The U.S. Department of Agriculture has asked the FCC to be flexible in its system for waivers of the USF/intercarrier compensation order, so the Rural Utilities Service has the flexibility it needs to adjust RUS loans held by rural carriers, Secretary Tom Vilsack told the Agriculture Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday. “If we have it then I think we can make adjustments,” he said. His comments came in response to questioning by Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., who in a February letter to Vilsack expressed his concern over how the order would affect the viability of the rural telecom companies, many of whom take out loans from the RUS.
FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell sought feedback on letting TV stations lease spectrum in the rulemaking the agency’s expected to start in what he expects to be a multi-year effort to auction the frequencies of broadcasters who agree to participate (CD March 15 p1). He’s happy Chairman Julius Genachowski is “talking more and more about the need to have flexible uses of spectrum” as the commission seeks to reallocate frequencies to wireless broadband. On Internet governance, McDowell said U.S. companies and the government must step up efforts to oppose a growing number of nations’ desire to have authority he said could include charging for international over-the-top video and other traffic (http://xrl.us/bmztw6). Much of McDowell’s Q-and-A with Media Institute President Patrick Maines was devoted to Internet and spectrum matters.
House Republicans said they were skeptical about the need for federal privacy legislation during a House Commerce Manufacturing Subcommittee hearing Thursday. Meanwhile, FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz and NTIA Administrator Larry Strickling urged Congress to set baseline privacy standards to ensure that websites and data brokers offer fundamental privacy protections to consumers.
Senators debated whether the government needs to step in to require more regulation of mobile banking. The discussion came during a hearing Thursday of the Senate Banking Committee. Chairman Tim Johnson, D-S.D., said more hearings are on the way in an area expected to grow in importance as consumers make more use of smartphones for financial transactions of all kinds.
The House Communications Subcommittee plans to work on cybersecurity, broadband stimulus, market competition and spectrum, Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., said this week. He also expects to do oversight on the national public safety network. He questioned the need for an FCC rule requiring broadcasters to post public files online, as well as legislation to stop employers from asking for Facebook passwords. His comments came in a recorded show scheduled to be shown this weekend on C-SPAN’s The Communicators.
SILICON VALLEY -- Privacy problems are among the most stubborn of a cluster of obstacles to a shift to mobile and Internet technologies that healthcare needs for financial and service reasons, executives said. Telehealth requires a high “level of invasiveness” in patients’ homes, “in their personal lives,” said Dr. Michael Blum, chief medical information officer of the University of California-San Francisco’s Medical Center. It calls for monitoring of patients’ weight and activities including eating and movement, he said late Wednesday at the Institute for Health Technology Transformation’s Health IT Summit, and only “a small group accepts that.” Dr. Yan Chow, Kaiser Permanente’s director of advanced technology, said there are techniques for placing devices for digital monitoring and communication so they are unobtrusive.
A New Hampshire deregulation bill that sailed through the state Senate recently is making its way through the House. Supporters said SB-48, which will loosen retail service requirements on regulatory reporting, service quality penalties and rates, has broad industry support and will be passed this year. However, independent ISPs like Destek Group see deregulation as bad news for consumers and small ISPs in the state. The bill would overturn a New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission decision to regulate VoIP.
Verizon defended itself against claims by Level 3 and others who the telco says “mischaracterize Verizon’s special access discount plans and their pro-competitive economic justifications” (http://xrl.us/bmzp86). Level 3 has long argued that the special access market is “broken” (CD July 23/10 p13), accusing Verizon and others of imposing unfair special access contracts (CD Feb 7/11 p13). The Internet backbone company told the FCC last month that incumbent price-cap LECs continue to use “exclusionary and anti-competitive contracting practices to minimize competition in the special access marketplace, thereby ensuring that they can reap the rewards of pricing well above competitive rates” (http://xrl.us/bmzp88). Level 3 asked the commission to declare Verizon’s “lock-up contracts” unlawful under Section 201(b) of the Communications Act.
The FCC Public Safety Bureau is working hard to wrap up a decision on the various longstanding applications from Oklahoma, New Orleans and other jurisdictions for waivers so they can build out early networks in the 700 MHz band, Chief Jamie Burnett said Wednesday. But Barnett, who spoke at a National Emergency Number Association conference, declined to provide a timetable for when the FCC will make a decision.
Sirius XM’s antitrust lawsuit against SoundExchange and the American Association of Independent Music (A2IM) is the latest chapter in a long-running battle that’s been waged for more than six years over royalty rates paid music labels for performance rights. The company sued SoundExchange and A2IM Tuesday in U.S. District Court in New York, arguing that the music rights organizations are violating the federal Sherman Act by interfering with Sirius efforts to secure cheaper direct licenses through another organization that pay 5-7 percent royalty rates instead of the 8 percent statutory rate for master rights owners. Sirius seeks an injunction barring the groups from interfering with its bid to get direct licenses, about 80 of which have been secured so far. The suit asks that SoundExchange be dissolved or an independent monitor be appointed to oversee the group’s compliance with antitrust laws for 10 years.