The FCC pushed back comment deadlines in its broadband deployment inquiry to Sept. 15 and Sept. 30, the Wireline Bureau said in an order issued Thursday in docket 15-191. The bureau wants to ensure the public has "sufficient time to respond to the numerous and complex issues" raised in a notice of inquiry the FCC recently adopted and released (see 1508060049 and 1508100054). Under Section 706 of the Telecom Act, the commission must determine if advanced telecom capability is being rolled out to all Americans in a reasonable and timely way, and if it's not, take immediate actions to remove barriers to deployment.

A U.S. District Court judge in Los Angeles vacated a hearing scheduled for Monday (see 1508130050) in Human Rights Watch's case against the Drug Enforcement Administration claiming the DEA illegally collected the group's international phone call records, a notice issued Thursday evening said. The DEA asked the court to dismiss the case because the data collection was stopped and the database holding the information has "been purged of the collected data," the agency's motion said. Judge Philip Gutierrez said in the notice that the DEA's motion to dismiss will be considered based on submitted pleadings and that no appearance by counsel is necessary.

Lightower and Fibertech Networks completed a $1.9 billion combination, doubling the individual companies' respective service footprints, a Lightower news release said Thursday. The combined company will operate under the Lightower name, and it said the fiber provider has customers including wireline and wireless carriers.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation plans to urge a U.S. District Court in Los Angeles Monday to allow Human Rights Watch (HRW) to proceed with a lawsuit against the Drug Enforcement Administration, EFF said in a news release Thursday. HRW, represented by Mark Rumold, EFF staff attorney, is pursuing a lawsuit against the DEA for its collection of records of the group's phone calls to particular foreign countries. The DEA has asked the court to dismiss the case because the phone record collection program is over, the release said. The hearing will be Monday at 1:30 p.m., EFF said.

Qualcomm Global Trading, a Qualcomm subsidiary, completed its acquisition of semiconductor and software provider CSR, the company said in a news release Thursday. The $2.4 billion acquisition will complement Qualcomm's current offerings by adding products and customers in the Internet of Everything and automotive sectors, it said.

Both sides sought more time to file briefs in Neustar's challenge to an FCC order giving Telcordia conditional rights to the next local number portability administrator (LNPA) contract (Neustar v. FCC, No. 15-1080). Neustar (the incumbent LNPA), the FCC and the Department of Justice filed a joint motion Thursday asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to move back briefing deadlines by a week to two weeks to accommodate "competing work demands." They said that intervenors CTIA, Telcordia and USTelecom, which back the FCC, consented to the motion. Under the proposed new schedule, Neustar's brief would be due Sept. 21, the FCC/DOJ brief would be due Oct. 28, intervenors' brief would be due Nov. 12, Neustar's reply brief would be due Nov. 25 and final briefs incorporating an index would be due Dec. 17. The D.C. Circuit recently set the current schedule (see 1508050023).

Former MIT and Harvard students are releasing One-Touch-911 to act as a data pipeline from any connected device to first responders as a part of the RapidSOS project that was originally developed to revolutionize emergency medical services, said a news release from the new company. RapidSOS is a technology platform that predicts emergencies before they occur, dynamically warns people in harm’s way, and ensures that first responders are always accessible. The One-Touch-911 system interfaces with dispatch centers in more than 135 countries -- transmitting data from a user’s phone directly to dispatchers in an emergency, the release said. The project received $5 million in financing from Highland Capital Partners, it said.

Harvard Law School professor Larry Lessig, an active voice in tech policy, is weighing a run for the Democratic nomination for president. “Today we've launched a kickstarter-like campaign, to raise the funds necessary to make a run plausible,” Lessig said in a Huffington Post column Tuesday. “If we hit our target of $1 million by Labor Day, then I will give this run every ounce of my energy.” His campaign would prioritize campaign finance overhaul, as he highlights on his 2016 website. “President [Barack] Obama should get Congress to shut down the FCC and similar vestigial regulators,” Lessig proposed in a December 2008 column for Newsweek. He has backed the net neutrality protections of the FCC under Title II of the Communications Act. “Title-II-light is the right regulatory home,” Lessig said in a different Huffington Post piece in February, lauding the White House for its advocacy and FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler for his interpretation of the statute. “Unlike the old days with utility regulation, the FCC will not regulate rates, or impose tariffs, or undue administrative burdens.”

The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau will host a robocall and caller ID spoofing workshop Sept. 16, the agency said Tuesday. The workshop builds on the FCC’s June declaratory ruling on implementation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which includes a provision allowing carriers to help consumers curb unwanted robocalls (see 1506180046). “The workshop will continue the Commission’s recent work helping consumers fight unwanted robocalls by examining the current state of robocall-blocking solutions, steps industry is taking to protect consumers from unwanted robocalls, and potential solutions to caller ID spoofing,” the FCC said. The all-day workshop will take place at FCC headquarters. Other details will follow.

The FCC announced a $2.96 million fine against Tampa-based Travel Club Marketing for making or initiating at least 185 unsolicited, prerecorded robocalls to more than 142 consumers, a news release said Tuesday. Those consumers hadn't consented to the robocalls and the majority of them had placed their phone numbers on the National Do Not Call Registry, the FCC said. This is the largest forfeiture order the commission has issued for robocalling violations. “It is unacceptable to invade consumers’ privacy by bombarding them with unwanted and intrusive robocalls,” Enforcement Bureau Chief Travis LeBlanc said. “All companies, and their owners, who thwart the Do-Not-Call list should expect to face severe consequences.”