Daily Digest 3/31/2020 (Toy Cannon)

Benton Institute for Broadband & Society
Table of Contents

Coronavirus Response

Chairman Pai Announces Plan for $200 Million COVID-19 Telehealth Program  |  Read below  |  Press Release  |  Federal Communications Commission
Keeping Lifeline Subscribers Connected During COVID-19  |  Read below  |  Kris Anne Monteith  |  Public Notice  |  Federal Communications Commission
FCC Acts to Support Connectivity on Tribal Reservation in New Mexico  |  Read below  |  Public Notice  |  Federal Communications Commission
FCC Will Seek Distance-Learning Dollars from Hill  |  Read below  |  John Eggerton  |  Multichannel News
Our Networks Are More Vital Than Ever. The FCC Owes Us Updates.  |  Read below  |  Jonathan Sallet  |  Undark
Congress Just Spent $2 Trillion on Coronavirus Relief. It’s Eyeing More.  |  New York Times
Democrats are ready to start work on a fourth coronavirus bill. Republicans want to wait.  |  Vox
More Coronavirus Stimulus? Pelosi’s Case for Health and Digital Infrastructure  |  Wall Street Journal

Internet/Broadband

For some, coronavirus pushes new issues to top of national agenda  |  Read below  |  Axios
Rural internet's importance highlighted by coronavirus  |  Read below  |  Jenny Schlecht  |  AgWeek
Coronavirus reveals critical gaps in Georgia internet service  |  Read below  |  Sally Sears  |  WGCL-TV
Coronavirus pushes traditional businesses into the digital age  |  Read below  |  Sara Fischer, Kim Hart  |  Axios
Universal connectivity is still the goal. We need to keep working on long-term solutions.  |  Read below  |  Francella Ochillo  |  Op-Ed  |  Benton Institute for Broadband & Society
The coronavirus crisis proves the internet should be a public utility  |  Read below  |  Ephrat Livini  |  Analysis  |  Quartz
How COVID-19 is proving the urgency of delivering universal broadband  |  Read below  |  Matt Dunne  |  Hill, The
The Broadband Lifeline in a Pandemic: Strategies for Provisioning Broadband to Temporary Emergency Sites  |  Read below  |  Andrew Afflerbach  |  Editorial  |  CTC Technology & Energy
Broadband First Responders: Libraries, Schools, and ISPs Open Wi-Fi Hotspots for Students  |  Read below  |  Katie Kienbaum  |  Institute for Local Self-Reliance
Coronavirus crunch may expose weakness in your broadband plan: much slower upload speeds  |  Read below  |  Rob Pegoraro  |  Fast Company
NDIA Executive Director Angela Siefer On COVID-19 Stimulus: More Action Needed to Connect Millions of Households  |  Read below  |  Angela Siefer  |  Press Release  |  National Digital Inclusion Alliance
Comcast says voice and video calls have skyrocketed 212 percent during widespread self-isolation  |  Vox
Comcast Tech Chief Werner: Peak Traffic Up 60% in Some Cities, But Network Is Handling It  |  Multichannel News
Windstream's network withstands the COVID-19 strain for now  |  Fierce
Streaming Soars (26%) Especially During Daytime, Conviva Says  |  Broadcasting&Cable
CenturyLink Supplies Ship-to-Shore Connection to Mercy  |  Multichannel News

Education

Congress and FCC Can Keep Students Online  |  Read below  |  John Harrington  |  Editorial  |  Funds For Learning
The Homework Chasm  |  Read below  |  Amir Nasr  |  Op-Ed  |  Slate

Health

USTelecom Proposes Changes in FCC's Rural Health Care Program During Pandemic  |  Read below  |  Jonathan Spalter  |  Letter  |  USTelecom
Senator Markey Calls for Expanded Telehealth Access for Medicare Recipients  |  US Senate

Wireless

AT&T Increasing Mobile Hotspot Data by 15GB  |  Read below  |  Press Release  |  AT&T
What Is Standalone 5G?  |  Read below  |  Joan Engebretson  |  Analysis  |  telecompetitor
FCC: C-Band Auction Still 'Go' for December  |  Multichannel News

Emergency Communications

Coronavirus Spread Creates Risk for 911: Who Will Answer?  |  Wall Street Journal

