Verizon and Verizon Wireless defended the carrier’s actions following the June 29 Mid-Atlantic derecho wind storm and subsequent 911 outages. The defense came in reply comments which the FCC posted Wednesday. The FCC is in the midst of an investigation of the northern Virginia 911 problems. Fairfax County, Va., recommendations were “constructive” and its derecho account “largely consistent” with the carrier’s own, Verizon said (http://xrl.us/bnoiir). Verizon “already fixed the specific problems” at hand and is “taking corrective actions ... including an audit of backup power resources and prompt remediation; redesign of the monitoring/telemetry system; additional redundancy in ALI [Automatic Location Identification] and trunk transport; and enhancing the methods and procedures for communicating information to PSAPs and the public,” it said. Verizon supports about 2,000 PSAPs, or public safety answering points, overall, and not all “may desire or need a Verizon representative to be present at an Emergency Operations Center,” the carrier said, referring to feedback received from northern Virginia 911 directors (CD Aug 15 p1). Deploying Verizon representatives may not be “feasible or optimal” during such natural disasters, it said. “Not all PSAP customers will necessarily want to share their own outage-related information with other PSAPs,” Verizon added. Verizon opposes any FCC mandates that it “take particular action to implement specific best practices,” which “would embroil the Commission in judgment calls about network configuration that are not amenable to a regulatory mandate,” it said. Verizon also opposes the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials’ recommendation (CD Aug 21 p5) that the FCC adopt backup power requirements. Those requirements “would impose one-size-fits-all operational and technical requirements that entail expansive regulation of network operations, without accounting for disparities in carrier resources, differences in service provider network configurations and localized PSAP concerns and resources,” Verizon said. The FCC’s original backup power rules wouldn’t have prevented the outages anyway, it said. The FCC “should direct the CSRIC [Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council] to determine whether to supplement or modify existing best practices in the areas of network monitoring, backup power, 911 network redundancy and diversity, and PSAP communications,” Verizon concluded its reply.
Verizon-owned ICSA Labs was authorized to certify electronic health records (EHR) by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, according to a release from the company on Wednesday (http://bit.ly/Skh6Yg). ICSA Labs now can certify that EHRs meet the “Stage 2” requirements, the release said. Those requirements were issued by the department in August and are expected to go into effect in October. “The latest round of federal requirements will enable us to help companies strengthen the security and privacy of their EHR offerings, ultimately benefitting both patient and health care provider,” ICSA Labs Health Care Program Manager Amit Trivedi said.
The Federal Election Commission approved by a 6-0 vote an advisory opinion requested by Revolution Messaging asking the agency to permit the use of shared short codes and allow contributions above the previously imposed $50-per-month and $200-per-election-cycle limits (http://xrl.us/bnoikt). Revolution Messaging called the FEC vote a “major victory.” “This decision will not only bring this service to political committees faster, but will make it more affordable and open for those using it,” said Revolution Messaging CEO Scott Goodstein. “It’s a tremendous victory for consumers who will use this technology to support federal PACs [political action committees] of their choosing. Text message fundraising is an innovation we should embrace, but not at the expense of transparency and good policy."
House Communications Subcommittee Ranking Member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., urged the FCC to implement consistent advertising rules related to the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act, in a letter (http://xrl.us/bnoikr) sent Wednesday to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. “While I'm always sensitive for the need to refrain from imposing unnecessary regulatory burdens, television viewers have a reasonable expectation that compliance of [sic] the CALM Act’s rules will be consistent across all commercial networks, including non-advertiser-supported networks,” she wrote. Eshoo, who authored the bill, slammed NCTA for seeking exceptions to the rules in a petition for reconsideration filed last month (http://xrl.us/bnoike). In the petition, NCTA said that the FCC mistakenly included promotional materials in its definition of commercial advertisements. In response, Eshoo wrote: “The plain language of the law does not provide a blanket exemption for promotional advertisements. ... Common sense and legislative guidance clearly demonstrate that the commission acted appropriately.”
