The Catholic Technology Network and the National EBS Association asked the FCC to move forward on a Further NPRM focusing only on licensing the remaining educational broadband service (EBS) white spaces throughout the U.S. Lawyers for the group reported on a call with Wireless Bureau Chief Roger Sherman and others at the agency. The FNPRM should be limited in scope “because incorporating other issues (such as changes to EBS educational reservation requirements as was suggested by one party in the [L]ifeline reform docket) would undoubtedly delay the resolution of the proceeding,” the EBS advocates said. That is according to a filing posted Friday in docket 03-66.

CTIA and the Competitive Carriers Association jointly offered the FCC near- and longer-term solutions for enabling consumers to keep their phone number no matter where they live or work. The groups, in a letter filed Friday, said they are responding to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, who on July called on them and the largest national carriers to identify practical solutions to nationwide number portability. “Many consumers consider their wireless number a part of their identity, and believe they can port their telephone number to any provider when they move to a new location,” CCA President Steve Berry said in a news release. “Unfortunately, this is not always the case, and both consumers and carriers are negatively impacted by the inability to port a number.” Under the proposal, carriers can “voluntarily enter contractual arrangements with third parties with access to numbering resources in areas where the … provider doesn’t have a network presence, to offer providers access to the local area of the telephone number of the potential subscriber,” Berry said.

U.K. telecom regulator Ofcom Friday said it would allow the use of white spaces devices (WSDs) to access the Internet, on a transitional basis, in bands other than the UHF TV band. Ofcom in February approved use of the devices in the TV white spaces. For the time being, Ofcom is allowing the use only of licensed, manually configurable devices. But Ofcom said it's reviewing other options and expects to issue revised rules by the end of 2018. “Ofcom has a duty to ensure that the radio spectrum is used in the most efficient way,” Ofcom said in its statement. “We have decided to authorise the deployment of WSDs on a license exempt basis where they meet certain technical and operational requirements to ensure there is a low probability of harmful interference to other spectrum users.”

A day ahead of the iPhone 6 release, Sprint said it will offer the 6s 16 GB phone for $1/month and the 6s Plus for $5/month with the trade-in of an iPhone 6. The promotion, part of Sprint’s iPhone Forever program, is for customers who “can’t wait to get their hands on the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus,” and is available to new and upgrade-eligible Sprint customers, the carrier said. Offers also extend to higher-capacity phones: the iPhone 6s is priced $5.77/month for the 64 GB and $10.53 for the 128 GB with the trade-in of an iPhone 6. For the 6s Plus, the 64 GB version is $9.77/month and the 128 GB device is $14.53/month with corresponding trade-ins, Sprint said. Sprint will also offer a $10/month price on iPhone 6s 16 GB or $14/month on iPhone 6s Plus 16 GB with the trade-in of an iPhone 5s, it said. Through Dec. 31, customers on any other carrier who switch to Sprint -- or existing Sprint customers who are upgrade-eligible and turn in any other smartphone -- will get a promotional rate of $15 per month on the iPhone 6s 16 GB, regularly $22/month without a trade, it said.

Turing Robotic Industries announced a Dark Wyvern edition of its Turing Phone that comes with a WiGig-enabled protective case. The Turing Armor case packs technology that can transfer 3.2 GB of data in less than 25 seconds and back up 64 GB of data in less than eight minutes, the company said. The phone is a dark gray version of the Turing unbendable Liquidmorphium design and features the same authentication methodology, chip platform, screen and dimensions of the company’s series one Android-based phones, it said. Price of the 128 GB edition is $999, including case and battery pack, the company said.

The FTC won't block an agreement between Sprint and Shentel, under which affiliate Shentel will acquire Sprint wholesale partner nTelos Wireless, the commission indicated. The deal was unveiled in August (see 1508100063). Industry officials said at the time they also expected the deal to get the FCC’s nod (see 1508110067). Edinburg, Virginia-based Shentel is also known as Shenandoah Telephone Co.

The government cannot force someone to hand over a smartphone pass code, as that is protected under the Fifth Amendment, the U.S. District Court in Philadelphia ruled Wednesday. The case came about after the SEC, while investigating two men for insider trading, asked the defendants for their company-provided smartphone pass codes. The defendants refused to hand their pass codes over, invoking their Fifth Amendment right. The SEC asked the court for an order to compel the defendants to give up the codes. Since the SEC cannot show with "reasonable particularity" the documents it seeks exist on the pass code-protected phones, the court denied the motion to compel, the ruling said. The SEC declined to comment Thursday.

Qualcomm has "a mountain of test results" to prove that LTE-U's carrier-sensing adaptive transmission coexistence (CSAT) mechanism ensures no adverse interference with Wi-Fi, said Dean Brenner, senior vice president-government affairs. His statement responded to a CableLabs blog post Tuesday in which it advocated for LTE-U to have a "listen before talk" (LBT) protocol (see 1509230078). While LBT is required in the 5 GHz band in Europe and Japan, elsewhere around the world "different technologies use different coexistence techniques in unlicensed spectrum," Brenner said. The maximum continuous transmission time for an LTE-U small cell, as spelled out in the LTE-U Forum specification, is 50 milliseconds, and the small cell will periodically rescan the spectrum looking for vacant or less-trafficked channels to transit on, he said. Meanwhile, he said, Wi-Fi access points "often do not share spectrum fairly with one another even though they use LBT for coexistence." Ultimately, Brenner said, "the real issue isn’t about LBT or CSAT [but] whether equipment will share the unlicensed spectrum fairly. And, the answer is clear from our testing: we have proven that LTE-U does share spectrum fairly and will not harm Wi-Fi. In addition, LTE-U Forum has defined a comprehensive and stringent Coexistence Spec to ensure all LTE-U equipment will coexist fairly with neighboring Wi-Fi or LTE-U nodes."

AT&T officials explained in more detail the kind of work carriers must do after they buy licenses in the TV incentive auction, in a teleconference with FCC officials, said a filing in docket 12-268. AT&T elaborated on its “First Field Application” (FFA) testing practices, the filing said. “FFA testing is part of a process that necessarily takes place before any new hardware or software is introduced into AT&T’s network, and is especially important prior to introducing a new spectrum band into the network,” the carrier said. “Its FFA process typically follows lab testing by its vendors, then testing in AT&T’s own labs ... [T]hat testing in a live network environment is essential.” CTIA and members have been pressing the FCC to put in place “commencement of service” rules that give licensees the time they need to conduct tests as they get ready to deploy on the 600 MHz licenses they buy in the auction (see 1509230043). “Software testing is especially complex, and includes tests to ensure that the software load is stable, that all features work and that all of the peg counters are operating properly,” AT&T said, noting that problems are identified as tests take place. “Device testing includes evaluations of how the devices interoperate with the hardware and software in the new band as well as in the other bands operating on the network, and is evaluated in various morphologies.”

FCC Commissioner Mike O'Rielly called on localities to facilitate wireless tower siting, or face commission intervention to move things along. Speaking at a town hall held by Rep. Dave Brat, R-Va., in Spotsylvania, Virginia, on Wednesday, O'Rielly said the FCC needs to review wireless build-out policies and technical requirements to ensure they encourage network expansion. "Part of this will require cooperation by the local governments," he said, according to written remarks posted Thursday. "The simple fact is that wireless providers are going to need to install thousands of new facilities to provide service. I get the fact that not everyone likes the aesthetics of towers but they are a necessity for wireless broadband. For those local governments that stall or try to block tower siting, know that you will see the Commission step in with appropriate authority to push things forward." O'Rielly also discussed FCC efforts to make more spectrum available and to update USF support for broadband.