The FCC is eyeing rural call completion and rural business data service (BDS) actions among others at its April 17 commissioners' meeting. A rural call completion item would set new rules seeking to improve long-distance provider monitoring of "intermediate providers" while easing reporting requirements, and seek comment on a recently enacted rural call law, blogged Chairman Ajit Pai Monday. The item combines an order and Further NPRM, said an agency official. Pai said a separate NPRM would look to offer BDS "inventive regulation" to rural telcos receiving model-based Connect America Fund broadband-oriented support.
The FCC will consider an NPRM at its April 17 meeting proposing to bar the use of money in any of the four USF programs to buy equipment or services from companies that “pose a national security threat” to U.S. communications networks or the communications supply chain. The NPRM appears mainly aimed at Chinese wireless equipment makers Huawei and ZTE, industry experts said. The biggest potential negative could be for smaller carriers, who sometimes find they must rely on Huawei as a low-cost handset provider for markets some larger companies don’t want to serve, industry officials said.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer filed a “request for consultations” at the World Trade Organization to “address China’s discriminatory technology licensing requirements,” said his office Friday. President Donald Trump’s memorandum proposing 25 percent tariffs on about $60 billion worth of Chinese goods imported to the U.S. directed Lighthizer to address “China’s discriminatory technology licensing practices” through a WTO “dispute proceeding” (see 1803220043). The consultations request was the first step in that process, Lighthizer's office said.
Legislators and industry players urged action in response to Facebook-Cambridge Analytica reports and big data’s relationship to privacy (see 1803200047 and 1803210056). And House and Senate Commerce Committee leadership submitted formal requests Friday for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify before their respective committees (see 1803220052).
Debate over a European Commission proposal for a new e-privacy law is heating up as telcos and digital companies race to comply with the EU general data protection regulation. The e-privacy regulation (ePR), which would modify existing electronic privacy rules enacted as part of telecom liberalization, is an exception to Europe's general reluctance to impose sector-specific privacy regulations and a political move aimed at leveling the playing field between traditional providers and over-the-top players that offer telco-like services, Hogan Lovells (Paris) telecom and privacy lawyer Winston Maxwell told a Tuesday webinar. Communications providers said the current version of the draft is inflexible, while digital rights activists criticized EU governments' failure to move forward on the regulation.
If the autonomous vehicle that recently struck and killed a pedestrian in Arizona is found to be at fault (see 1803200064), it further underscores the need for swift legislative action, Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., told us. “That is one of the arguments of why we need to get a bill that creates a policy framework and some guardrails around everything’s that’s happened.” Thune is lead sponsor of the American Vision for Safer Transportation Through Advancement of Revolutionary Technologies Act (S-1885).
President Donald Trump signed the Repack Airwaves Yielding Better Access for Users of Modern Services (Ray Baum's) Act FCC reauthorization and spectrum legislative package (HR-4986) and other tech and telecom policy provisions included in the $1.3 trillion FY 2018 omnibus spending bill (HR-1625) Friday, despite a last-minute threat to veto the measure. The Senate passed the omnibus early Friday 65-32, after behind-the-scenes "begging, pleading and cajoling" to assuage objections from Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Jim Risch, R-Idaho, said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., on the floor.
The FCC and FTC took a deep dive on illegal robocalls during a joint forum at FCC headquarters Friday, a day after FCC members approved creating at least one reassigned numbers database to help businesses avoid calling reassigned numbers (see 1803220028). FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said the fight against unwanted robocalls requires that his agency, the FTC and others work together. Acting FTC Chairman Maureen Ohlhausen agreed.
The judge overseeing the AT&T/Time Warner antitrust trial almost surely will evaluate the evidence and law dealing with the proposed vertical merger the same way he would a horizontal deal, experts told us. In opening argument Thursday (see 1803220033), companies' outside counsel Dan Petrocelli of O'Melveny told U.S. District Judge Richard Leon of Washington, "You're not going to need a crystal ball," since horizontal deals inherently reduce competition while verticals lead to increased business efficiencies and innovation.
The FCC took USF actions and made proposals intended to help rural telcos provide broadband-oriented service and to improve high-cost subsidy program operations. Dissenting Democrats said their requests for changes to an NPRM went unheeded. Chairman Ajit Pai said the minority members waited too long to make their suggestions, a charge they denied. The commission Friday released two orders and a notice (here) that provide up to $545 million in additional support to rate-of-return carriers, flesh out expense and investment cost-recovery restrictions, and aim to examine the rural USF budget and a possible tribal broadband factor. The item appears largely consistent with a draft (see 1801160040 and 1801170048).