The Consumer Federation of America praised the European Union Wednesday for its proposed Data Protection Regulation, which is designed to update and strengthen consumer privacy rights in EU member nations. In a letter to members of the European Parliament, the federation and other U.S. consumer and privacy groups said the regulation “will benefit consumers around the globe as businesses improve their privacy practices and security standards.” “We need 21st century solutions to address the privacy issues that are raised by the increasingly global marketplace and the proliferation of new data collection techniques and uses,” Susan Grant, the federation’s director of consumer protection, said in a news release. The EU’s proposed regulation would expand its definition of “personal information,” limit profiling, create a new data breach notification requirement and strengthen the authority of EU members’ data protection agencies. In the letter, the U.S. groups noted that the Obama administration’s proposed Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights contains similar privacy protection, but lacks legal force. “The EU is leading the way by tackling these complex issues in a comprehensive manner, which the U.S. hasn’t done so far,” the letter said (http://xrl.us/bnoikp).
Hurricane Isaac-related calls overloaded a Louisiana public safety answering point (PSAP) Aug. 30, the National Emergency Number Association (NENA) said Wednesday (http://xrl.us/bnoiic), identifying the St. John the Baptist Parish Sheriff’s Office PSAP. “The center had been overloaded with requests for service and all the telecommunicators, who were also victims of the storm, had been working non-stop,” NENA said. An eight-member Louisiana Telecommunicator Emergency Response Taskforce attempted to aid the PSAP, which had staff “who were pushing 40 hours on-duty without relief,” according to NENA. The PSAP had requested the task force’s aid.
The FCC is hosting a free accessibility workshop for developers Thursday and Friday. The workshop, “Developing with Accessibility” (DevAcc) is meant to stimulate additional application developer collaboration on accessibility solutions for different technology platforms, the FCC said. The workshop will include training sessions on various accessibility application programming interfaces and coding opportunities, the FCC said. DevAcc is part of FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s Accessibility and Innovation Initiative, which began two years ago (http://xrl.us/bnoihj).
The FCC gave KWBT(FM) Mexia, Texas, 30 days to show why it should be able to move the city of license to Bellmead, where M&M Broadcasters said it met the agency’s allotment priorities because it would be the first outlet. The company’s application was deficient because it didn’t show Bellmead is independent of the Waco urbanized area, which has other stations, an Audio Bureau letter Wednesday to the company said (http://xrl.us/bnoiin). “We therefore do not find that the relocation is supported by the alleged need for KWBT’s current programming. Consistent with the Commission’s stated goal of protecting listeners in smaller communities and rural areas from the loss of needed transmission and reception services, we conclude that the public interest would be better served by retention of Station KWBT as a second local transmission service at Mexia, rather than by the addition of an eighth local transmission service at Waco.” A 2011 order approved by commissioners made moving radio stations closer to urban areas harder (CD March 4/11 p10).
Cablevision renewed its deals to carry CBS’s TV stations and cable networks, the companies said Wednesday. Stations affiliated with the CBS network that that broadcaster owns, WCBS-TV New York, KYW-TV Philadelphia and KCNC-TV Denver, and WPSG (CW) Philadelphia, were included, a CBS spokesman said. The operator also is continuing to carry Showtime, Smithsonian Channel and CBS Sports Network, the joint news release said (http://xrl.us/bnoit5). Cablevision has had carriage disputes over other stations and cable channels.
CenturyLink recently won two FCC task orders through the General Services Administration’s Networx Enterprise contract program. The orders could be worth up to $9.6 million over the next five years, CenturyLink said Wednesday. CenturyLink will provide the FCC with Wide Area Network services -- including private line services and Network-Based Internet Protocol Virtual Private Network services -- as well as Managed Trusted Internet Protocol Services. Both orders will support key FCC programs such as the National Broadband Plan, CenturyLink said. “One of the FCC’s many missions is to protect and promote America’s communications infrastructure,” said CenturyLink General Manager Diana Gowen. “This means its communications provider must provide robust, secure networks that allow the FCC to capitalize on today’s technology” (http://xrl.us/bnoieg).