Platforms/Content

Twitter cracks down on coronavirus misinformation from Rudy Giuliani, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro  |  Axios
Facebook’s Fact Checkers Fight Surge in Fake Coronavirus Claims  |  Wall Street Journal
Facebook Could Help Journalism by Making News Easier to Find  |  Wired

Security/Privacy

Saudi spies tracked phones using flaws the FCC failed to fix for years  |  TechCrunch
President Trump Extends Cybersecurity National Emergency  |  White House
Countries are using apps and data networks to keep tabs on the pandemic  |  Economist, The
Digital disease surveillance: Tracking a pandemic  |  Knowable Magazine
Google Wants Your Data in Exchange for a Coronavirus Test  |  Foreign Policy
How Is Covid-19 Creating Data Breaches?  |  Government Technology
Cat Zakrzewski: We asked more than 100 tech experts if US should use location data to track coronavirus. They were split.  |  Washington Post
New York Attorney General Looks Into Zoom’s Privacy Practices  |  New York Times
Court: Violating a site’s terms of service isn’t criminal hacking  |  Ars Technica
Stuart Brotman: The Case for a Federal Digital Privacy Strike Force  |  Security

Elections & Media

Why is Joe Biden Silent on Net Neutrality?  |  Read below  |  Andrew Wyrich  |  Daily Dot
Trump Won the Internet. Democrats are Scrambling to Take it Back.  |  New York Times

Journalism

The nation's biggest story could devastate news industry |  USA Today
Gannett newspaper chain to furlough journalists  |  Hill, The

Company News

Satellite Internet Company OneWeb Files for Bankruptcy  |  Read below  |  John Eggerton  |  Multichannel News
Vice Issues Pay Cuts, Furloughs Amid Coronavirus Crisis  |  Wrap, The

FCC Reform

FCC Finds Time to Weigh Media Bureau Consolidation  |  Read below  |  Alexandra Levine  |  Politico
 
 
Today's Top Stories

Coronavirus Response

Chairman Pai Announces Plan for $200 Million COVID-19 Telehealth Program

Press Release  |  Federal Communications Commission

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced his plan for a COVID-19 Telehealth Program to support health care providers responding to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. As part of the CARES Act, Congress appropriated $200 million to the FCC to support health care providers’ use of telehealth services in combating the COVID-19 pandemic. If adopted by the FCC, the Program would help eligible health care providers purchase telecommunications, broadband connectivity, and devices necessary for providing telehealth services. These services would directly help COVID-19 patients and provide care to patients with other conditions who might risk contracting the coronavirus when visiting a healthcare provider—while reducing practitioners’ potential exposure to the virus. Chairman Pai has also presented his colleagues with final rules to stand up a broader, longerterm Connected Care Pilot Program. It would study how connected care could be a permanent part of the Universal Service Fund by making available up to $100 million of universal service support over three years to help defray eligible health care providers’ costs of providing telehealth services to patients at their homes or mobile locations, with an emphasis on providing those services to low-income Americans and veterans. 

About the COVID-19 Telehealth Program: This $200 million Program would immediately support health care providers responding to the pandemic by providing eligible health care providers support to purchase telecommunications services, information services, and devices necessary to enable the provision of telehealth services during this emergency period. It would provide selected applicants with full funding for these eligible telehealth services and devices. In order to receive funding, eligible health care providers would submit a streamlined application to the Commission for this program, and the Commission would award funds to selected applicants on a rolling basis until the funds are exhausted or until the current pandemic has ended.

About the Connected Care Pilot Program: This three-year Pilot Program would provide universal service support to help defray health care providers’ qualifying costs of providing connected care services. It would target funding to eligible health care providers, with a primary focus on pilot projects that would primarily benefit low-income or veteran patients. The Pilot Program would make available up to $100 million, which would be separate from the budgets of the existing Universal Service Fund programs and the COVID-19 Telehealth Program. The Pilot Program would provide funding for selected pilot projects to cover 85% of the eligible costs of broadband connectivity, network equipment, and information services necessary to provide connected care services to the intended patient population. In order to participate, eligible health care providers would submit an application to the Commission for the Pilot Program, and the Commission would announce the selected pilot projects.

