NSTAC: Balance Industry and Federal Interests in Spectrum Strategy

The President’s National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee (NSTAC) urged that the administration balance the interests of wireless carriers and DOD in a letter the group approved at a virtual meeting Wednesday. The letter raises concerns about the congressionally mandated Emerging Mid-Band Radar Spectrum Sharing Feasibility Assessment (EMBRSS) study of the lower 3 GHz band (see 2309280087). Moreover, it says federal use of spectrum must change. Industry officials note the missive is unusual in that NSTAC rarely weighs in on spectrum issues. NSTAC members approved the letter, addressed to President Joe Biden, on a unanimous vote with little discussion.

It comes with the NTIA set to release on March 14 an implementation plan for the national spectrum strategy (see 2403050048).

“The Implementation Plan must consider all the critical use cases of spectrum including the entire communications industry, federal national security missions, other federal agencies, affected industries, manufacturers, satellites, and end users including consumers, enterprises, and combatant commands as well as international allies,” the letter said.

The plan should acknowledge the need for spectrum “is growing for both commercial wireless services and federal national security (or national security) missions,” NSTAC said. “Ensuring the ability of the DOD to meet its mission requirements in the face of evolving threats and pacing challenges is of paramount importance to the NSTAC.” But the letter stresses, “This does not necessarily mean that all aspects of the DOD’s use of spectrum remain unchanged.”

The national spectrum strategy calls for a co-led NTIA and DOD study of the lower 3 GHz band (see 2402090059). NSTAC said future work should build on work by the Partnering to Advance Trusted and Holistic Spectrum Solutions (PATHSS) study.

“PATHSS provided a crucial step in establishing greater trust and a mutual understanding of the challenges and opportunities in any band across the military and should be expanded upon for any spectrum sharing process,” the letter said: While NSTAC “supports the processes involved in developing the EMBRSS report, not all NSTAC members agree with its conclusions.”

NSTAC called for “aggressive timelines” and stressed the importance of clearly defining dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS). The plan should “define the critical aspects of DSS needed across a range of different use cases and bands to be studied in the testbeds, and that could accelerate co-existence between commercial and federal uses.”

NSTAC said work remains on DSS. The letter calls for study of “the predictability of available resources; efficient system performance measurements; real-time or near real time spectrum sensing in complex radio frequency environments such as mixed RF signals and heterogeneous systems when they are needed; management of mutual interference between networks of the same technology or across different technologies; and interference detection and mitigation-techniques.”

“Demand for spectrum is growing rapidly as more innovations occur in wireless and spectrum dependent technologies,” said Jeff McElfresh, AT&T chief operating officer and chair of NSTAC’s DSS Subcommittee, who presented the letter at the meeting. Work started on the letter in January, he said. “There are, and continue to be, a wide range of perspectives on spectrum and DSS among NSTAC members” and the letter was an attempt to find consensus, he said.

DSS is identified in the spectrum strategy as “one key to meeting these growing demands,” McElfresh said. The strategy launches “a moonshot effort” to advance DSS, in collaboration with industry, he said. That will include a national testbed for DSS, he said.

Committee members had many different views, said NSTAC member Kyle Malady, CEO of Verizon Business. “Any effort to improve our current spectrum situation is most welcome by the wireless industry,” he said. The letter shouldn’t “distract from other efforts" to provide specific spectrum for the wireless industry and the government, he said. “This needs to be additive to the body of work that’s going on and not become a distraction,” he said.

The NSTAC report underscores the need for major changes in how the federal government makes spectrum decisions, Brad Gillen, CTIA executive vice president, said in a Thursday blog post. NSTAC notes that prior attempts, “including the DOD-led EMBRSS report on the lower 3 GHz band, have been hampered by a lack of alignment on data sources, operating environments, interference parameters, and more,” Gillen said. The letter underscores the need for new technology “to make DSS a reality” and for better harmonization of spectrum allocations, he said.

“The clear takeaway from the NSTAC letter is that in the near term, America needs more full-power, licensed spectrum to meet demand, support economic growth, and power Americas global economic competitiveness,” Gillen said.

NCTA said Thursday new technology is making coexistence in spectrum bands possible, without forcing the reallocation of federal systems. Wireless carriers “are vested in ignoring how these changes bring new opportunities to consumers and future spectrum policy,” NCTA said: “Instead, they (and their trade association CTIA) want to cling to old methods of clearing spectrum and forcing relocation of federal incumbents to make room for exclusive, high-power licensed operations. This tired approach is increasingly unnecessary, impractical, and costly.”

NSTAC also approved a report on “Measuring and Incentivizing the Adoption of Cybersecurity Best Practices.” U.S. national security “depends on the secure, reliable functioning of our nation’s critical infrastructure,” the report says: “However, the continued drumbeat of significant cyber incidents suggests existing market forces may be insufficient to incentivize the adoption of cybersecurity best practices and standards at the level needed to meet the evolving cyber-threat landscape.”