AT&T added 656,000 net postpaid phone customers in Q4, closing the year with 69.6 million subscribers, it said Wednesday. Verizon reported 217,000 net post-paid phone adds Tuesday (see 2301240053). T-Mobile said before its release it added 927,000 postpaid phone net adds in Q4. The earnings report sent AT&T’s stock price up 6.34% to close at $20.42.
Howard Buskirk
Howard Buskirk, Executive Senior Editor, joined Warren Communications News in 2004, after covering Capitol Hill for Telecommunications Reports. He has covered Washington since 1993 and was formerly executive editor at Energy Business Watch, editor at Gas Daily and managing editor at Natural Gas Week. Previous to that, he was a staff reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Greenville News. Follow Buskirk on Twitter: @hbuskirk
Barriers remain to wide-scale launch of open radio access networks, said NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson and other speakers at an NTIA listening session Tuesday as the agency seeks advice on a $1.5 billion federal fund to spur ORAN. The fund was part of the $54.2 billion Chips and Science Act signed into law in August (see 2208090062). NTIA is also taking written comments, due Friday in docket NTIA-2022-0003.
Verizon returned to positive postpaid phone adds in Q4, with net adds of 217,000, after losing subscribers in recent quarters. It reported retail postpaid net adds of 1.4 million, its “best single quarter performance in seven years.” Analysts said questions remain as Verizon fights for customers with AT&T, which reports Wednesday, and T-Mobile, which reports next week.
Reply comments largely tracked initial comments on an FCC NPRM on proposed rules for making the emergency alert system and wireless emergency alerts more secure (see 2212270048). FCC commissioners approved an NPRM 4-0 in October (see 2210270058). Replies were due Monday in docket 15-94. “As demonstrated throughout the record, the Commission should not adopt the cybersecurity proposals in the NPRM,” said CTIA: Participating carriers “implement WEA-specific technical standards and have robust cyber risk management plans that cover WEA operations, making the proposed certification requirement unnecessary.” The Competitive Carriers Association agreed with CTIA that the record is clear. “Instead, the Commission should promote the success and security of the WEA program in other ways including through collaborative multistakeholder security improvement processes,” CCA said: “Imposition of onerous new regulatory burdens that make WEA less flexible, more difficult, and disproportionately more costly for smaller and regional carriers to administer may potentially undermine participation in the WEA program.” USTelecom also urged a light-handed approach by the FCC. “Rather than create a new regime, the Commission should find ways to achieve its goals within the context of a harmonized, whole-of-government approach, in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and other government partners, as well as industry,” USTelecom said. The group noted CISA is already looking at when incidents should have to be reported: “Additional requirements, at this time, before the dust has settled, risk further fragmenting reporting requirements across the federal government, frustrating the Commission’s interest in working with its federal partners.” Opposition wasn't unanimous. The FCC won’t impose a significant burden on providers by requiring annual security certifications, said the Center for Internet Security. “The required risk management plan consists of nothing more than implementing [security standards] in a timely manner as part of normal operations,” the center said: “There is essentially no cost associated with implementing these controls, and a requirement for annual self-certification to the FCC would likely involve at most an on-line submission or completion of a two-page template with check-off boxes.” Broadcasters and cable companies also raised concerns. “It is imperative … that any changes to the EAS rules are proportionate to the needs of the EAS ecosystem and consistent with evolutions in broadcast infrastructure,” said Gray Television: “Gray shares the concern of several commenters that many of the proposals in the NPRM are not justified and could prove counter-productive by imposing unnecessarily burdensome obligations on broadcasters. At the same time, Gray wholeheartedly endorses the proposal of the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) to permit EAS Participants to virtualize certain elements of their EAS operations.” As comments show, “the Commission should take care when creating any new EAS monitoring or reporting requirements to ensure that the new rules are clearly necessary and that EAS Participants continue to have sufficient time to evaluate any potential issues regarding failure of, or unauthorized access to, their EAS system and facilities,” said Altice USA: “Any new rules also should allow the greatest possible flexibility in cybersecurity policies and practices so that Participants can tailor them to the unique needs of their networks.”
The Wireless ISP Association’s message to NTIA is simple: Without WISPs, the U.S. won’t connect everyone everywhere to broadband, said WISPA President David Zumwalt in an interview Monday. WISPA is working to overcome NTIA reluctance to fund projects that rely partly on using unlicensed spectrum, he said. Zumwalt is a former WISP executive who took the helm at WISPA last year.
The FCC is investigating the latest data breach at T-Mobile, an agency spokesperson said Friday. T-Mobile reported in an SEC filing Thursday that someone started obtaining data through a single application programming interface (API) starting Nov. 25. T-Mobile said it became aware of the breach Jan. 5. The perpetrator accessed billing addresses, email, phone numbers and other limited data covering about 37 million customers, the company said.
The U.S. Export-Import Bank said Thursday the U.S. doesn’t have comparative leadership in telecom equipment manufacturing and agreed to move forward on a long-term project to restore it. The Ex-Im board supported 4-1 a policy change to potentially provide additional support for gear made outside the U.S., to better compete with China, and to promote open radio access networks.
FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel isn’t signaling what the FCC may do following up on last year’s receiver performance notice of inquiry. Initially, some experts speculated the FCC may focus on a policy statement rather than rules (see 2208050044). At an FCBA webinar Tuesday, an aide to Commissioner Nathan Simington said the commissioner wants a follow-up to the notice (see 2301170072).
The FCC released a long-awaited order and Further NPRM Wednesday on the future of the 4.9 GHz band. Commissioners approved the item 4-0 as expected (see 2211090036). Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel circulated an order in October establishing a national band manager, which would govern the leasing process in the band, with an accompanying FNPRM asking for feedback on details of how the leasing process could work (see 2210260064). None of the commissioners attached statements.
Many questions remain on the FCC’s notice of inquiry on receiver standards (see 2208050044) and what will come next, experts said during an FCBA webinar Tuesday. Erin Boone, chief of staff to Commissioner Nathan Simington, who sought the NOI, said her boss believes the time has come for the FCC to do more. “Given the current controversies that we’ve seen recently with the C band, and with the Ligado matter, it’s pretty clear that spectrum, particularly valuable mid-band spectrum, is extremely encumbered and congested,” Boone said. “My boss thinks it’s crucial for policymakers to look for new solutions to the problem,” she said. Until now all efforts to manage interference in commercial spectrum have focused on regulation of transmitters “and through decisions to create large, and often wasteful guardbands … or just by adjudicating interference claims on a case-by-case basis through what has proven to be a rather clunky process said,” Boone said: “As a result, large amounts of valuable spectrum lie fallow, spectrum reallocations are unnecessarily contentious and spectrum users lack certainty for investment.” Looking at the issue is “trying to understand the problem,” Boone said. “What do we mean exactly when we’re talking about receiver performance characteristics, and sort of make this a little a more tangible … for lawyers like me that might not be as tech savvy,” she said. “The NOI is just one step in a many years-long marathon,” said Wilkinson Barker’s Kara Graves. The FCC received about 90 comments last summer, she said. Most commenters “generally agreed that receiver performance affects the spectrum environment, but they were divided on whether or not the FCC should actually take any of the actions that it has sort of outlined,” she said. “Many commenters, I think not surprisingly, did express particular views about specific services, so highlighting how well their service performs or how well the receivers in their service use case perform,” Graves said. Most agreed “the issue is complicated and that a one-size-fits-all solution may not be the most appropriate path forward,” she said.