Keeping Lifeline Subscribers Connected During COVID-19

Kris Anne Monteith  |  Public Notice  |  Federal Communications Commission

To help Americans stay connected during the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, the Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau:

  1. temporarily waives, on its own motion, the Lifeline program’s usage requirements and general de-enrollment procedures, until May 29, 2020,
  2. extends, on its own motion, our previous waiver of the Lifeline program’s recertification and reverification rules to May 29, 2020 to ensure that all of the waiver periods for Lifeline’s de-enrollment rules will have the same duration, and
  3. directs the Universal Service Administrative Company to pause any involuntary de-enrollment of existing subscribers

FCC Acts to Support Connectivity on Tribal Reservation in New Mexico

Public Notice  |  Federal Communications Commission

The Federal Communications Commission has granted an emergency Special Temporary Authority request filed by A:shiwi College & Career Readiness Center to use unassigned 2.5 GHz spectrum to provide wireless broadband service over the reservation of the Pueblo of Zuni in New Mexico in light of increased demand due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The A:shiwi College and Career Readiness Center, formerly the University of New Mexico Gallup-Zuni Campus, was established by the Zuni Tribe in 2016.

FCC Will Seek Distance-Learning Dollars from Hill

John Eggerton  |  Multichannel News

The Federal Communications Commission was looking for money from Congress for remote education in the COVID-19 aid bill that passed recently, but didn't get it. An FCC official signaled on background March 30 that it is not giving up. The FCC official said to look for the FCC to renew the funding pitch for the next round of COVID-19 aid that is almost surely coming. He also cited the efforts Internet service providers are taking on their own dime, including offering free service to low-income residents with school-age children currently lacking home broadband.

Our Networks Are More Vital Than Ever. The FCC Owes Us Updates.

Jonathan Sallet  |  Undark

As so many Americans work from home, as our schoolchildren and university students shift to online learning, as virtually all of our social interactions occur online, a fundamental question looms: Will the internet break? The answer is probably not a simple yes or no, and it’s probably not the same answer everywhere in the United States. That’s why the Federal Communications Commission, the agency where I previously served as general counsel, should issue a weekly broadband status report, updating America on what is working about our broadband networks and what, if anything, is not. America’s network infrastructure is a patchwork quilt of technologies reaching across a vast geographic area with widely varying usage patterns even in normal times. But we are not in normal times, and the need for an entity that can provide school administrators, emergency planners, and the general public with a bird’s eye view of the health of our variegated communications systems and technologies has never been greater. It’s not enough to receive (if we do) individual network reports. The FCC, with its view across networks, should step up.

[Jonathan Sallet is a former general counsel for the Federal Communications Commission and currently a senior fellow at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, a nonprofit organization working to bring affordable, high-capacity broadband to all people in the U.S. to ensure a thriving democracy.]

For some, coronavirus pushes new issues to top of national agenda

  |  Axios

The coronavirus pandemic is helping shift policy priorities for some Americans. School closures and remote work across the country are showcasing how inequities in access to high-speed broadband can impact access to education and work during a time of crisis.

Rural internet's importance highlighted by coronavirus

Jenny Schlecht  |  AgWeek

Getting broadband internet access to rural areas has been a goal for rural advocates and service providers alike for years, but the COVID-19 pandemic has made such access more important than ever. Seth Arndorfer, the CEO of DCN, which is owned by North Dakota’s independent rural telecommunications companies, said internet usage on the member companies’ systems increased by 10% to 40% during the first 10 days since people in the state were urged to stay home. Internet congestion and slowdowns have been more rare than in some places, because North Dakota already had the ability to expand bandwidth. It’s been similar in South Dakota. Jake VanDewater is the vice president of engineering, operations and IT at SDN Communications, a South Dakota company that provides business to business internet and also has 17 rural telephone companies that it works with to provide broadband service to rural areas across the state. He said the companies have been preparing for a few weeks for the changes that would come with people staying home more. While they continue to monitor changes in use patterns, so far, things are going well.

Coronavirus reveals critical gaps in Georgia internet service

Sally Sears  |  WGCL-TV

Rural Georgians struggling who for years have struggled to gain internet access could see new sympathy from internet users in Georgia towns and suburbs. Critical to supplying that service are the state's 42 Electric Membership Cooperatives (EMCs), which provide electricity to well over two thirds of Georgia's real estate. But state lawmakers so far are showing little interest in asking Georgia taxpayers to help their rural neighbors with the price of internet. Instead, the Chairman of the House Telecom Committee Don Parsons (R-Marietta), thinks EMC members themselves may be persuaded by the coronavirus demands to pressure the leadership of their own organizations. He sees the potential as he acknowledges "there's a risk, to do something you have not done before."  A critical question he'd like answered is whether EMCs will be willing to work with other partners to lessen the price and encourage more customers. The debate in the state legislature will wait until lawmakers decide the threat is lessened and the session can resume. In the meantime, however, the sight of students gathering at fairgrounds for internet access may push EMC members to new conversations.

