The Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council easily approved three reports by its working groups Wednesday, including on risks to stand-alone 5G networks from new standards by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) and on standard operating procedures for emergency alerts. None was immediately made available by the FCC.
Country of origin cases
Hamilton Relay told the FCC it implemented new procedures July 23 for call takeovers (CTOs) to make the process more seamless for providers of the IP captioned telephone service and other relays. “Previously, when a CTO occurred, the user would be directed by the CA [communications assistant] to press the captions button, and a new CA would take over the call with minimal disruption,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 13-24. Now “once a call takeover is approved by the CA’s supervisor, the call routes to the next available CA, and the original CA will continue captioning until the new CA actually takes over the call. Thus, there is no wait time.”
ViacomCBS' CBS All Access streaming service will rebrand as Paramount+ early next year as the company expands its content offerings and debuts the service in Australia, Latin America and the Nordic nations, it said Tuesday. It said it will enlarge content offerings with more than 30,000 TV episodes and movies and continue developing original content.
NTIA extended by 30 days its comment deadline for its internet use survey, says a notice in Monday's Federal Register. NTIA originally opened a 60-day comment period July 7.
As fallout from the annulment of Privacy Shield continues, industry and regulators in the U.S. and EU are struggling to decide how to maintain trans-Atlantic personal data flows, they said. The European Commission plans to launch an “adoption process” for new data transfer mechanisms in “the coming weeks” and hopes to finalize it by the end of the year, European Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders said Thursday, noting there won't be any "quick fix."
Responses from Alphabet, Facebook, Squarespace and Twitter about alleged anti-conservative bias are “completely unpersuasive,” Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, said Thursday. Lee originally wrote the companies asking each to “justify anti-conservative bias in their content moderation process.” Alphabet's Google uses content moderation standards that “are apolitical, unbiased and do not preference one point of view over another,” the company wrote. Twitter doesn’t use “political viewpoints, perspectives, ideology or party affiliation to make any decisions, whether related to automatically ranking content or how we enforce our rules,” it wrote. Facebook also denied undue political influence over its content moderators. Squarespace said many of Lee’s questions don’t apply to the company because it doesn’t have market power or a comments section and doesn’t engage in “content removal coordination with other online platforms or competitors.” Lee responded: “I continue to be concerned about the ideological discrimination going on at these firms and I believe further oversight will be necessary in order to obtain the facts and answers that the American people deserve.”
CTA shifted the all-digital CES 2021 to Jan. 11-14, five days later than its original Jan. 6-9 run as a physical show. The change reformats the event to be Monday-Thursday instead of Wednesday-Saturday. Only media will get access the first day, with conference programming the last three days and an “exhibitor showcase” featured on the middle two. "Many will be returning to their offices for the first time in January" since the pandemic began, emailed spokesperson Caroline Finnell. "The shift gives exhibitors and attendees more cushion time between the holidays and show times."
Chairman Ajit Pai said the FCC remains focused on illegal robocalls, consumers’ top interest at the agency. Carriers don’t want “this junk traffic," he told USTelecom Wednesday. Pai said cooperative efforts are working.
Roku reminded customers they can watch Disney’s Mulan, which was originally destined for theaters but debuted instead Friday as a streaming offer due to COVID-19 (see 2008050003). The live-action remake is being streamed on Disney+ at $29.99 through Nov. 2. On Dec. 4, all Disney+ subscribers get access at no additional cost.
Neil Dellar, 61 and an attorney in the FCC Office of General Counsel, died Thursday. Dellar spent 20 years at the agency, where he was one of the original members of the OGC’s Transaction Team and worked on fraud and bankruptcy issues. “He was known throughout the Commission as the go-to person on issues of corporate law,” emailed FCC General Counsel Tom Johnson. Survivors include his wife, son and mother.