Alaska Communications President-CEO Bill Bishop died Tuesday at his Anchorage home. Cause of death wasn’t provided, but the company said he had taken leave-of-absence to focus on his health. Bishop joined Alaska Communications in August 2004 and filled several roles, including senior vice president-customer and revenue management and chief operations officer before becoming CEO in 2019. Before joining Alaska Communications, he worked for AT&T, McCaw Communications and a federal government logistics contracting company. Bishop was on the USTelecom board and a former chairman of Alaska Business Week, an entrepreneurship training program for high school students. Survivors include his wife, Deena, and three children.
USTelecom's Industry Traceback Group (ITG) "remains the best candidate" for the role of the registered industry consortium for tracebacks, the group told the FCC. Comments posted Friday in docket 20-22 showed support for USTelecom's redesignation as the registered consortium, a designation the group has held since 2020 (see 2007270068). Iconectiv also submitted a letter of intent for designation.
Industry groups urged the FCC to largely continue its current methodology for calculating benchmarks for the urban rates survey (see 2305090068). Comments posted Friday in docket 10-90 sought minor adjustments. The benchmarks "offer high-cost support recipients a simple way to demonstrate that they have satisfied their obligation," said NCTA. The group backed giving the Wireline Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics the "flexibility to account for variables that result in irregularities," but said any major modifications should be subject to peer review. "The current methodology for calculating these benchmarks is sufficient and need not be materially changed," said USTelecom. The group sought "a few discrete administrative adjustments," including that providers only be required to report rates for service plans necessary to calculate the benchmarks and non-discounted rates for each service tier within a census tract. WTA said it "strongly supports the continued inclusion of accurate upload speed and capacity allowance variables in the URS and its benchmark calculations," saying capacity allowances and overage charges should be included in the survey data and benchmarks.
Industry, state officials and advocacy organizations welcomed FCC proposals aimed at closing a loophole in robocall rules and addressing Stir/Shaken caller ID authentication, in comments posted Tuesday in docket 17-97 (see 2303160061). Most commenters agreed the commission should allow use of third-party authentication solutions without minimal restrictions.
The telecom industry warned California regulators not to overstep, in Friday comments on three rulemakings at the California Public Utilities Commission. Litigation is likely if the CPUC ramps up VoIP regulation, said internet-based phone providers in docket R.22-08-008. Meanwhile, in docket R.23-04-006, video franchise holders said there’s no need to revamp how they’re treated under the state’s Digital Infrastructure and Video Competition Act (DIVCA). Consumer groups fail to support their calls for stricter and more widely applied service-quality metrics for voice, said telecom groups in reply comments in R.22-03-016.
The FCC released the second iteration of its new broadband availability maps Tuesday, showing more than 8.3 million homes and businesses lack access to high-speed broadband. It also shows a net increase of more than 1 million new serviceable locations from the initial map. It's "the most accurate depiction of broadband availability in the FCC’s history," NTIA said in a blog. The agency will rely on the maps for its broadband, equity, access and deployment program allocations.
Mintz names Reza Dokhanchy, ex-Kirkland & Ellis, a member of the firm’s Intellectual Property Litigation Practice … NCTA names Mansoor Abdul Khadir, ex-Democratic National Committee, associate vice president-external affairs, and Michael Pauls, from USTelecom, vice president-government relations.
USTelecom sought redesignation of its Industry Traceback Group as the FCC's registered traceback consortium, in a letter posted Friday in docket 20-22 (see 2208220055). The group said its tracebacks "aid in the ongoing fight against fraudulent, abusive, and unlawful robocalls in several ways," noting ITG data resulted in "an eight-fold decline in the number of student loan robocalls over the course of 2022." The ITG "continues successfully to meet the criteria established in the Traced Act for the registered consortium" and its track record "demonstrates that it remains the right entity for the role," USTelecom said.
Attorneys general from 48 states and the District of Columbia sued Avid Telecom, owner Michael Lansky and Vice President Stacey Reeves for illegal robocalls, per a complaint Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona (docket 4:23-cv-00233). Avid didn't comment. According to the complaint, Avid violated the Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act, Telemarketing Sales Rule, the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and state laws in 11 states in facilitating billions of illegal robocalls for years via the company's VoIP services. Avid received more than 329 notifications from the USTelecom-led Industry Traceback Group (ITG) putting it on notice that it was transmitting illegal robocalls, said the complaint. The states allege Avid "knew or consciously avoided knowing they were routing illegal robocall traffic." In the complaint, they ask for an injunction and damages for each illegal call.
Rural healthcare program (RHC) participants and industry continued to back the FCC's efforts to modify the program's rate methodologies, in reply comments posted Tuesday in docket 17-310 (see 2304250074). Some urged the FCC to facilitate competitive bidding and a copayment structure in the telecom program and Healthcare Connect Fund (HCF) rather than revert to the commission's previous rates database.