Coronavirus pushes traditional businesses into the digital age

Sara Fischer, Kim Hart  |  Axios

A slew of old-line industries that once hesitated to embrace digital technologies are now being forced to do so for the sake of survival. Once consumers get used to accessing services digitally — from older restaurants finally embracing online ordering, or newspapers finally going all-digital — these industries may find it hard to go back to traditional operations. Going virtual may open up new markets and new channels for engaging with consumers. But consumers will also likely rush to take part in out-of-home experiences once the pandemic eases and they can leave home again.

Universal connectivity is still the goal. We need to keep working on long-term solutions.

Francella Ochillo  |  Op-Ed  |  Benton Institute for Broadband & Society

Coronavirus has caused a seismic shift in everything about life as we know it. Schools, businesses, and non-essential entities are closed indefinitely. As fear and economic uncertainty escalate, so does the need for information. Students have been forced into remote learning programs regardless of whether they are equipped. Before COVID-19, many did not have the requisite tools to complete assignments at home. Now, some of those students, who were already at a disadvantage, will spend the remainder of the school year using smartphones to comply with remote learning mandates. Many small businesses that shut their doors and laid-off employees are unlikely to reopen in their previous forms. Even though some will, that won’t stop the tidal wave of economic devastation headed for their communities. Unemployment claims have already exceeded three million while economists expect job losses to soar to 47 million. Local governments working feverishly to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of those residents are also responsible for protecting their own workforce. It has become clear, if it wasn’t already, that being able to maintain real-time communications during a national emergency is critical. In fact, high-speed connectivity has become the oxygen of those networks.

[Francella Ochillo is the Executive Director of Next Century Cities, a non-profit membership organization founded to support mayors and local officials who work to ensure that every resident​ has fast, affordable, and reliable internet access.]

The coronavirus crisis proves the internet should be a public utility

Ephrat Livini  |  Analysis  |  Quartz

The spread of the novel coronavirus has proven conclusively that the internet should be a public utility. It’s a basic necessity in the 21st century, like running water, gas, and electricity. Perhaps after the pandemic panic gives way to a new state of normalcy, the people will demand inexpensive and reliable high-quality broadband, and maybe private internet service providers will have to sing a different tune. They already recognize that access is essential, based on their response to the coronavirus quarantines. That will make it harder to walk back the admissions and concessions they’re making today, and they may well find that if they don’t want to keep playing nice, a time will come when they’re no longer necessary because the game has totally changed.

How COVID-19 is proving the urgency of delivering universal broadband

Matt Dunne  |  Hill, The

The COVID-19 pandemic has put the consequences of America’s “digital divide” on full display. This dire situation makes clear the need for universal rural broadband. To finally deliver on this promise, we need an effort on the scale of the Rural Electrification Act (REA), passed by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the depths of the Depression to power farms and small towns out of poverty. We must pass a 21st century version of that act, one that equips local communities with the resources they need to bring connectivity to the last mile of rural America. 

If there was ever a time for a new and innovative approach to democratizing rural broadband, that time would be now. Here’s two steps to get it done: First, we need to make it easier to build new fiber networks. Second, we need to set up models to de-risk deployment for taxpayers and small-town communities. Following the broadband model used in the state of Vermont, we should authorize “Communications Union Districts” that enable communities to access municipal bonds for financing the broadband buildout, without putting taxpayers at risk.

[Matt Dunne is the founder and executive director of the Center on Rural Innovation.]

Broadband First Responders: Libraries, Schools, and ISPs Open Wi-Fi Hotspots for Students

Katie Kienbaum  |  Institute for Local Self-Reliance

As the Covid-19 outbreak pushes almost all daily functions online, libraries, schools, and Internet service providers (ISPs) are finding themselves on the front lines of responding to their communities’ connectivity needs — especially those of students. Nationwide, these broadband first responders are working rapidly to open and deploy public Wi-Fi hotspots that families can access from the safety of their parked cars. Recently, the American Library Association (ALA) recommended that libraries leave their Wi-Fi turned on and accessible while facilities are closed. In many ways, these efforts wouldn’t be as necessary if federal and state governments had invested adequately in high-quality, affordable networks years ago. However, there is still time for officials to support providers’ efforts now.

