FCC Approves Charter-TWC Protective Orders

The Federal Communications Commission has approved the protective orders and associated framework for treating sensitive information in the Charter-Time Warner Cable deal. That means the FCC can start the shot clock on the merger review and open a comment window.

The three Democratic Commissioners had already voted to approve, but the item could not be official until the other two votes were in or the time to vote had run out. The Republican Commissioners had issues with how the FCC had addressed protection of sensitive info more generally as part of a court remand of its protective orders in the AT&T-DirecTV and Comcast-TWC deal reviews. The votes are now all in, with Commissioner Ajit Pai dissenting in part and approving in part and Commissioner Michael O'Rielly dissenting.