EAGLE-Net confirmed its plans to ask NTIA for a time extension for the project’s broadband stimulus work in Colorado, beyond the cycle of the many other three-year Broadband Technology Opportunities Program stimulus grants. “EAGLE-Net plans to complete the majority of this construction by August 2013 and request an extension of its BTOP project to 2014,” it said in a news release Tuesday (http://bit.ly/10V8Hzz). “At the end of this phase, over 50 percent of the 190 combined school districts (178) and Board of Cooperative Educational Services (12) in Colorado will be on-net to the EAGLENet network.” The news release focused on the federal government lifting the partial suspension (CD May 1 p5) of the project’s work since December. “The hard work is ahead of us,” said CEO Mike Ryan.
Discovery Communications’ “Connect the Dots” science, technology, engineering and math education initiative includes the start of the Discovery Education STEM Camp program for teachers and parents, a new science-focused series that premiered Wednesday night on Discovery Channel and a partnership between Science Channel and U.S. manufacturers to promote skilled-trade careers. That’s according to a news release from the company, which expanded its commitment to the White House STEM initiative as expected (CD April 30 p13).
White House officials said Tuesday that a veto threat against the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) would need to be accompanied by an effort to advance cybersecurity legislation “without compromising privacy.” The version of CISPA that passed the House in April does include “some important improvements” over previous versions, but did not address all of the White House’s core concerns, particularly when it came to privacy protection, said U.S. Chief Technology Officer Todd Park and Cybersecurity Coordinator Michael Daniel in a blog post responding to a “Stop CISPA” petition submitted through the White House’s We the People petition service. “The President has been clear that the United States urgently needs to modernize our laws and practices relating to cybersecurity, both for national security and the security of our country’s businesses -- but that shouldn’t come at the expense of privacy,” Daniel and Park said. The White House examines any cybersecurity legislation to see if it has sufficient privacy and civil liberties protections, charges a civilian agency with leading information sharing efforts, and provides narrowly-tailored protections, Daniel and Park said. “The United States must update our cybersecurity laws, but we will not sacrifice our values in the process,” they said (http://1.usa.gov/11TKtm1).
The nine largest cable operators have deployed more than 40 million set-top boxes with CableCARDs since the 2007 integration ban, compared with 604,000 CableCARDs deployed for use with TVs and other “retail CableCARD-enabled devices,” NCTA said. The report filed with the FCC (http://bit.ly/ZRCkjo) contains the CableCARD statistics for Cablevision, Charter, Comcast, Cox and Time Warner Cable. Comcast has the largest number of CableCARDs in use, with 350,821, according to the report.
The Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) presented a draft framework meant to guide the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) discussions next week on developing a Do Not Track (DNT) standard, that would require users to turn on the DNT functionality in a browser’s settings panel; DNT would be off by default (http://bit.ly/15Xg0aK). W3C’s tracking protection group, which has been working for the past two years to craft a DNT standard, plans to meet May 6-8 in Sunnyvale, Calif. Consumer groups pushed Congress last week to create its own DNT standard amid perceptions that the industry-led effort was stalled (CD April 23 p10). The DAA framework suggests that third parties would promise to not collect data on browsers that have the DNT functionality enabled, but would still be allowed to collect data in those cases “for the narrow set of permitted uses,” DAA said Tuesday in the framework. A description of the DNT setting would be neutral, DAA said. It would inform users that turning DNT on “limits collection and use of web viewing data for certain advertising and other purposes” and that “some data may still be collected and used for certain purposes and a description of such purposes,” as well as note that if a user has voluntarily allowed a business to collect his information, activating the DNT setting won’t limit that collection, DAA said. DAA counsel Stu Ingis, who presented the draft framework during a conference call Monday, was not available for comment. Peter Swire, co-chair of the W3C tracking protection working group, said he plans to discuss his thoughts on the DAA framework Wednesday during the group’s regular conference call at noon EDT.
The Montana Telecommunications Association (MTA) concurs with USTelecom that the FCC should “reconsider permitting and encouraging the speculative installation of excess capacity” with regard to the Rural Health Care Program, it told Wireline Bureau officials April 22 and 23, said an ex parte filing posted Tuesday (http://bit.ly/ZUnVBq). MTA also expressed its concern that posting requests for proposals on the Universal Service Administrative Co. website “may be too passive” a move. “Stakeholders should not be expected simply to divine when or where a Healthcare Connect project is planned that may affect them either positively or negatively,” it said.
Any Video Relay Service (VRS) provider that blocks consumers from using competing services to leave a point-to-point video message should be sanctioned, Purple told several FCC officials in meetings Thursday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/ZycJLa). The commission must also take steps to create a fair competitive environment that lets smaller providers grow their market share and increase operating efficiencies, Purple told aides to four FCC commissioners. The steps should include addressing interoperability issues, allowing address book portability and banning VRS interpreter non-compete agreements, Purple said. Purple also encouraged adoption of its proposed VRS rate structure (CD Oct 9 p14), and action on its request for a limited waiver of the March 7 deadline to set IP Captioned Telephone Service to a default “captions off” setting (CD March 5 p12).
The FCC Wireline Bureau seeks comment on an application to transfer control of IP Networks to Level 3, it said in a public notice Tuesday (http://bit.ly/157PfRs). Level 3 seeks streamlined treatment. Comments in docket 13-100 are due May 14, replies May 21.
The FCC should convert all mobile satellite service licenses to flexible-use licenses and grant LightSquared’s license modification request and allow the company to move forward and use at least some of its spectrum, the Technology Policy Institute said in a report released Tuesday (http://bit.ly/13JCg3H). The most available spectrum is the MSS spectrum, most of which is licensed to Dish Network and LightSquared, it said. “There do not appear to be significant regulatory or legal impediments to the deployment of the Dish spectrum.” LightSquared “has been embroiled in a dispute with the global positioning system industry, which threatens to make the LightSquared spectrum unusable,” it said. By resolving the issue in a manner that allows LightSquared to use its spectrum, the FCC “can produce significant benefits for millions of users of mobile broadband services for the U.S. economy more generally.” Because the GPS band isn’t a typical unlicensed band, the commission hasn’t promulgated standards for GPS devices, it said. The absence of clearly defined rights and a market mechanism for moving spectrum to higher-valued uses “is the cause of the failure to resolve the LightSquared-GPS dispute in an economically efficient manner,” TPI said. This week, the FCC granted LightSquared an experimental authorization to assess the technical feasibility of using the 1675-1680 MHz band with existing federal operations (CD April 30 p7).