NDIA Executive Director Angela Siefer On COVID-19 Stimulus: More Action Needed to Connect Millions of Households

Angela Siefer  |  Press Release  |  National Digital Inclusion Alliance

On March 27 President Donald Trump signed the $2.2 trillion CARES Act to offset the economic impact of the pandemic and the public health response to it. Unfortunately, the CARES Act does not include meaningful help for tens of millions of Americans who are struggling to deal with closed schools, closed workplaces, limited access to banks and retailers, a mostly inaccessible health care system, and the public health obligation to “stay home”, possibly for months – all without the benefit of home internet connections. We are pleased to be able to point to the appropriated $50 million for the Institute of Museum and Library Services for digital equity efforts. But $50 million is a drop in the bucket. To enable IMLS and state, territories and tribal governments to promote meaningful short-term digital inclusion measures, Congress must:

  • Quickly increase the appropriation for this initiative to at least $500 million, if not more; and
  • Make clear that this funding is meant to support concrete, practical community action – by libraries, of course, but also by other public and nonprofit organizations as well – that will quickly connect poor and rural households to the Internet for education, healthcare, and other vital needs, during this crisis.

NDIA also calls on policymakers to consider two other measures as part of the nation’s emergency response to the COVID-19 crisis:

  1. Creation of a new, across-the-board Federal broadband subsidy that would be available to all households meeting an income threshold, similar to SNAP or LIHEAP.
  2. Emergency funding for quick-turnaround solutions that extend immediate affordable broadband service to unconnected communities and residents, including building Wi-Fi, school bus Wi-Fi, and rural fixed wireless setups. These solutions are likely to be implemented by local governments, anchor institutions, housing authorities and community volunteers.

Congress and FCC Can Keep Students Online

John Harrington  |  Editorial  |  Funds For Learning

Congress and the Federal Communications Commission should act swiftly to ensure that all our school-aged children are online and continue learning during the coronavirus pandemic. Keeping students safe and connected during this challenging time is essential to our society’s well-being. Urgent and effective action is required, and the existing E-rate funding program is the most viable solution to meet the need. Congress should immediately:

  1. Contribute stimulus support to the E-rate Category Two budget system.
  2. Designate off-campus connectivity for students as an educational purpose.

The FCC should immediately:

  1. Expand Category Two funding to include end-user devices and off-campus connectivity.
  2. Waive its 28-day bidding period in favor of local emergency bidding requirements.
  3. Allow FY2020 Category Two funding requests to be submitted until June 30, 2020.

The Homework Chasm

Amir Nasr  |  Op-Ed  |  Slate

Communities across the nation are working hard to address the issue of connectivity for students. But we need a national approach, not an ad-hoc strategy. Otherwise, large swaths of the student population risk losing weeks or months of their educations and falling dangerously far behind their peers. Congress and the Federal Communications Commission have several options, but one of the most pertinent to the issue of education is the FCC’s E-Rate program. The FCC should dedicate a special allocation of money from the Universal Service Fund to reimburse schools and libraries that purchase and loan out Wi-Fi hotspots to students who live in homes that lack adequate broadband access, as FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel and 16 US senators recently recommended. The FCC could also leverage E-Rate support to empower local educational institutions to extend their broadband access to their communities using innovative methods, like the bus fleet in Indiana, TV White Spaces, and other wireless internet service technologies.

[Amir Nasr is a policy analyst at New America’s Open Technology Institute]

The Broadband Lifeline in a Pandemic: Strategies for Provisioning Broadband to Temporary Emergency Sites

Andrew Afflerbach  |  Editorial  |  CTC Technology & Energy

I’ll describe a way for your community to meet ar  critical need – service to ad hoc emergency sites like surge hospital locations, triage centers, and even parking lots where mass testing or treatment may occur. And there will be a need for service to other ad hoc locations, like temporary housing sites for emergency and health care workers or national guard personnel. All of these will require broadband, fast, both for public needs and to support first responders and health care workers.

