The FCC and a handful of state attorneys general have created an unprecedented enforcement partnership to go after internet service providers that violate consumers’ data privacy and security.

Currently, the Federal Trade Commission has authority over broadband data privacy and security issues, but the Federal Communications Commission’s Democratic majority is in the process of bringing the internet under its regulatory authority by reclassifying broadband access as a Title II telecommunications service subject to its regulation.

FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel said the agency is formalizing the cooperation with attorneys general in Illinois, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and New York, all Democrats, through a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with each.

Under the agreements, the Democratic-headed FCC and the Democratic AGs will coordinate investigations and prosecutions and share resources and expertise.

“I am thankful to these four partners for prioritizing interagency cooperation, and we welcome other state leaders to join us in this effort to ensure we work together to protect consumers and their data,” Rosenworcel said of the partnership.

“These strategic partnerships … will allow us to maximize our efforts to address risks arising from the misuse or mishandling of sensitive data we entrust with service providers and the continued threats posed by cybercriminals and foreign adversaries,” FCC Enforcement Bureau chief Loyaan Egal said.

The move means states that want to launch investigations into ISPs will get the FCC Enforcement Bureau staff's expertise, as well as help with things like subpoenas.

Rosenworcel pointed to the success of its new state AG partners in cracking down on robocalls, and looks to leverage that effort in policing ISP conduct when it comes to data protection, privacy and security.

The FCC’s participation will be coordinated through its Privacy and Data Protection Task Force.

Broadband providers are telling the FCC in no uncertain terms to reject calls by cable programmer Fuse Media and public advocacy groups to mandate that those providers collect data on the diversity of the video content vendors they buy programming from, including for their owned or affiliated streaming services which, they point out, are not regulated by the agency.

And as for unaffiliated streaming companies like Netflix, Apple TV or Roku, they argue that without putting diversity data collection requirements on them, too, the Federal Communications Commission certainly won't be getting a view of the marketplace.

NCTA-The Internet & Television Association and USTelecom made those points in comments on the petition.

Also: FCC Seeks Input on Content Diversity Petition

“Any report purporting to say anything about the video marketplace without covering these major participants [Netflix, Apple TV, etc.] would be of questionable value,” the groups told the FCC. “[I]t would be inappropriate to place regulatory burdens only on certain online providers that happen to be affiliated with FCC regulatees.”

But NCTA and USTelecom aren't looking to have the FCC put diversity reporting requirements on any of the major participants.

”Nothing in the Communications Act authorizes the Commission to collect the broad sets of proposed data from the entities it actually is authorized to regulate or those regulatees’ affiliates that are not regulated by the Commission,” they said, “much less from third-party programming vendors over which the Commission has no authority to mandate such data collections.”

Also: Fuse Charges AT&T with Discrimination

Back in May, Fuse Media, an independent programmer which offers content meant for younger, multicultural viewers, led groups petitioning the FCC to collect the content diversity data, including from streaming services owned by media companies licensed by the regulator. The groups argued that the FCC’s failure “regularly to collect and report on data regarding the demographic diversity of vendors providing one of the most critical inputs to the video marketplace: content,” did not square with its charge to promote competition and diversity in the video marketplace.

But NCTA and USTelecom told the FCC such a data-collection mandate was beyond the commission’s authority, and was unnecessary and unconstitutional to boot.

Both associations said their members were “committed to diversity and inclusion” and argued the “vibrancy“ of the media marketplace demonstrated that commitment. But they said the Fuse petition did not advance either of those goals, but rather would burden distributors and their affiliates and “raise serious policy questions.”

As an example of that “vibrancy” they pointed to Comcast Xfinity, which they pointed out offered “TVOne, Cleo, AspireTV, Revolt, Afro, KweliTV, The Africa Channel, BET, BET Her, Impact, Up Faith & Family, Black News Channel, and OWN.”

As to the burden, that would include collecting diversity data “from all linear programming networks they carry, vendors for apps they make available, and vendors for VOD content,” they said, adding that it was unclear how much data would have to be collected from each.

For example, they asked, if an MVPD had the Prime Video app on its set-top, would it have to collect diversity data on the whole of Amazon? Then there are the five production companies involved in the Hulu offering, Only Murders In The Building. Would Hulu’s owner, The Walt Disney Co., have to collect diversity data on each one? Such a requirement would be unprecedented, they said.

Then there is the fact that the data collection burden, and presumably the responsibility for its accuracy, is on the distributor, not the content provider, who might not cooperate or whose data might not be accurate.

Back in November, FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel pledged to Congress that the agency would take a fresh look at the video programming marketplace, particularly as it concerned independent programmers like Fuse. ■

INCOMPAS says one of the keys to saving the FCC's Universal Service Fund subsidy program is to make internet service providers (ISPs) pay into it.

Currently the fees to support the multi-billion-dollar program to get advanced communications services to low-income and rural residents, as well as schools and libraries, come from dwindling voice and telecom service rather than broadband network providers.

As the FCC ponders ways to shore up the fund as it prepares a mandatory report to Congress due August 12, INCOMPAS, which represents streaming, communications and technology companies, has issued a fact sheet to help make its case.

INCOMPAS points out that revenue from telecom USF supporters has fallen precipitously -- from $68.1 billion in 2004 to $29.1 billion in 2021 -- causing the USF fee, which is passed on to customers, to rise to 33% and likely to 40% soon.

Also: Could the FCC Make Video Streamers Pay Into the Universal Service Fund?

INCOMPAS deals with the issue of why USF needs to be saved if Congress is separately putting tens of billions into broadband buildouts through various programs, including the massive infrastructure legislation.

The group says that one issue is that most of that money is going to deployment rather than affordability programs like the USF subsidies to low-income residents. "It is unlikely that Congress’ funding will meet all the ongoing needs that the USF supports," it says.

"The facts are clear when it comes to USF, delay is not an option," said Angie Kronenberg, chief advocate and general counsel for INCOMPAS. "Evolving USF so that its revenue base of support includes broadband internet access services is an immediate, common-sense solution that provides a sustainable long-term solution for the program."

Congress has been kicking the tires on legislation (the Funding Affordable Internet with Reliable Contributions [FAIR Contributions] Act) that would require the FCC to study the feasibility of extending the fee to ISPs, but also to streamers and other edge providers. Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), who authored the bill, has said both ISPs and the edge providers were included because: "These companies have benefited from the connectivity the USF supports but have not yet had to contribute." ■

Internet service providers have dropped their challenge of a U.S. District Court’s ruling upholding California’s network neutrality law.

The state adopted the California Internet Consumer Protection and Net Neutrality Act of 2018 (SB 822), prohibiting blocking, throttling and paid prioritization, after the Federal Communications Commission eliminated its similar net neutrality rules and reclassified internet access as a Title I information service under Trump-era chairman Ajit Pai.

The ISPs had already lost a federal district court challenge to the law and two appeals court efforts to block enforcement.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit had denied the request of ACA Connects, NCTA, CTIA and USTelecom for an injunction of enforcement of the California law while their underlying challenge was appealed. The ISPs then asked the full 9th Circuit to review that panel decision, a request that was denied.

It is the underlying challenge to the initial district court ruling, and thus to the law, that the ISPs have now dropped, according to court documents. The suit was dismissed without prejudice, which means ISPs could refile it if they chose.

The Republican Trump administration had also challenged the California law in court, but the Biden administration withdrew that — Democratic President Joe Biden is a net neutrality rule fan.

