Members of the House Commerce Trade Subcommittee pressed several officials on the virtues of vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) crash avoidance technology and its challenges, pinpointing spectrum availability and cybersecurity as predominant future concerns.
Intense bipartisan net neutrality legislative negotiations at the top levels of the Senate Commerce Committee are failing to convince all members that a compromise is the right course. Several Democrats and Republicans back the ongoing negotiations between Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., and ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla. But some Democrats and Republicans told us that such a bipartisan deal may not satisfy them -- and one Commerce Committee Republican is gearing up to offer her own net neutrality legislation if necessary.
A Cisco representative will be among the witnesses testifying Thursday before the House Commerce Trade Subcommittee alongside automotive interests. The hearing will focus on vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication, which relies on automotive-held spectrum in the upper 5 GHz that other stakeholders want to use for unlicensed purposes. In addition to Cisco Global Transportation Executive Barry Einsig, the witnesses are Peter Sweatman, director of the University of Michigan’s Transportation Research Institute; Nat Beuse, associate administrator-vehicle safety research for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration; David St. Amant, president of the Econolite Group; and Harry Lightsey, General Motors executive director-global connected customer experience. In May, the Department of Transportation, FCC and NTIA “briefed Subcommittee on Communications and Technology staff on the testing progress for V2V communications,” the GOP memo said of Commerce lawmakers' bipartisan efforts in recent months (see 1505270044): “All agencies reported that they were working together with private industry stakeholders on test devices and protocols that can be used to test whether the spectrum can be shared without disrupting vehicle communications technology. The expectation is that testing could begin sometime within the next year.” The Democratic memo raised concerns about privacy and cybersecurity inherent in this connected-vehicle technology. “The potential for capture of personally identifiable information (PII) in connected vehicles has worried the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and some consumer groups,” the Democratic memo cautioned. “In October 2014, the FTC identified several potential privacy issues stemming from V2V communications, including the ability of vehicles to track consumers’ precise geolocation over time, the ability of hackers to remotely access a car’s internal computer network, and the ability of a vehicle to track driving habits that could be used to price insurance premiums without drivers’ knowledge or consent.” The hearing will be at 10 a.m. in 2123 Rayburn.
Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, is confident the FCC net neutrality order will be overturned “in the next two to three years,” he said during an episode of C-SPAN’s The Communicators, set for telecast this weekend. He criticized the agency for the order and worried about how the political climate may affect various matters, saying a longer-term perspective may be required.
A bitterly divided FCC voted 3-2 Thursday to approve a package of proposals and actions to move the Lifeline USF program toward broadband coverage and move to improve oversight and counter abuses. The FCC's Democratic majority said the NPRM and orders would reboot Lifeline for the 21st century by helping low-income consumers gain broadband access and by undertaking further administrative restructuring to ensure program efficiency and integrity. But the Republican minority said Democratic refusal to impose or even propose a Lifeline budgetary cap was fiscally irresponsible and invited further waste, fraud and abuse.
FCC items moving Lifeline USF toward broadband coverage and authorizing VoIP numbering direct access appear likely to be approved Thursday, despite some continuing controversies and even resistance, agency and telecom industry officials told us. The VoIP numbering item is a "slam dunk 5-0 [vote]," said an agency official, but questions remain about whether Lifeline will draw dissent. Signaling different points of emphasis, Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said Wednesday it was time to "reboot" the Lifeline program for this century, while Commissioner Ajit Pai said the FCC needed to focus on establishing a Lifeline budget and reining in abuses if it's going to authorize broadband support.
Sen. David Vitter, R-La., introduced S-1545 “to require a quarterly report by the Federal Communications Commission on the Lifeline program funded by the Universal Service Fund,” its title said. The bill’s text wasn't online and it has been referred to the Commerce Committee, where Vitter isn't a member. The legislation has no co-sponsors. Vitter is a critic of the Lifeline program and recently derided any proposed expansion as “absurd.”
With only a few exceptions, consumer advocates questioned Thursday whether the NTIA multistakeholder meeting on facial recognition should continue if consensus can't be reached on whether opt-in consent would be a baseline requirement. During the stakeholder meeting, NetChoice Policy Counsel Carl Szabo asked consumer advocates to set aside the opt-in, opt-out matter because it’s “just going to be a tug of war” between industry and advocates, with “all ending up in the mud.” Consumer groups declined to put the issue aside, calling it a foundational part of the discussion. After two hours of discussion, consumer groups met during a scheduled break and decided to take a couple of days to think about whether they would continue participating in the multistakeholder process and didn't return for the rest of the scheduled meeting.
AT&T, CenturyLink and Verizon expressed concerns about a possible FCC requirement that telecom carriers providing Lifeline-supported service retain sensitive consumer documentation that's submitted to demonstrate eligibility for the USF program. The large telcos said the FCC shouldn't move forward with the proposal or should consider it further in a Lifeline NPRM the FCC is planning to vote on along with a Lifeline order at its June 18 meeting. Meanwhile, wireless Lifeline providers and others continue to lobby the FCC, backing the possible expansion of traditional Lifeline voice support to broadband access.
SmartEdgeNet disputed Public Knowledge and Bandwidth.com criticisms of a draft FCC order that would authorize VoIP providers to obtain phone numbers directly from numbering administrators (see 1506080030), an item that's on the agency's agenda for the June 18 meeting. "Neither submission raises any real concerns regarding the assignment of telephone numbers to interconnected VoIP providers," SmartEdgeNet (SEN) said in docket 13-97. "The submissions of both Bandwidth.com and Public Knowledge seem more devoted to inducing fear and uncertainty -- and therefore delay and excessive regulation -- than to identifying any actual problems that might arise from permitting interconnected VoIP providers to directly receive allocations of telephone numbers, or suggesting meaningful solutions to any problems they claim to be worried about."