Your community can deliver an emergency state-of-the-art solution, quickly, like this: The first step is a building that is connected over your city- or county-owned fiber and that is within a couple of miles of the emergency location that needs service. Ideally, you will have line of sight from the building to the emergency location. A temporary mast and antenna mounted on the building rooftop can deliver a high bandwidth mmWave signal to a receiver at the emergency site. That receiver can be mounted at the site or in a mobile command vehicle owned by your jurisdiction.

[Andrew Afflerbach is CEO & CTO of CTC Technology & Energy]

AT&T Increasing Mobile Hotspot Data by 15GB

Press Release  |  AT&T

Starting April 2 through May 13 we’re giving AT&T mobility consumers and small businesses more ways to connect:

  • More mobile hotspot data – We are automatically increasing mobile hotspot data by 15GB a month for each line on an unlimited plan that currently includes a monthly tethering allotment. That means if you’re on AT&T Unlimited Elite you’ll automatically get 45GB a month of tethering per line.
  • What you want online, even easier – When you purchase or upgrade your device online, we’ll give you free express shipping, as well as waive or credit the activation, upgrade and restocking fees.

USTelecom Proposes Changes in FCC's Rural Health Care Program During Pandemic

Jonathan Spalter  |  Letter  |  USTelecom

In order to provide further support to healthcare providers, the Federal Communications Commission should, in addition to adopting final rules for the proposed Connected Care Pilot Program, consider the following actions during the emergency:

  • Temporarily increase the annual undiscounted cost of eligible expenses Healthcare Connect Fund Program applicants may apply for and remain exempt from the competitive bidding requirements to up to $100,000. Consider allowing Telecommunications Program applicants to also benefit from this exemption.
  • Open a new application filing window for Funding Year (FY) 2019 funding requests and waive competitive bidding requirements as well as the FY 2019 rural health care support mechanism funding cap to allow healthcare providers to immediately access more bandwidth and associated support for the remaining months of Funding Year 2019. Because healthcare providers may experience increases in demand of several times their normal patient contacts during the COVID-19 pandemic, allow eligible healthcare providers who seek only to increase bandwidth capacity or add eligible locations under an existing telecommunications service contract to extend the term of their contract and increase the amount of their funding requests for eligible services as needed for doing so, without resoliciting bids or re-applying to USAC for approval of a separate funding request.
  • Waive or significantly increase the rural health care support mechanism funding cap for FY 2020 if necessary to accommodate increased demand.
  • Postpone the implementation schedule for the new rules adopted in the RHC Promoting Telehealth Report and Order by one year to allow healthcare providers (HCPs) to obtain services and apply for support with a minimum of disruption and uncertainty. Given the significant additional effort required by the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC) to implement new rules and the immediate need for additional support for HCPs, now is not an optimal time to implement major changes to the Rural Health Care Program.
  • To the extent not already addressed by the FCC's Wireline Competition Bureau, suspend or postpone audit fieldwork and deadlines for responding to document or information requests from USAC auditors, in order to allow healthcare providers and service providers to devote all available resources to the demands of the COVID-19 pandemic.
  • Make a separate allocation of funds available for “Category 2” Internal connections, basic maintenance and managed internal broadband services for eligible healthcare providers (consistent with support for such services in the E-rate program) during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coronavirus crunch may expose weakness in your broadband plan: much slower upload speeds

Rob Pegoraro  |  Fast Company

Binge-watching in high-def isn’t an act of irresponsibility in a moment of crisis. “The internet as a whole is fine,” agrees Doug Suttles, CEO of the bandwidth-measurement firm Ookla. “It can handle a ton.”  Coronavirus-induced traffic during the day still doesn’t exceed the nightly peaks your internet provider should have already designed its systems around. But Suttles notes that the coronavirus crunch may expose a weakness in your own broadband service plan: upload speeds much slower than your downloads. That’s the usual state of affairs on cable internet, the most widely used sort of broadband in the US, but it’s also common at already-slow, phone-based DSL service. Those providers rarely advertise how their uploads can be less than a tenth of their downloads. But extended time on Zoom and other video-conferencing services will make that painfully plain. Warns Shuttles: “At the home, that bottleneck will get hit really quickly.” Although it may be somewhat reassuring to realize that the congestion that some people are seeing is not network congestion, that’s also a problem you probably can’t fix without moving to someplace served by one or more fiber providers. And for many Americans, that’s an upgrade as far off as a coronavirus vaccine. 

Wireless

What Is Standalone 5G?

