Reporting

The Federal Communications Commission completed a three-month, Congressionally-mandated report by the FCC's Media Bureau looking into the television content rating system.

For 5G boosters, the benefits of installing the wireless technology are obvious: It allows delivery of super-fast internet speeds. But to hook up the “small cells” that power 5G grids, wireless providers have to install thick wires and poles and antennae on nearly every block they want to cover, outfitted with equipment that is about the size of a large backpack. It’s not just that 5G requires a lot of gear, which alone can provoke the not-in-my-backyard (NIMBY) backlash that puts a stop to all sorts of projects. It’s also that some people really don’t like it when they see it.

House Commerce Committee Chairman Frank Pallone (D-NJ) raised concern at the Federal Communications Commission oversight hearing about the agency’s response to “major consumer problems,” suggesting the commission had been deferring to corporate interests when it comes to fixing things like “robocalls or widespread communications failures after disasters like Hurricanes Maria and Michael.” The criticism came days after the FCC’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau issued a report detailing “the unac

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), whose House Commerce Subcommittee is leading efforts to craft privacy legislation, raised the prospect of tackling concerns over competition and data protection at the same time. Asked about next steps on privacy legislation, Chairwoman Schakowsky said the question is where to limit the “scope” of a bill. “You can really get into a whole lot of things,” she said. “There’s talk about breaking up the big tech companies. Is that a part of this? Is that a separate [issue]?

Public-interest groups and civil liberties advocates say there's no clear evidence Facebook, Twitter, Google, and other companies suppress conservative viewpoints. And they say they're troubled by the prospect of government officials, particularly President Donald Trump, seeking to intimidate Silicon Valley over the issue. "A more pressing problem than alleged 'censorship' of any particular viewpoint is the proliferation of misinformation, propaganda, hate speech, terrorist content, and harassment online," said John Bergmayer, a senior counsel at Public Knowledge.

The White House announced an unprecedented campaign asking Internet users to share if they had been censored on Facebook, Google and Twitter, tapping into President Trump’s long-running claim that tech giants are biased against conservatives. The effort, which the White House said on Twitter was directed at users “no matter your views,” seeks to collect names, contact information and other details from Americans.

Amid a deepening trade war with China, President Donald Trump declared a “national emergency” to protect US communications networks in a move that gives the federal government broad powers to bar American companies from doing business with certain foreign suppliers — including the Chinese firm Huawei. President Trump declared the emergency in the form of an executive order that says foreign adversaries are exploiting vulnerabilities in US telecommunications technology and services. It points to economic and industrial espionage as areas of particular concern.

As expected, the Democratic leaders on the House Communications Subcommittee used the Federal Communications Commission oversight hearing to hammer FCC Chairman Ajit Pai over policies and actions with which they strongly disagree. In his opening statement, Chairman Mike Doyle (D-PA) said Chairman Pai had yet to explain to Congress or the American people what it was doing about mobile carriers sharing real-time geolocation data. He also slammed the inaccurate and deeply flawed broadband deployment data, old and faulty business broadband data, and warned the FCC not to act on a USTelecom forb

The internet on the Havasupai reservation (AZ) has been a mixed bag. Tribal employees could sign on to their email and do internet searches but not much else. The tribe began working with a company called MuralNet in 2017 to get teachers and students better access. They successfully sought temporary authority from the Federal Communications Commission to use the Educational Broadband Services (EBS) spectrum that wasn’t being used. “We’re really putting our chips on EBS,” said Mariel Triggs, chief executive of MuralNet. “It works in extreme cases.

Access to rural broadband internet should become easier in 2019 with the passage of a Missouri law and the awarding of federal grants from the Federal Communication Commission. The budget that passed the MO legislature recently included $5 million toward the new Rural Broadband Development Fund, and the FCC has recently announced more than $25 million in federal grants from the Connect America Fund (CAF).