications reported results for the first quarter of 2023. The company:

• Achieved record consumer fiber broadband net adds of 12,337, an increase of 60% versus the first quarter of 2022. Consumer broadband net adds were positive by 2,404;
• Grew consumer fiber broadband revenue by 56% and increased the average-revenue-per-user (ARPU) by 5.7%;
• Completed 53,858 fiber upgrades to Gigabit+ speeds, now extending fiber-to-the-premises (FttP) capabilities to 40% of the addressable market.

Federal efforts to pass children’s online safety protections have languished amid disagreements between House and Senate leaders about which proposals to rally around.

In the State of the Union speech earlier in 2023, President Biden made it clear that he wants to see the monies spent on infrastructure projects follow the Buy America rules. The law says that purchasing funded by the US government should have a preference for using American-made products. The rules allow for waivers from this provision, but the presumption is that without a waiver that American goods must be used.

High-speed internet access is expanding in rural Oklahoma. The Cooperative Broadband Coalition, or CBC, celebrated a major milestone: 100,000 Oklahomans who previously did not have access now had access to high-speed internet. The Cooperative Broadband Coalition said 10 electric cooperatives with fiber subsidiaries are experiencing adoption rates as high as 52% in rural Oklahoma, adding about 2,000 subscribers a month.

Approximately 1.4 million locations currently eligible for funding in the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program would not be eligible if the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) were to change its definition of “reliable” broadband, according to an analysis by telecom consultancy Vantage Point Solutions. At issue is whether fixed wireless access (FWA) service deployed in unlicensed spectrum bands is considered “reliable.” Currently, NTIA doesn’t consider it to be reliable because of concerns about the long-term ability of unlicensed spectrum to s