ISPs had argued that California‘s adoption of net neutrality rules were preempted by the FCC‘s decision to roll back its own rules against blocking, throttling and paid prioritization, which had prompted California to create similar rules to fill what it saw as a regulatory void.

Also: ACA Connects Makes Its Case Against California Net Neutrality Law

The three-judge 9th Circuit panel (Judges Mary M. Schroeder, J. Clifford Wallace and Danielle J. Forrest) — one of the most liberal circuits in the federal appeals court system — had agreed with the federal district court that the FCC lacked the authority to preempt the state law because in reclassifying internet access as an information service under Title I of the Communications Act, the FCC no longer had the authority to regulate the internet in the way it did when broadband was a Title II telecommunications service.

The panel pointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit‘s decision upholding the FCC’s Title I reclassification, but also striking down an accompanying order asserting the reclassification preempted state net neutrality rules.

The 9th Circuit panel also had rejected the ISPs’ contention that the California law was preempted because it conflicted with the underlying FCC policy or because interstate service was the sole province of federal law.

“The ISPs threw in the towel today on their challenge to California’s net neutrality law,” said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, senior counselor to the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, one of those defending the law before both the federal district court and the 9th Circuit. “Realizing that they could not successfully appeal the January 2022, decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to the Supreme Court, the ISPs gave up. They were forced to accept what most observers had seen: in the wake of the Federal Communications Commission’s decision disclaiming interest in treating broadband access service as subject to federal regulation, the states were freed to adopt their own requirements.

“Several other states have adopted net neutrality requirements by statute or executive order. The reasoning of the 9th Circuit court allows those provisions to remain in effect as well,” he said, adding: “The end of this litigation is a boon for free speech, competition and innovation on the internet.” ■

INCOMPAS, whose members include Netflix, Google, and Amazon, said South Korea's proposed mandated network use fees are targeted to U.S. streamers and would create barriers to both consumer choice and content provider market access.

That is according to a new report from INCOMPAS in conjunction with the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI) on the interconnection fees South Korea is considering requiring Netflix and other streamers to pay ISPs there.

Netflix last year sued SK Broadband over exacting such a fee but lost in a Korean court.

Also: INCOMPAS Tells FCC That Interconnections Need Government Minding

Now the South Korean government is considering making such "network use" fees obligatory for larger players, like Netflix.

"The latest legislative proposals would set a dangerous precedent by imposing disruptive and unwarranted taxes on the delivery of online content, which would ultimately raise costs for end users and CPs [content providers], and disincentivize the innovation that has underpinned the growth and socio-economic benefits of the internet-driven economy in Korea and around the globe," the report said.

INCOMPAS said streamers already represent a key part of the online value chain and that such fees would give ISPs "disproportionate and unjustified leverage to extract payments" from content providers. It said the proposed fees ignore the fact that content providers invest heavily on infrastructure -- cables, data centers, caches -- that reduce the traffic "burden" on ISPs.

"End users pay ISPs for an internet connection with the expectation that it will allow them to reach all legal content available on the internet, without discrimination based on whether CPs have paid 'network use fees' or not," the report said. "CPs do not 'push' traffic at ISP customers. Rather, the end users request that content enabled by CPs be delivered to them by their ISP. Similarly, CPs also do not 'use' ISPs' last-mile broadband networks; end users do, and they pay for that network usage. Mandating 'network use fees' would therefore lead to ISPs double charging by assessing CPs for services for which end users have already paid."

The report alleges a mandatory fee would incentivize ISPs to allow traffic congestion or even purposely limit performance.

It would also be a double tax, said the report: "End users pay ISPs for an internet connection with the expectation that it will allow them to reach all legal content available on the internet, without discrimination based on whether CPs have paid 'network use fees' or not. ... Mandating 'network use fees' would therefore lead to ISPs double charging by assessing CPs for services for which end users have already paid." 

Cable broadband operators are telling the FCC that it should not start making them pay into the Universal Service Fund broadband subsidies, especially given the tens of billions of dollars in broadband subsidies the Biden Administration has offered up in COVID-19 and infrastructure programs, but that if it does, mobile broadband, including texting revenue, and edge providers, should be added to the contribution rolls as well.

Edge providers and competitive carriers have already weighed in saying that the current model of only making telecoms subsidize advanced communications that is increasingly broadband-focused is unsustainable and that ISPs need to take up the slack.

Also: Edge Tells FCC to Add ISPS, Not Them, to Contribution Base

In its comments on the FCC's inquiry into what USF changes, including who contributes, need to be made, NCTA The Internet & Television Association said that the FCC should leave any action on USF sustainability to Congress and should not take up contribution reform "at this time," particularly given marketplace changes over the past few years and "the issuance of massive amounts of federal funding
to address important broadband deployment and adoption needs."

In particular, NCTA said: "Any solution involving an expansion of the existing contribution base to include broadband revenue would represent a fundamental shift in USF contribution policy that should be undertaken by Congress." It told the FCC that such a "fundamental repositioning" requires The Hill's "buy-in and guidance."

As to Big Tech, NCTA said one way to make the contribution base more equitable includes "moving to an appropriations based system or directing the Commission to develop a more equitable contribution base that includes the very largest tech platforms that have benefitted immensely from and owe their very
existence to the deployment and use of the Internet."

Also: Could the FCC Make Streamers Pay Into USF

NCTA is also proposing a freeze--then a cap--on the USF high-cost support given those "massive amounts" of infrastructure-related broadband subsidies.

But cable ISPs also argue for getting rid of the contribution factors entirely, fees that wind up being passed along to customers. They suggest that a direct congressional appropriation for broadband support, rather than a fee/tax on communications services is the better way to go, something edge providers and competitive carriers would be OK with as well. ■

Internet-service providers weighed in Monday on the White House‘s promotion of the 10 million households now served by some of its billions of dollars in broadband subsidies. 

The ISPs wanted to point out they have been offering affordable broadband to millions through their own subsidy programs for years, though they welcome the Biden administration‘s help (as long as it is targeted to the unserved and not to overbuilding in the name of price and competition).

“As the nation’s leading broadband industry, we join the Administration in celebrating the milestone of connecting ten million households to the internet via the subsidy program that Congress included in last year’s infrastructure legislation,“ Michael Powell, president and of NCTA–The Internet & Television Association, said. ”For the past decade, over 14 million consumers have subscribed to the internet via NCTA member company broadband adoption programs which include low-cost services of $10-$20 per month, discounts for computers and digital skills and literacy training. 

Also: Broadband Prices Have Been Dropping

“Cable broadband providers strongly supported inclusion of the federal subsidy in the infrastructure legislation and are active participants in the Affordable Connectivity Program,“ Powell added. “These collective public-private efforts are making a real difference in closing the digital divide and we remain committed to the mission of connecting all Americans to the internet through these programs plus our efforts to build new networks in areas that don’t yet have service.”

Comcast also pointed to its Internet Essentials program.

“Comcast is an active participant in providing connectivity through this program and has been working on the issue of broadband adoption among low-income families for over a decade,” the company said, including pointing to its own 10 million benchmark.

“In 2011, we launched Internet Essentials, a $9.95 tier of service geared for low-income families,” Comcast added. “Since the program launched, we’ve kept the price the same while increasing speeds and features, and we’re proud to have connected 10 million people, including 5 million students, over the past 10 years. Comcast is working to get the word out to customers and community partners about the ACP and help get even more people connected to broadband, example materials are attached.”

