Internet/Broadband

The goal of this article is to offer framing for conversations about the role of measurement in informing public policy about the Internet. Researchers reviewed different stakeholders’ approaches to measurements and associated challenges, including the activities of US government agencies. Overall, researchers found that advances in measurement in the public interest will have to address the following challenges: objectivity of measurements and associated inferences; legitimate business interests in secrecy; respect for privacy, the role of the research community, and sustainability.

Does the entry and exit of competitors to/from broadband services markets have large effects on the quality of broadband plans offered to consumers? Answers to this question inform the design of subsidies to improve broadband in underserved areas and antitrust policy. Researchers found strong evidence that market structure (competition) is very important in explaining the evolution of maximum available speeds available from legacy technology Internet service providers (ISPs) serving US urban census blocks over 2014–2018.

This article compares funding and other broadband policies for rural and Indigenous regions in Canada and in the United States, concluding with lessons from Canadian and US policy and regulatory experiences that could be relevant for broadband policy development in other countries with rural and Indigenous regions. There are many similarities in regulations and policies in the US and Canada concerning Indigenous and rural broadband. Both have several government funding programs to upgrade or extend rural broadband, including to Indigenous/Tribal communities.

This study analyzes how the COVID-19 pandemic has altered individual perceptions of Internet service providers (ISPs) and Internet importance, reliability, and status as an essential public utility (EPU). The authors found that lower-income, younger, women and racial-ethnic minority participants had lower ISP and Internet reliability perceptions. The pandemic increased the perception of the Internet as an EPU by 15% and access to in-home Information and Communication Technology was significantly related to perceptions of Internet importance and reliability.

There are suddenly a lot of open-access networks springing up around the country. Traditionally, open-access networks have been built by local governments such as the public utility districts (PUDs) in Washington. Today, there are also open-access networks being built by commercial network owners. I’ve been asked by several internet service providers (ISPs) if they should consider operating on an open-access network. Here are a few of the most important factors to consider about operating on an open-access network:

Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel appointed seven members to the Board of Directors of the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC). The three-year term for these positions begins on January 1, 2023.

As states begin to receive funds from the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Act, they need to lay the groundwork for high adoption and fiscal sustainability said Brookings Institute panelists. The majority of the BEAD program’s $42.5 billion in funding has yet to be disbursed, and state allocations are expected by June 2023.

The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced that Massachusetts received its first “Internet for All” grants for deploying high-speed Internet networks and developing digital skills training programs under the Biden-Harris Administration’s Internet for All initiative.

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is like a start-up within the federal government, despite being nearly 45 years old. We delivered on programs to improve Internet connectivity while also notching big wins on spectrum policy, international standards, and other important tech policy issues. Highlights from the year included:

Facebook parent Meta has agreed to pay $725 million to settle a class action lawsuit that claimed the social media giant gave third parties access to user data without their consent. It is the “largest recovery ever achieved in a data privacy class action and the most Facebook has ever paid to resolve a private class action,” said Keller Rohrback L.L.P, the law firm representing the plaintiffs. The class action lawsuit was prompted in 2018 after Facebook disclosed that the information of 87 million users was improperly shared with Cambridge Analytica, a consultancy firm linked to former Pre