CTA representatives met with FCC Public Safety Bureau staffers to update them on steps the group is taking to assist the agency in implementing a cyber trust mark program for smart devices (see 2311130034). CTA said it initiated three working groups within its Privacy Management Committee. “The Program should include a process for self-attestation, streamlined review and renewal processes, liability protection and leverage modern industry practices like e-labeling and other technology solutions,” said a filing posted Thursday in docket 23-239.

The Tower Climbers Union/Communications Workers of America reached agreement with QualTek Wireless in Henderson, Nevada, where QualTek will provide a severance package and make it easier to organize as the company emerges from bankruptcy. “In May 2022, the workers became the first group of tower technicians in the United States to win formal union representation,” CWA said Thursday: “When QualTek filed for bankruptcy a year later and laid off the workers, the company was required under U.S. labor law to bargain with the union over the impact of the layoffs. The settlement is a result of that bargaining.” Had the union not existed, “QualTek could have just handed us our pink slips and waved goodbye,” said Derek Combs, a former QualTek tower technician.

The Public Safety Spectrum Alliance (PSSA) fired back at the Coalition for Emergency Response and Critical Infrastructure (CERCI) after it questioned PSSA's advocacy of the 4.9 band (see 2312200065). “Utilities are coming after the public safety 4.9 spectrum,” PSSA said in a statement: CERCI “has engaged in a campaign which misleads public safety leaders regarding the importance of preserving the 4.9 radio spectrum for public safety use.” The PSSA said the band should be assigned to a single nationwide licensee, which would “prevent an unwieldly patchwork of deployments across the nation and create the economies of scale necessary to speed deployment by maintaining a consistent set of build out regulations and creating the necessary incentives for the proliferation of new equipment and technologies.”

Samsung Electronics told the FCC a cyber trust mark program for IoT devices should be voluntary, “industry-led, transparent and evolving.” The program “should leverage IoT security standards that are risk-based as well as regularly and easily updatable to keep pace with evolving threats, technologies, and techniques,” Samsung told Public Safety Bureau staff, according to a filing posted Wednesday in docket 23-239. The program should also “start with IoT devices, rather than products,” Samsung said: “Samsung agrees with the weight of the record that focusing the Program initially on devices will enable the FCC to implement the Program with speed and efficiency, while allowing stakeholders time to develop an approach to more complex IoT products.” LG Electronics reported a call with an aide to Commissioner Brendan Carr. “The success of the program will rely as much on branding, marketing, and consumer education as on regulation, compliance, and enforcement,” LG said: “The Commission should seek to maximize device manufacturer participation in the program, and should minimize administrative burdens or program infrastructure obligations that will deter participation while offering little corresponding consumer value.”

The State E-rate Coordinators’ Alliance and the Schools, Health and Libraries Broadband Coalition asked the FCC to extend comment deadlines on a November NPRM that proposes schools and libraries be allowed to seek funding from the E-rate program for Wi-Fi hot spots and wireless internet access services that can be used off-premises (see 2311090028). The groups asked for an extension of the comment deadline from Jan. 8 to Jan. 26 and replies from Jan. 22 to Feb. 9. Additional time would “ensure a comprehensive record is developed to inform the Commission’s development of a report and order,” they said in a filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-31.

FirstNet has “confirmed and validated” completion of the initial five-year build of the public safety network, AT&T and FirstNet said in a joint release Wednesday. “The initial build of the FirstNet network was done on time, on budget and on task,” FirstNet Authority Chair Richard Carrizzo said. “Through our public-private partnership -- and close collaboration with the public safety community across the country -- we have achieved many milestones, with completion of the initial phase of buildout of FirstNet representing a defining accomplishment,” the release said. The network includes more than 1,000 “purpose-built” cellsites where state and public safety stakeholders identified a coverage need, they said. The network covers more than 2.91 million square miles, which is 250,000 square miles more than any commercial network, the release said.

Petitioners Maurine and Matthew Molak are seeking 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals review of the FCC’s Oct. 25 declaratory ruling authorizing funding for Wi-Fi service and equipment on school buses under the commission’s E-rate program, according to their petition Wednesday (docket 23-60641). The Molaks are “aggrieved” by the ruling because it will increase E-rate program “outlays” and “thereby directly increase" the amount of the federal universal service charge they pay each month as a line-item on their phone bill to fund the program's costs, their petition said. In addition, the Molaks have “a special interest in this matter” as co-founders of David’s Legacy Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to the memory of their son “and committed to ending cyberbullying through education, legislation, and legal action,” it said. The ruling “undermines that crucial mission by enabling unsupervised social-media access by children and teenagers” on school buses, it said. The ruling exceeds the FCC’s statutory authority and “is contrary to law,” it added. The Molaks are asking the 5th Circuit to vacate the ruling “and grant such other relief as it may deem appropriate,” said the petition.

Members of the recently formed Coalition for Emergency Response and Critical Infrastructure (CERCI) slammed a recent filing by the Public Safety Spectrum Alliance (PSSA) on the future of the 4.9 GHz band. “By claiming that CERCI is ‘a thinly veiled attempt by commercial interests to hijack the 4.9 GHz band,’ PSSA devalues the role of our law enforcement organizations as members actively engaged with CERCI and seeks to undercut our support of continued local-public safety use and control of the 4.9 GHz band, including control over the decision of whether to lease access to non-interfering, compatible, critical-infrastructure industry users,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 07-100. The Major Cities Chiefs Association, the National Sheriffs’ Association and the National Association of Women Law Enforcement Executives signed the filing. “In contrast to CERCI’s substantial public-safety support, PSSA has not identified any current public-safety officials or associations as members or any members at all,” the groups said. CERCI launched in November (see 2311160052).

The FCC Office of Engineering Tuesday approved a request by Continental Automotive for a waiver of agency rules to allow authorization of a tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS) operating in the 315 MHz and 433 MHz bands. OET sought comment last year (see 2210310064). “As designed, Continental’s new TPMS would have limited proliferation and would not have a high potential for causing harmful interference to the authorized services in the bands,” OET said in docket 22-382: “The narrow relief we are providing will permit the deployment of innovative unlicensed applications that offer significant benefits to the public without increasing significant potential interference to authorized users in the band.”

5G Automotive Association representatives met with staff for FCC Commissioners Brendan Carr and Anna Gomez on a 2021 petition for partial reconsideration of an order reallocating the 5.9 GHz band (see 2107230033). The group noted that it raised one issue in the petition, protection for cellular vehicle-to-everything technologies against unwanted emissions from unlicensed services that share the band. 5GAA has “demonstrated in the record that with the emissions levels the Order adopted, C-V2X range would be significantly reduced (by more than 50%), delaying safety messages and unnecessarily undermining C-V2X effectiveness,” it said in a filing posted Tuesday in docket 19-138. The group also met with Office of Engineering and Technology staff.