The White House called on the public and others to help spread the word about the ACP program, including at community events and on social media. ■ 

Cable and telecom internet service providers are pushing back on Democratic Federal Communications Commission nominee Gigi Sohn‘s promise to recuse herself from some issues if confirmed. They‘re suggesting such an offer signals a wider problem with which issues she would or should be weighing in on, and what impact that would have on the agency and the industry.

NCTA – The Internet & Television Association and USTelecom, in separate but similar letters to the chair and ranking members of the Senate Commerce Committee, told them they had issues with Sohn‘s promised recusal from certain broadcast matters. The Commerce Committee is holding a confirmation hearing vote Wednesday (February 2) on Sohn‘s nomination. The trade groups signaled there are some cable/broadband-related issues — think net neutrality — for which her past advocacy should raise similar concerns, if there are any concerns to be raised.

Sohn has pledged not to participate in agency decisions regarding retransmission consent or copyright issues if she is confirmed to the open Democratic seat on the commission.

That stems from her advocacy on those issues when she headed Public Knowledge.

Also: Preston Padden: ‘Wall Street Journal’ Declines Letter in Defense of Gigi Sohn

In her recusal offer to FCC general counsel Michelle Ellison, Sohn promised that, for the first four years of her term as commissioner, “I will recuse myself from participation in FCC Docket No. 10-71 or any related FCC docket concerning the same issues.” But she went beyond that.

“For the first three years of my term,” she also wrote, “I will recuse myself from any proceeding before the Commission where retransmission consent or television broadcast copyright is a material issue in the Commission’s disposition of that proceeding.” She defined material issue as “one that has influence and effect on the ultimate disposition of the matter or matters considered in the proceeding.”

Sohn said she would look to the general counsel‘s office to “make any necessary determination on the application of this recusal to a particular matter.”

In his letter, NCTA president and CEO Michael Powell said that while NCTA ”strongly supports” following government ethics rules that are meant to prevent a conflict of interest or the appearance of conflict, “Ms. Sohn’s letter raises several serious concerns.”

While he said the letter should not be read as opposition to the nomination, Powell has a couple of issues with the recusal pledge.

He said it is not clear why those would be the only issues from which she would recuse herself, “given the breadth of issues in which Public Knowledge was involved” under Sohn. He said the recusal should ”logically extend“ to all the matters she advocated for at Public Knowledge, or none.

Second, he said: “Next, in the more recent years since her service at the Commission during the Obama administration, Ms. Sohn has been publicly involved on matters of direct interest to our membership. There is no logical basis for treating these matters differently from the retransmission and copyright issues for purposes of recusal.”

Arguably the main issue she was involved in after Public Knowledge was the Title II-based net neutrality rules she stumped for as a top counselor to then-FCC chairman Tom Wheeler.

More than one Washington insider has suggested that her support for Title II, and broadband operators‘ ongoing unhappiness with that advocacy, was a big reason she was getting so much pushback on the nomination from Republicans.

Also: CWA’s Christopher Shelton Calls for Gigi Sohn’s FCC Confirmation

Powell also has issues with the scope of the recusal, which could cover a wide range of proceedings, past and future, he said. Sohn signaled in her recusal letter she would not be recusing from media ownership rules. But Powell said that “the Commission will repeatedly be required to determine whether retransmission consent or copyright issues are ‘material’ to a particular docket — including media ownership proceedings where the impact on retransmission consent rates can be at issue.” Powell is a former chairman of the FCC.

In its letter, USTelecom also said it was not taking a position on the nomination, only on the recusal offer.  

“It appears highly irregular to recuse an official from any proceeding that addresses two broad, important issues because of a prior filing in a rulemaking more than a decade ago,” said USTelecom president Jonathan Spalter in his letter. “In fact, the ethics rules generally state that prior participation in a rulemaking proceeding is not a basis for recusal. Thus, it appears that Ms. Sohn’s reasoning for recusing herself would establish a new standard for FCC commissioners participating in proceedings in which they were previously active.”

USTelecom said the recusal was clearly to assuage the broadcast industry, there are other issues much broader than a single industry. “Can the FCC be confident that Ms. Sohn will not be perceived as being able to act impartially and not give preferential treatment to any private organization or individual based on her prior FCC advocacy if, as it appears from her letter, she is concerned may not be the case for certain issues?”

USTelecom asks whether Sohn‘s failure to recuse herself from other issues on which she has advocated [like Powell“s letter, Spalter does not say which, though net neutrality is the elephant in the room], will that create the appearance of benefitting one industry over others with no precedent or rational basis."

Both NCTA and USTelecom said they want Congress to at least take these into account before they vote “in order,” as Spalter put it, “for you to assess their practical implications for the adjudicatory and rulemaking functions of the FCC as well as on the continued effectiveness and impartiality of the Commission.”

“Rather than ensuring impartiality,“ Powell said, ”Ms. Sohn‘s targeted recusal has instead raised serious questions regarding transparency together with significant concerns that one industry has been singled out for special treatment to win their support for her confirmation.“ ■

Cable and telco broadband operators have joined with computer companies and others to ask that they be allowed to "buy (less) American" when they are using the monies provided for in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) to build out networks.

In a letter to the heads of the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce and Transportation, NCTA-the Internet & Television Association, USTelecom, CTIA and others said the Buy American requirements for broadband spending could delay closing the digital divide.

"Americans without access to broadband cannot wait for a domestic supply chain to be developed out of whole cloth.... We believe that a limited, programmatic waiver is a necessary precondition to effective and efficient investment in broadband," they said.

Also: White House Issues Guide to Broadband Infrastructure Billions

While they agreed with the long-term goal of promoting more U.S. production, in the short term they said a 55% U.S. content requirement, as the IIJA mandates, does not reflect the current reality of the global supply chain, which includes "switching, routing, transport, access, operations systems, and customer premises/end user equipment and devices," each with hundreds of components with their own supply chains sourced from "trusted vendors and suppliers" around the world.

In fact, they went so far as to say that "no combination of network products would meet the IIJA’s content requirements from end-to-end."

Instead, they said, a limited waiver acknowledges what can be done in the real world. They also point to the precedent of the 2009 American Recovery Act, which imposed similar "buy American" broadband build-out provisions, but at the behest of the Agriculture and Commerce Departments, granted a "buy American" waiver. It also pointed to a similar waiver that Congress built into the Federal Acquisition Regulations. ■

The Federal Communications Commission has voted unanimously on a proposed regime for implementing Congress's mandate that internet-service providers tell their customers up front about the service those customers are buying via point-of-sale labels, and one commissioner used the agency’s January public meeting to call for Big Tech to be held to the same standard.

The FCC since 2016 has allowed ISPs voluntarily to use such so-called nutrition labels as proof that they are adhering to its transparency requirements. But chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel made clear that the difference now is the label is mandated.

The FCC is proposing to use that 2016 label format, which resembles a food nutrition label, as the mandated one, but asks whether there need to be any changes or additions.

Among the provisions in the Biden administration’s Infrastructure Act — which allocated billions of dollars for broadband, including subsidies for broadband service — was that the FCC mandate the broadband “nutrition label” so consumers can know the speed and quality of service they are getting at what price and with what fees attached.

According to the FCC Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, the label has to include “accurate information about prices, introductory rates, data allowances and broadband speeds,” as well as “management practices.” Any ISP that does not hew to the letter of the label could be pursued by the Federal Trade Commission under its authority to prevent “false and deceptive” advertising.

The labels must be accessible to the disabled and must promote equity in the provision of service.

