Satellite news truck companies worry the pending C-band partial clearing could mean the end of their industry, since the lost spectrum is a necessary and irreplaceable resource. Satellite C-band providers say those occasional user worries are misplaced. Operators say their post-clearing plans leave enough spectrum to maintain service at least for the near term.
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Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, reintroduced legislation Thursday that would direct a Homeland Security Department study on deepfakes and similar types of media. Introduced as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act, the Deepfake Report Act would direct DHS to “assess the technology used to generate deepfakes, the uses of deepfakes by foreign and domestic entities, and available countermeasures.” The original legislation passed the Senate in October.
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai laid out a busy agenda for commissioners’ July 16 meeting. It tentatively includes (see 2006240044) an order addressing supply chain security and equipment from Chinese companies Huawei and ZTE, and an update of vertical location accuracy rules for wireless calls to 911. Commissioners will also consider broadband mapping, call blocking technology and emergency calling rules. Also on the agenda is the draft order establishing 988 for a nationwide three-digit suicide hotline and giving carriers a July 2022 deadline for implementation (see 2006230022). FCC members would vote on changing the cable leased access rate formula.
One-page technical abstracts are due July 3 for the annual Symposium on Vehicle Displays and Interfaces, said the Society for Information Display Wednesday. SID originally planned to hold the conference physically Sept. 29-30 in Livonia, Michigan, but COVID-19 forced it to convert it to a virtual event Oct.14-15. Organizers are seeking technical papers on a such subjects as trends in automotive displays and consumer acceptance of different display and interface technologies. Authors whose abstracts are chosen will be notified later in July, and their full papers will be due Aug. 17, said SID.
Local Exchange Carriers of Michigan unlawfully billed and collected improper end office charges on aggregated toll-free long-distance traffic originating from wireless customers, said an FCC Enforcement Bureau order Wednesday. LEC-MI must refund AT&T $972,394, plus interest, for charges it paid February 2012-April 2014. The billing dispute dates back to 2012, AT&T said in a complaint (see 1908080035). LEC-MI didn't comment now. AT&T declined comment.
The FCC sought comment on a petition from a group of broadcasters asking the agency to authorize program origination for FM translators and FM boosters. The petition seeks “a uniform FCC rule change for both FM boosters and FM translators to allow each to originate programming content provided that the primary station is retransmitted for no fewer than 40 hours in any calendar week,” emailed Womble Bond's John Garziglia, who represents the Broadcasters for Limited Program Origination. Comments are due in RM-11858 July 23, per Wednesday's Daily Digest.
The FCC Wireline Bureau extended through Sept. 1 a waiver for competitive LEC Inteliquent of certain access stimulation rules, in an order effective Tuesday. During COVID-19, staff said conference calling services from Zoom and Cisco WebEx spiked and "materially increased Inteliquent’s ratio of terminating-to-originating traffic," designating it an access stimulating CLEC that without the waiver would have made it subject to financial responsibilities (see 1909260055). The original waiver was in March (see 2003270016).
T-Mobile is playing fast and loose with job promises related to buying Sprint, Communications Workers of America President Chris Shelton responded Tuesday to the carrier's challenge of the California Public Utilities Commission’s mid-April conditional OK. Two consumer advocacy groups joined the union in slamming T-Mobile’s Monday petition in docket A.18-07-011 to modify conditions on jobs, speeds and deployment. The request follows reported layoffs at the carrier. Continued fighting between T-Mobile and the CPUC might portend litigation over state wireless authority (see 2005010048).
Clearing the 3.7-4 GHz band of incumbent satellite services for terrestrial use of the spectrum will cost about $3.53 billion, under estimates from satellite providers that were due Friday. The FCC C-band clearing order in February cited estimates of $2.8 billion-$6.1 billion. The agency didn't comment Monday.
Give voice providers more call blocking authority and more liability protection, industry asked the FCC in comments posted through Monday in docket 20-93. Don't limit a safe harbor to one-ring scams because doing so wouldn't "provide the certainty against all illegal robocalls as new scams arise," USTelecom said. "T-Mobile and other carriers will be hesitant to take advantage of opt-out call blocking without a safe harbor," it said. The safe harbor should also "protect providers from liability due to inadvertent mislabeling or misidentification of a call’s level of trust," said CTIA. Avoid "prescriptive requirements governing how providers communicate with their subscribers -- for instance, call labeling requirements or a requirement to notify subscribers dialing international toll-generating numbers of the cost before connecting the call, the latter of which could be a complex and expensive undertaking," said NCTA. Incompas said a new rule for international gateway providers to verify "the nature and purpose of foreign originators would be unnecessary and overly burdensome." AT&T said FCC should require as "baseline best practices for robocall mitigation" that providers have "the capability to monitor traffic patterns that would flag suspect calling campaigns, and then robust application of the provider’s terms of service to eliminate problem customers."