Joan Engebretson  |  Analysis  |  telecompetitor

What is Standalone 5G? While non-standalone 5G shares existing core network infrastructure with 4G, the standalone version uses a new, cloud-native approach to the network core. Standalone 5G is designed to boost 5G performance in two important ways. First, it will provide lower latency in comparison with the non-standalone approach, which should enable it to support real-time and near-real-time applications such as autonomous vehicles and augmented and virtual reality. Second, standalone 5G is required to support network slicing. Dish, which will be a new entrant in the mobile market, has been touting its plans to use a standalone approach in the 5G network it plans to build. But apparently three of the major US carriers – AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon — also plan to deploy standalone 5G, and all three have indicated deployment plans for this year or next.

Elections & Media

Why is Joe Biden Silent on Net Neutrality?

Andrew Wyrich  |  Daily Dot

Former Vice President Joe Biden’s stance on network neutrality has remained somewhat of an open question for more than a year as he’s become the front runner to take on President Donald Trump later in 2020. Questions about why Biden did not bring up the issue have been raised as other candidates have forcefully pushed their views during the Democratic primary. Many have even detailed exactly how they would restore a policy achievement made by a White House Biden was a part of.

The former vice president’s campaign only broke its silence when asked about his stance by the Daily Dot for this article. A Biden campaign spokesperson said that the former vice president “supports net neutrality” and that he was “outraged” when the Federal Communications Commission repealed the rules in 2017. “Joe Biden supports net neutrality. He was proud to see the FCC take direct action to protect consumers and innovators by preserving the open internet during the Obama-Biden Administration. Like most Americans, Joe Biden was outraged that the Trump administration reversed the Open Internet Rule and inflated this nation’s digital divide,” the campaign spokesperson said.

The campaign declined a request to comment on more specific views of Biden’s, including whether he supported classifying broadband providers under Title II of the Communications Act and whether if elected he would appoint FCC commissioners who supported Title II classification. Benton Senior Fellow and Public Advocate Gigi Sohn said she expects Biden to “come out on the right place on this” if elected president. “I don’t really have any doubt that Joe Biden and whoever Joe Biden’s FCC chair is going to be is going to be supportive of reinstating the 2015 Open Internet rules,” Sohn said, adding, “It’s become such a partisan issue—I think, unfortunately—that I can’t see any Democratic nominee diverging from it.”

Company News

Satellite Internet Company OneWeb Files for Bankruptcy

John Eggerton  |  Multichannel News

OneWeb, one of the companies looking to use constellations of satellites to provide competition to terrestrial and wireless broadband providers, has filed for bankruptcy and will try to sell the company.  OneWeb suggested it was on the verge of getting financing when the pandemic hit. It had already invested billions of dollars in the enterprise. Back in June 2017, the Federal Communications Commission unanimously approved OneWeb's request to deliver its service in the US market (as part of a global operation), including particularly hard-to-reach and expensive-to-reach rural areas, after FCC chairman Ajit Pai proposed approving it. 

FCC Reform

FCC Finds Time to Weigh Media Bureau Consolidation

Alexandra Levine  |  Politico

Media industry, take note: As of the past week, a Federal Communications Commission action item is now circulating that could spell some structural changes within the FCC, specifically within its Media Bureau that deals with TV and radio issues. “If adopted, this proposal would consolidate the Media Bureau’s Engineering Division with the Bureau’s Industry Analysis Division,” an FCC spokesperson said. For the coming fiscal year, the FCC requested funding for 131 full-time employees for its Media Bureau, a number that’s been dwindling in recent years amid the changing media landscape. By comparison, there were 171 full-time staff for the bureau in fiscal year 2015, 183 in 2012 and more than 250 just a few years prior.

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Benton (www.benton.org) provides the only free, reliable, and non-partisan daily digest that curates and distributes news related to universal broadband, while connecting communications, democracy, and public interest issues. Posted Monday through Friday, this service provides updates on important industry developments, policy issues, and other related news events. While the summaries are factually accurate, their sometimes informal tone may not always represent the tone of the original articles. Headlines are compiled by Kevin Taglang (headlines AT benton DOT org) and Robbie McBeath (rmcbeath AT benton DOT org) — we welcome your comments.


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Kevin Taglang

Kevin Taglang
Executive Editor, Communications-related Headlines
Benton Institute
for Broadband & Society
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847-328-3049
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