The item asks a number of questions, including on how to ensure the accuracy of the labels' content and the proper implementation timelines.

Also: FCC Tees Up Broadband Nutrition Labels

Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, a Democrat, said he was pleased to support the item and begin the process of expanding public access to better information on broadband offerings. He said the nutrition labels will help everyday households compare prices and find the best package and deal for them.

Rosenworcel said the labels would help stop unexpected costs and fees in the “fine print.”

And while the 2016 label was voluntary, Congress gave the FCC support for a mandate that would hold ISPs to their promises, which would mean better service and better prices.

Commissioner Brendan Carr, a Republican, supported the item, but wanted to make the point that the FCC already had transparency rules on the books. “The FCC has long worked to promote transparency, including through specific rules,” he said. “Right now, we have rules on the books, for instance, that require broadband providers to publicly disclose accurate information regarding their network management practices, performance characteristics, and commercial terms sufficient to enable consumers, businesses, and entrepreneurs to make informed choices.”

While Carr voted to launch the process mandated by Congress, he suggested that using the 2016 label “could artificially constrain the agency’s ability to make decisions that reflect today’s market for connectivity.”

He also put in a plug for requiring labels from edge providers, which he has been highly critical of.

“[W]hile I am open to ways we can improve the transparency and disclosure rules that apply to broadband providers, I continue to believe that the real black box is in a different portion of the Internet ecosystem — Big Tech,” he said. “Big Tech companies provide far less transparency than broadband providers regarding their practices and commercial terms. In fact, just this week, four state AGs sued Google for misleading consumers about when Google was tracking their location information. I have been clear that I favor — and consumers deserve — greater transparency from these companies. And I have previously called for the FCC and FTC to take action here. The transparency rule that currently applies to broadband providers or even the nutrition label approach we propose here would be a good place to start when it comes to bringing much-needed and long-overdue transparency to Big Tech. This would ensure that all Internet users, from entrepreneurs to small businesses, have the information they need to make informed choices.”

Advocates See a Transparency Tool

“A broadband label is a great tool to increase transparency and help consumers better understand what they are paying for with their internet plan,” said Jonathan Schwantes, senior policy counsel at Consumer Reports. “And for those lucky consumers who enjoy a choice of ISPs, a clear, uniform label will allow those consumers to comparison shop.

“For far too long ISPs have gotten away with confusing information about the internet service they provide, hidden data caps, and bills that vary by ISPs filled with a laundry list of mysterious fees buried in the fine print. The label is a critical step in shedding more light on these practices, and will help consumers better understand what has become the essential service of the early 21st century.”

“Today’s FCC vote is a welcome step forward and a win for consumers,” Joshua Stager, deputy director for broadband and competition policy for New America‘s Open Technology Institute, said. "OTI has long called for truth-in-billing for the broadband industry, which is notorious for keeping customers in the dark. Hidden fees, surprise bills, and dense contracts are familiar problems to anyone who deals with these companies.

“The broadband nutrition label cuts through this confusion by clearly disclosing the cost and terms of service in a simple, consumer-friendly format.” 

The Federal Communications Commission is proposing to close what it says are loopholes that have allowed broadband providers to evade rules that are supposed to allow tenants in Multi-Tenant Environments (MTEs) — such as apartments, condos or mobile homes — to have choice among internet services.

The agency in September asked for a new round of comments on its proceeding. FCC chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel Friday (Jan. 21) circulated a Report and Order and Declaratory Ruling to the other commissioners that would take a number of steps in that direction.

Specifically, the Report and Order would:

1) Prohibit providers and dwelling owners (park owners in the case of mobile homes) from striking exclusive revenue-sharing agreements;

2) Requite providers to let tenants know “in plain language” if they have exclusive marketing arrangements with building owners — though importantly it does not prohibit such arrangements.

Also: FCC Seeks Input on Broadband and MTEs

The Declaratory Ruling would “clarify” that current rules prohibit sale or leaseback arrangements that have the effect of blocking alternate providers.

“With more than one-third of the U.S. population living in apartments, mobile home parks, condominiums and public housing, it’s time to crack down on practices that lock out broadband competition and consumer choice,” she said. “Consumers deserve access to a choice of providers in their buildings.  I look forward to having my colleagues join me in lifting the obstacles to competitive choice for broadband for the millions of tenants across the nation.”

It's not a lock, but the fact that she has circulated it and promoted that circulation suggests she has the votes, including at least one Republican vote, to pass it.

"The proposal by Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel to expand internet options for apartment dwellers is welcome news," said Jonathan Schwantes, senior policy counsel for Consumer Reports. "Despite exclusive arrangements between ISPs and landlords being banned for years, it's time to finally put an end to practices and close loopholes that stifle broadband competition and consumer choice, especially for those most in need. We know that when consumers have more choices for internet service, they enjoy lower prices." ■

Associations representing cable, telecom and wireless ISPs have teamed up to ask the FCC to create a safe harbor for companies that want to enroll eligible consumers in the new Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) subsidy before the FCC has figured out just how to transition from the COVID-19-driven Emergency Broadband Benefit subsidy to ACP under rules not yet hammered out.

The ACP takes effect December 31 and without a grace period between its launch and the FCC's implementing rules, which the FCC indicated won't be adopted until mid-January and probably won't become effective until sometime after that, that uncertainty could discourage ISP participation.

"Unfortunately, the ACP program requirements will not be clear until the Commission addresses key issues identified in the record, including the scope of plans that providers must include in the program and the circumstances in which providers may continue to use credit check inquiries," they told the FCC. "If providers defer enrolling new households in ACP due to this uncertainty, it would have an unfortunate impact on eligible low-income households when the program begins. It also would disadvantage providers that have chosen to participate in EBBP relative to providers that have not done so," they said.

Also: ISPs Tell FCC Not to Mandate Subsidies on Grandfathered Broadband Plans

They are proposing a safe harbor between December 31 and whenever the ACP rules take effect, during which ISPs would be operating under the old EBB rules, with some modifications. Any ISPs that comply will be deemed in compliance with ACP.

It would require the FCC to defer enforcing statutory requirements, but they point out the FCC has done so before in order to effect an orderly transition to a new regulatory framework." Tying deferred enforcement to the proposed safe harbor would "provide the Commission and consumers with the certainty that providers would continue to follow the established EBBP rules during this deferral period." ■

ISPs are telling the FCC not to require ISPS to allow broadband subsidy recipients to apply those subsidies to grandfathered plans, arguing that it would be burdensome and confusing, though they also said they should be free to apply the subsidies to select grandfathered plans.

The ISPs argue that requiring that the subsidy be applied to older plans being phased out could prove problematic in terms of billing and conflicts with the statute's language about plans that are "generally available."

The FCC sought input on how to transition Congress' COVID-19-realated Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB) subsidy program to the new, $14 billion, Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) subsidy in the infrastructure bill, including on how to interpret the Congressional mandate that the subsidy be applied to “any internet service offering” and whether that extended to “legacy or grandfathered" plans.

Those grandfathered plans are ones no longer offered to new customers but maintained for legacy customers until the plans are phased out. Those could include plans inherited by a company when it bought another ISP.

NCTA-the Internet & Television Association told the FCC that a mandate to apply the subsidies to grandfathered plans would avoid confusion and insure the program could actually be administered.

It said the FCC should clarify that the "any internet service offering" to which the subsidies apply means "offerings that are generally available to new customers" but not necessarily to grandfathered plans.

