Telecommunication

The Federal Communications Commission proposed rules to help ensure that the public has access to the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline if a service outage occurs.

The Federal Communications Commission approved several proposals for the Rural Health Care (RHC) Program to make it easier for healthcare providers to receive support, reduce delays in funding commitments, and improve the program's overall efficiency. Reliable high-speed connectivity is critical for rural healthcare providers to serve patients in rural areas that often have limited resources, fewer doctors, and higher rates for broadband and telecommunications services than urban areas.

AT&T reported fourth-quarter results that showed sustained momentum in customer additions across 5G and fiber and solid growth in wireless service and broadband revenues. Revenues from continuing operations for the fourth quarter totaled $31.3 billion versus $31.1 billion in the year-ago quarter, up 0.8%.

As if household budgets were not already under enough pressure, millions of broadband and mobile phone customers look set to face rises of more than 14% in their monthly bills from April 2023. BT, TalkTalk, Three, and Vodafone are among the big operators that are contractually allowed to increase their bills in line with the previous year’s inflation rate, as measured by the consumer prices index (CPI) in December – plus a further 3%-3.9% on top. If the increases are passed on in full, as many experts expect, it would result in home broadband customers typically paying about £50 ($60) a yea

The UK government has warned mobile and broadband providers that it is not “right” for them to raise prices by more than 14 percent from April 2023, as customers contend with the surge in living costs. Much of the fixed broadband and mobile and phone market has in recent years implemented price increases in April of each year for new customers and those already in contract. Telecommunications groups tend to base rises on the previous year’s annualized rate of inflation, plus about 3.9 percent.

Big kudos to the Federal Communications Commission for the release of its Communications Marketplace Report at the end of 2022. This is the first Communications Marketplace Report released under FCC Chairwoman Rosenworcel’s leadership, so none of us should be surprised that there are vast improvements in the information covered.

More than 20 million businesses have a landline phone as their main business number. Three-quarters of people over the age of 75 rely on a landline phone. And one-third of US households have a landline phone.

The Federal Communications Commission launched a proceeding to strengthen rules for notifying customers and federal law enforcement of breaches of customer proprietary network information (CPNI). The FCC will look to better align its rules with recent developments in federal and state data breach laws covering other sectors. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking launches a formal proceeding to gather information on this important issue and also take comment on rule changes proposed by the FCC. The FCC seeks to better address telecommunications carriers’ breach notification requirements.

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.

Congress passed the bipartisan Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act of 2022, which restores the Commission’s authority to ensure service providers charge “just and reasonable rates” for intrastate and interstate calls and other communications methods used by incarcerated individuals in correctional facilities. The legislation is the result of the dedication of the late Martha Wright, who led the charge in 2003 to create positive change and ensure families with incarcerated individuals had the ability to stay in contact with their loved ones by eliminating the burden of