"In implementing this provision, the Commission should confirm that the requirement applies only to service offerings that are generally available in the marketplace, not legacy plans," NCTA said. "The Commission, however, should not prohibit providers from choosing to allow consumers to apply their ACP benefit to legacy plans."

AT&T also opposes including grandfathered plans in the mandate.

"Participating providers should not be required to apply the ACP benefit to grandfathered plans. By definition, grandfathered plans are not generally available and actively sold. Grandfathered plans are older plans that are no longer available to new customers, but those customers already on the plan can remain. The number of customers on grandfathered plans usually decline until there are none remaining, and the provider discontinues the plan."

AT&T said it has hundreds of such plans and that the system upgrades necessary to enable the benefit to be applied to those "antiquated" systems would be burdensome and outweigh the benefit to that "declining" group of consumers.

Those upgrades would include "extensive technology development work done on older billing systems," it argues. To mandate the subsidies be applied to grandfathered systems would thus discourage provider participation. Like NCTA, AT&T says better to give ISPs the flexibility to apply it when it makes sense, on "the most relevant, select grandfathered plans for which system changes can be more easily accommodated." ■

The FTC has concluded that ISPs are collecting and sharing more data about their customers than those customers are aware of, including internet traffic and real-time location data, while "failing to offer consumers meaningful choices about how this data can be used."

FTC chair Lina Khan said the report would be part of an "ongoing conversation" about commercial data practices, but one that could be "incorporated" into FTC action.

That is according to a staff report culminating a two-year investigation into the data practices of AT&T, Cellco Partnership (Verizon Wireless), Charter, Comcast, T-Mobile and Google Fiber, a report the FTC said revealed "troubling aspects of some ISP data collection practices." The FTC also sought info from three affiliated ad entities, AT&T’s Appnexus (rebranded Xandr); Verizon’s Verizon Online; and Oath Americas (now Verizon Media).

Cable ISPs pushed back hard on the report and its "lumping" of their business with the Big Tech platforms NCTA-the Internet & Television Association suggested should be the FTC's focus.

Also Read: FTC Asked to Prevent Surveillance Advertising

The report pointed out that news outlets had reported that location data had been shared with third parties including "car salesmen, property managers, bail bondsmen, bounty hunters, and others without reasonable protections or consumers’ knowledge and consent."

It also said that while companies claim to give consumers choice, many make it tough to exercise that choice, and while they promise to keep data only as long as it is needed for a business purpose, what falls under that definition varies "widely."

The FTC said the report's findings underscore the need to restrict data collection and use.

The report was approved unanimously 4-1 by the commission, with Khan issuing a separate statement.

Khan said the report highlighted 1) problems with the notice-and-consent framework for data collection and sharing; 2) the expansion of ISPs into vertically integrated businesses including ones providing content for their broadband "pipes"; and 3) the potential use of "hyper-granular" online dossiers to discriminate against users.

Khan also said she thought the FCC had the expertise to "fully oversee internet providers," and that it should reassert that authority by "once again put[ting] in place the nondiscrimination rules, privacy protections, and other basic requirements needed to create a healthier market."

That was a reference to the FCC's decision during the Trump Administration to reclassify broadband access as an information service, eliminate those rules, and deed oversight of most of that to the FTC. To reassert that authority and return the rules, the FCC will need a third Democrat since the commission is currently at a 2-2 political tie.

While the FTC has appeared to be more focused on big edge players like Facebook and Twitter of late, it talked about how the ISPs had become tech giants offering "voice, content, smart devices, advertising, and analytics" that all implicated data collection on a big scale.

Among the "troubling" practices report found were that several of the ISPs "combine data across product lines; combine personal, app usage, and web browsing data to target ads; place consumers into sensitive categories such as by race and sexual orientation; and share real-time location data with third-parties."

The companies have privacy protections, but the FTC said that while a number of them promise not to "sell" data to third parties, they allow it to be shared and otherwise monetized "and hide disclosures about such practices in fine print of their privacy policies."

While the association's representing telecom ISPs provided cautious responses focusing on their support of federal privacy legislation, NCTA led with major pushback on both the report and the FTC's characterization of ISPs before joining in a call for consistent privacy rules across all sectors, including online platforms and other Big Tech.

“Consumers’ online safety and privacy is a top priority for the wireless industry, and federal legislation that uniformly protects users across all platforms is the best way forward," said CTIA, the wireless association. "We are looking forward to continuing to work with the FTC, lawmakers and companies across the ecosystem to ensure consumers are protected.”

“As the FTC has called for numerous times, and as previously urged by USTelecom, Congress must enact a national, comprehensive federal privacy framework that puts consumers first and applies uniformly to all companies operating online," said USTelecom, which represents wired telecom ISPs.

“The FTC’s report provides a highly distorted view of ISP data collection policies and inappropriately attempts to lump broadband providers into the same category as the Big Tech platforms. Cable broadband providers take seriously their responsibility to safeguard the personal information of their customers and do not surveil their customers or sell their location data. Viewed objectively, today’s presentation is a broad attack on online advertising generally, not specific ISP actions. And what is further missing from today’s report is the much larger story about Big Tech platforms that are premised on maximizing user attention. What is needed is a consistent set of privacy rules across the online marketplace on a technology-neutral basis. We look forward to continued engagement with policymakers to forge a strong, consistent framework for privacy protection.”

Cable operators aren't gerrymandering their broadband service in urban areas but instead delivering fast speeds equitably throughout their footprint, said NCTA-The Internet & Television Association, which also said it has the data to back up that assertion.

NCTA said that the claim that ISPs favor some communities “absolutely” does not apply.

Citing its own just-released analysis, NCTA said that gigabit speeds are offered to 91% of all urban households, and while that percentage rises to 94% of middle income residents, it actually falls to 90% of those with the highest income.

Also Read: House Dems Focus on Digital Disparities

As to any claims of a difference in availability according to race or ethnicity, NCTA said there is “virtually no” difference.

For urban areas with the highest percentage of African-Americans and Hispanics, that availability of gigabit speeds from cable broadband providers is 92% and 94%, respectively. For urban areas with the lowest percentage of African-Americans and Hispanics, the figures are 92% and 94%, said NCTA.

The data, said NCTA, "clearly shows that cable broadband providers have built and continue to update broadband networks throughout their entire service areas, including urban centers."

The NCTA study is based on FCC broadband availability data, which the association concedes needs improving, and Census Bureau data for racial composition. 

A New York court has blocked a law that would have required ISPs to provide low-cost broadband to low-income households, issuing an injunction that temporarily blocks the enforcement of the new law and signaling that the ISPs are likely to win the underlying case that the law should not go into effect at all.

The court signaled that ISPs are likely to prevail on the argument that imposing such rate regulation was a form of common carrier regulation that conflicted with the FCC's most recent decision that internet access is a Title I information service not subject to common carriers regs, and so the New York State law is preempted. "To be clear, the ABA is rate regulation, and rate regulation is a form of common carrier treatment," said Judge Denis R. Hurley of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

Seeking the injunctions were ACA Connects, CTIA, The New York State Telecommunications Association, USTelecom, NTCA-the Rural Broadband Association, and the Satellite Broadcasting & Communications Association.

Affordable Broadband Act was to have gone into effect June 15. It would require ISPs in the state to offer low-income households high-speed broadband--at least 25 Mbps download speeds-- for $15 per month, or of 200 Mbps for no more than $20. About 2.7 million households would qualify, or more than a third of all the households in New York. The service had to be offered as a standalone and must be advertised and promoted so people know it is available.

Prices could be raised according to a statutory formula, but only once every five years.

The associations sued to block the law April 30 and sought the injunction May 6.

In granting the injunction, Judge Hurley also agreed with ISPs that they would suffer irreparable harm--potentially facing civil penalties or losing their franchise if they don't comply with the law, or if they do, having to supply broadband at a loss, which would "raise advertising expenditures, impose administrative costs due to providers’ need 'to develop a system for validating customers’ eligibility,' force them to cancel preexisting business plans for upgrades to, and expansion of, their broadband networks, and inflict reputational harm," said the court.

The court concluded the harm was actual and imminent not remote or speculative, one of the tests for a preliminary injunction.

Hurley said the threat of monetary harm was most persuasive argument since trying to redress that harm later by getting money back from the state government would be difficult since it has sovereign immunity. "Though monetary damages would usually supply an adequate remedy at law negating the availability of preliminary injunctive relief, the harm takes on special import where, as here, the Eleventh Amendment precludes redressability."

ISPs are already offering a variety of low-cost broadband plans using the FCC's Lifeline broadband subsidies, and will be offering more with COVID-19 aid money.

Notably absent from the suit was NCTA-the Internet & Television Association. A spokesman had no comment on the injunction and said NCTA had not signed on to the suit because "plenty of others already had."

As promised, Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.) has introduced a bill, the Expanding Opportunities for Broadband Deployment Act, that would eliminate the ETC (eligible telecommunications carrier) requirement for accessing Lifeline broadband subsidies.

Butterfield represents a rural North Carolina that desperately needs broadband, he has said, but that qualified providers are being discouraged from participating in FCC subsidy programs due to the "outdated" state-by-state ETC reporting requirements.

Cable operators have long pushed to scrap the ETC requirement to open up subidies for more cable ops.

Also Read: FCC Sets Deadline for Non-ETCs

"The bill will enable more broadband service providers to participate in the FCC’s Universal Service Fund (USF) programs by eliminating an outdated requirement that only internet service providers designated as eligible telecommunications carriers (ETCs) may receive USF dollars," said Butterfield, adding: "Eliminating the ETC requirement will benefit low-income families in North Carolina and across the country by providing more choices for broadband service through the Lifeline Program while promoting competitive prices and high-quality service."

NCTA-The Internet & Television Association, was applauding.

“Getting broadband to unserved communities that need it most is an important priority for our industry. The Expanding Opportunities for Broadband Deployment Act introduced today by Rep. G. K. Butterfield (D-NC) is legislation that takes important steps forward to achieving that goal and accelerating broadband deployment for more Americans," NCTA said in a statement. By retiring the eligible telecommunications carrier (ETC) designation, more ISPs with a proven track record of operating broadband networks would compete for government support. Now is the time for Congress to remove barriers that deter ISPs from delivering broadband service so that every American can have access to this important resource.”

ISPs may not want broadband access to be treated as a utility, but the Department of Transportation is recommending that approach to states when it comes to using highway rights of way (ROW) to boost broadband deployment.

That came in a memo from the Department of Transportation to state DOTs. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg committed his department to work with states to "host transmission lines, build renewable energy projects, deploy broadband, and support electric vehicle charging along highway rights-of-way," all part of President Joe Biden's modernization of the power grid.

Buttigieg encouraged Federal Highway Administration division offices to encourage state DOTs to think about practices to further broadband deployment, including "minimizing repeated excavation of the roadway" [more popularly known as "dig once"], coordinating with broadband utilities [note the use of the term "utility"] during highway construction, and integrating trenchless technologies into construction practices, as appropriate."

Also Read: Broadband Infusion in Biden Plan Faces Challenges

DOT also encouraged the states to treat broadband as a utility--in terms of accommodating them in rights of way (ROW) "to the extent practicable and consistent with State law." It said that for broadband projects, updating a state's utility accommodation policy could help. It added that states where laws allow for broadband to be considered a "utility facility," can proceed with the permitting process under applicable terms and conditions.

DOT provides for an alternative to the utility designation for broadband. "As a separate path from accommodation as "utilities," the FHWA may approve alternative uses of the highway ROW if it is determined that such occupancy, use, or reservation is in the public interest and will not impair the highway or interfere with the free and safe flow of traffic thereon," DOT said.

ISPs are all for digging once and otherwise speeding broadband deployment, but would probably prefer that their definition as utilities not gain traction if it also suggests they should be reclassified as Title II telecom services subject to mandatory access and rate regs as Democrats have been pushing for.

Former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said ISPs pushed for reclassification of internet access as a Title I service so that authority over their service could get put in the FTC and "lost" among all that agency's other responsibilities, which is what he said the Trump Administration ended up doing.

Wheeler, currently a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, has argued for creating a new expert agency, separate from the FTC or FCC, to oversee digital platforms. 

Also Read: Tom Wheeler to Hill: 1 Gig Needed to Bridge Digital Chasm

As FCC chairman, Wheeler focused on ISPs, saying he did not have authority over platforms. But he also did not use his bully pulpit to raise red flags about the power platforms like Google and Facebook wielded, instead focusing on ISPs as the snakes in the virtuous platform garden.

Wheeler, who was being interviewed for C-SPAN's Communicators series, was asked why the U.S. needed a new agency. He said the current rules were built around industrial concepts that don't apply and it is time for a "new regulatory paradigm" that provides for both more agile regulation, which tech companies have asked for, while still protecting competition and consumers. 

He said the best way to do that was to start with a clean slate with a new set of expectations and procedures.

Asked whether the FCC could handle digital issues, Wheeler said that the reason he didn't do anything about digital economy issues during his tenure atop the FCC was that while the commission had authority over networks it did not have authority over the content delivered over those networks.

Wheeler said the reality is that the network (IP delivery) and the application are now both zeros and ones, and that what should be focused on is the impact of both, not getting lost in the zeros and ones.

Wheeler suggested that the $40 billion the FCC has spent in subsidies for broadband in high-cost areas over the past decade was invested in "building for yesterday's needs rather than tomorrow's realities," something he said frustrated him while he was at the agency. He said those subsidy programs, thus far, have failed. Instead, he said, a one-time $80 billion should be spent to fiber the country. 

President Joe Biden this week announced that broadband subsidy money in his massive infrastructure bill would go toward building future-proof broadband, so he is clearly reading from the same page as Wheeler.

Wheeler put in a plug for the return of Title II net neutrality rules--ISPs have argued that that would be re-applying last century's common carrier regs to today's realities.

But he did not put in a plug for current acting FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel to get the permanent nod. Asked who he thought President Biden should name, he suggested it should be someone like him with management experience, since the chair is basically the agency CEO. Rosenworcel's experience is in policy as a top Hill and FCC staffer before being named to the commission.

Also Read: Pressure Builds to Name Permanent FCC Chair

There was some friction between Wheeler and Rosenworcel toward the end of his chairmanship, according to multiple sources, after Rosenworcel took a different view on how the FCC should craft set-top box rules to promote more video competition.

Wheeler declined to recommend anyone, saying it was a decision Biden was capable of making on his own. He did say he hoped he would pick someone with "experience in the field and strong leadership." 

The Wheeler episode of Communicators airs on C-SPAN Saturday, April 3, at 6:30 p.m. ET and Monday, April 5, on C-SPAN2 at 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. ET.

Some major broadband associations want to make sure the FCC knows they are on the same page when it comes to spending the $3.2 billion in emergency broadband funds Congress has allocated.

The FCC has 60 days from the passage of the COVID-19 aid package Dec. 22 to figure out just how to do that.

Also Read: NCTA Says Broadband Pledgers Should Get Funds

According to an ex parte document filed with the FCC, executives from ACA Connects, NCTA-the Internet & Television Association, INCOMPAS, and WISPA, the wireless internet service providers association, met via videoconference with Wireline Competition Bureau staffers to present a unified front on some key elements of the program.

They want the FCC to allow non-eligible telecommunications carriers (ETCs) to be eligible for the new funds and get the training to be able to participate in the applications process from "day one."

They also want the FCC to establish an initial filing window for applications, rather than the current proposal to have a rolling review process, and they want a single start date for all providers that qualify "so that consumers are presented with a full array of competitive broadband choices."

Also Read: Verizon Proposes Government-Funded Broadband Debit Cards

Lastly, they want flexibility in "the specific service offerings that are available for the EBB program, the categories of households that may participate, and the verification processes that providers will use to qualify households."

The European Commission has unveiled what it bills as an ambitious reform of the digital marketplace and it clearly appears to deliver on that billing. It includes proposed new rules for social media, online markets, ISPs, and other platforms that operate in the European Union, as well as a definition of who qualifies as a digital "gatekeeper" and stiff penalties for gatekeepers who get out of their lanes.

The new rules were set out in the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act.

Also Read: FTC Investigating Video Streamer, Social Media Data Practices

The Digital Service Act covers network infrastructure companies, access providers, domain name registrars, cloud hosting services, online marketplaces like Amazon, app stores, and social media platforms, with tougher rules for "very large" platforms, which the EC says pose "particular risks in the dissemination of illegal content and societal harms."

The reforms include transparency reporting, complaint and redress mechanisms, vetting third-party suppliers, user-facing transparency about online advertising, external audits, sharing data with authorities and researchers, codes of conduct, and more.

The goal of the act is to "improve the mechanisms for the removal of illegal content and for the effective protection of users’ fundamental rights online, including the freedom of speech," as well as to strengthen public oversight of online platforms, particularly those very large platforms that reach over 10% of the EU population--Facebook, Amazon, etc.

The Digital Markets Act is "a set of narrowly defined objective criteria for qualifying a large online platform as a so-called 'gatekeeper.'" If they meet the definition, they will have a list of "do's and don'ts" that apply to their daily operations.

A company will be considered a gatekeeper if it: (1) "has a strong economic position, significant impact on the internal market and is active in multiple EU countries"; (2) "has a strong intermediation position, meaning that it links a large user base to a large number of businesses"; and (3) "has (or is about to have) an entrenched and durable position in the market, meaning that it is stable over time."

Any company to which those apply (1) must allow for interoperability by third parties in certain situations; (2) must allow businesses to access the data they generate when they use a gatekeeper platform: (3) must provide advertisers tools and info to verify the their ads on the gatekeeper platform, and 4) allow business users to contract with customers outside the platform.

Those are the do's--or, more accurately, "musts." The don'ts include (1) favoring their own services or products in rankings; (2) preventing consumers from linking to businesses outside the platform; and (3) preventing the de-installation of pre-installed software or apps.

Failure to do or not do what they are supposed to could result in fines up to 10% of a company's total annual worldwide sales and periodic payments of up to 5% of average daily sales.

“As representatives of the world’s leading companies across all the segments of industry, we recognise our shared responsibility to maintain a safe, competitive, and innovative online environment,” said Guido Lobrano, of tech association ITI. “All relevant stakeholders need to work together towards these goals. While ITI and its members will develop detailed views on the legislative proposals in the coming weeks, we support the Commission’s effort to safeguard citizens from illegal content online and will continue to advocate for rules that maintain a well-functioning, competitive online ecosystem. We look forward to discussing these and further aspects of today’s proposals with the European institutions in the coming weeks. We are committed to serving as a useful resource to all stakeholders involved in the process.”

But ITI did not like the designation of "gatekeeper," which it found pejorative. "There should be no negative implication attached by default to companies designated as gatekeeper under the DMA criteria," it said, adding that it was not appropriate for the legislation "to label the designated companies with an inherently negative definition. This designation is only a prerequisite to attach more stringent obligations to platforms that play a systemic role in a market. Talking about a 'provider of core platform services' would be, for example, more appropriate."

A feisty FCC Chairman Ajit Pai spent several paragraphs of his blog on the Oct. 27 public meeting agenda making the case for why he was right to deregulate internet access and critics were wrong.

He was commenting on the plan to vote on the FCC's response to a federal appeals court demand that the FCC better explain how its Restoring Internet Freedom order affects various constituencies.

Related: FCC to Vote on Net Neutrality Remand Item

Billing the agenda as Halloween treats, he called the criticism of the Restoring Internet Freedom's elimination of rules against blocking, throttling and paid prioritization a "trick" played by "numerous Washington politicians, far-left special-interest groups, Hollywood stars, and Silicon Valley tech giants."

Referring to the arguments made by some net neutrality rule advocates, Pai dismissed them. "The American people were told that they would get the internet one word at a time. They were told that they would have to pay $5 per tweet. They were told that it would be the end of the internet as we know it. It was frightening stuff to be sure, but it was utter nonsense," he wrote.

Related: Court Upholds Most of FCC ISP Dereg

He said the FCC had ignored those "falsehoods" and the "ruckus" they created, which included death threats, a bomb threat, and harassment. The result, he argued, and ISPs have argued as well, is that network investment hit levels not seen in a decade while remaining "free and open."

He praised ISPs for their performance during the pandemic, saying they have not had to do what networks in some other countries have done, including asking streaming services like Netflix and YouTube to down convert from HD to SD.

A group of prominent Senate Democrats led by former tech exec Mark Warner (D-Va.) are calling on ISPs to take further steps to expand broadband coverage and insure that they are doing everything possible to close the digital educational divide as students return to increasingly virtual classrooms.

In a letter to the CEO's of AT&T, CenturyLink, Charter Communications, Comcast, Cox Communications, T-Mobile, and Verizon, they called on the companies to "limit the economic and social disruption" of COVID-19, specifically by suspending limits and fees on broadband usage, as well as to expand coverage areas, in the name of remote learning and education and healthcare, but with an emphasis on education as a new school year begins.

Related: ISPs Launch Bridge to Educational Connectivity

"We have heard from public schools who express appreciation for internet service options that enable remote learning, but are also concerned with ongoing data limitations and continued lack of service for many households," they wrote.

Earlier in the pandemic, the ISPs suspended overage charges and late payments and service cut-offs due to nonpayment at the behest of the FCC, but that Connect America pledge has expired. "[W]e ask again that you temporarily suspend data caps and associated fees or throttling for affected communities, and work with public school districts, colleges, and universities to provide free, or at-cost broadband options for students whose schools are closed due to COVID-19 and don’t have sufficient access at home," the senators wrote.

They cited what they said were "numerous" complaints from parents and teachers about usage caps and limited bandwidth as well as being ineligible for new service due to past missed payments.

The letter came only days after FCC chairman Ajit Pai praised cable and telecom ISPs for a new educational tech initiative, K-12 Bridge to Broadband, which provides discounted service to school systems so they can buy home access for unconnected low-income families. Pai pointed out that there are billions in COVID-19 aid that schools could tap.

Cable operator and telecom ISPs are offering school districts a discount on home broadband to help bridge the educational digital divide.

NCTA-The Internet & Television Association (as well as USTelecom) are teaming up with nonprofit EducationSuperHighway on the K-12 Bridge to Broadband, which will help public school districts and states identify the low-income students who need help to join the remote hybrid learning educational system prompted by the pandemic.

Cable ops who have committed to the program include Comcast, Cox, Charter, Mediacom and GCI.

“America’s broadband networks are continuing to play a critical role in helping the nation adapt to changes in daily life required by the COVID pandemic,” said NCTA president Michael Powell. “As the school year begins, these changes are front and center in many parts of the country, with family rooms temporarily replacing classrooms and more schools using online instruction to continue their educational mission. In rising to these challenges, the cable industry is continuing to provide robust and reliable service and is redoubling our efforts to work collaboratively with schools, communities and other partners to get families connected through innovative new service models that will foster and sustain the educational progress of our children.”

The basic approach of the K-12 Bridge to Broadband is that NCTA members will offer a "sponsored service" through which school systems can buy broadband for low-income students at a discount. ISPs will also work with school districts to identify the eligible students who don't have broadband.

ISPs will agree not to use any information shared with them by the school for target marketing to participating families or for other services unrelated to the sponsored service.

The new initiative got a shout-out from FCC chairman Ajit Pai, who urged school systems to use some of the billions in existing connectivity funding to help with the remote learning effort.

“I thank NCTA and the EducationSuperHighway for launching this initiative to make it easier for students in low-income families to connect to the internet,” said Pai. “With the start of the school year and the continued reliance upon remote learning in many parts of the country, it is essential that students have the connectivity they need to continue their education through this and similar initiatives. I therefore reiterate my call for states and school districts to take advantage of the $16 billion in CARES Act funding that can be used to connect our nation’s students during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The FCC has been working with the U.S. Department of Education to raise awareness of this CARES Act funding for remote learning, and this money is already having a positive impact. For example, in the District of Columbia, the CARES Act is making it possible for the D.C. government to cover monthly Internet bills for tens of thousands of children in low-income families who attend local public and charter schools. Similar initiatives using CARES Act funds have been launched in other states, including Alabama and Connecticut, to ensure low-income students are able to engage in remote learning during the ongoing pandemic.”

ISPs' ears must have been burning Tuesday (Sept. 1) as FCC chairman Ajit Pai praised them for the performance of their networks during the pandemic and that investments they had made in those networks that paved the way for that performance.

Pai was providing remarks for a virtual ITU global regulator symposium.

Asked to address the experience of dealing with the pandemic, Pai said the headline was that America's communications networks had performed extremely well.

"Our wired and wireless networks handled this surge without any significant service disruptions or declines," said, citing Ookla figures showing that between March 2 and July 13, average U.S. fixed broadband speeds were actually up 10%, while average mobile broadband speeds were up by 4%.

Why was this the case in the face of increased demand from a stay-at-home populace? He said part of it was the hard work and creativity of carriers. "As one example, from March to July, Comcast, our nation’s largest cable operator, averaged nearly 900 network improvements per week, on top of over 450 improvements to its core network. Because of these efforts, they added more than 128 Terabits of capacity."

But beyond that, he said, "I would argue that the biggest reason U.S. carriers were equipped to handle the unexpected surge in traffic was the investments they made long before anybody had ever heard of COVID-19. Over the past couple of years, we’ve seen network investment hit levels that our nation hadn’t seen for over a
decade."

As he has said before, Pai credited the FCC's elimination of net neutrality rules in 2017 for that increase in investment. "I would also point out that broadband investment declined in the U.S. in 2015 and 2016 (two years when the Internet was treated like a public utility)—the first time that had happened outside of a recession in the Internet era," he added to push the point.
 
He also pointed out that ISPs had responded when the FCC asked them to voluntarily keep subs connected during the economic hit of COVID-19. "By working with industry cooperatively, we made progress much more quickly than we would
have had we pursued command-and-control regulation," he said.

Pai suggested the takeaway for regulators is that "unleashing private markets often can be the most effective way to advance the public interest."

FCC chair Ajit Pai has signaled he is asking ISPs to extend a portion of their Keep Americans Connected through the end of July, at least via deferred and extended payment plans, but is also supporting a legislative proposal to use taxpayer funds going forward.

The chairman sent a letter to Congress seeking funds via legislation to help keep consumers stay connected over the "coming months" after the pledge ends June 30. It was initially to have ended in May, then early June, but has already been extended twice.

"[B]roadband and telephone companies, especially small ones, cannot continue to provide service without being paid for an indefinite period of time; no business in any sector of our economy could. So I believe now is the time for legislation to ensure that doctors and patients, students and teachers, low-income families and veterans, those who have lost their jobs and livelihoods due to the pandemic and the accompanying lockdowns, those in our cities and those in the countryside—in short, all Americans—remain connected until this emergency ends.

Specifically, he is backing the Broadband Connectivity and Digital Equity Framework from Republicans Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee and Greg Walden (R-Ore.), which he calls a forward thinking proposal which would secure such connectivity. 

Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) expressed concerns about whether and how Congress could compensate internet service providers for their contribution to COVID-19 relief--in the form of investment in and payment relief for their customers via the Keep Americans Connected pledge. 

That came in a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on FCC spectrum auction oversight.  

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said the FCC would be happy to work with Congress on a way to compensate ISPs, particularly smaller, rural carriers, for the lost revenue due to their pledge not to pull the plug on nonpaying customers during the pandemic. 

The FCC adopted its connectivity pledge March 12, then extended it to June 30. Virtually all the major ISPs and many of the smaller ones--over 750 in all--signed on to that pledge. 

Specifically, they pledged to: 

(1) "not terminate service to any residential or small business customers because of their inability to pay their bills due to the disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic;   

(2) "waive any late fees that any residential or small business customers incur because of their economic circumstances related to the coronavirus pandemic; and  

(3) "open WiFi hot spots to any American who needs them." 

Moran asked what the cost to ISPs had been of waived late fees and payments, and whether there was any plan for them to recoup that money, particularly the smaller ISPs, essentially small businesses, who were also suffering economic issues during the pandemic.

Pai said he had had conversations with companies and associations that the pledge "can be a hardship." He said he did not have numbers for lost revenues, but would be happy to work with Congress to find a funding vehicle, though he suggested that could be for "continuing" those connectivity commitments. 

He said he would defer to Congress on the appropriate amount and vehicle for such compensation, but offered his FCC team to work on it with them. 

Moran asked if the FCC had anticipated this would just be a payment "pause," after which customers would be expected to pay when they could? 

Pai agreed it was a "pause," but what the companies did afterwards would be up to them. He said the FCC's focus was in keeping connectivity.

Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) expressed concerns about whether and how Congress could compensate internet service providers for their contribution to COVID-19 relief--in the form of investment in and payment relief for their customers via the Keep Americans Connected pledge. 

That came in a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on FCC spectrum auction oversight, at which FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.  

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said the FCC would be happy to work with Congress on a way to compensate ISPs, particualrly smaller, rural carriers, for the lost revenue due to their pledge not to pull the plug on nonpaying customers during the pandemic. 

The FCC adopted its connectivity pledge March 12, then extended it to June 30. Virtually all the major ISPs and many of the smaller ones--over 750 in all--signed on to that pledge. 

Specifically, they pledged to: 

(1) "not terminate service to any residential or small business customers because of their inability to pay their bills due to the disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic;   

(2) "waive any late fees that any residential or small business customers incur because of their economic circumstances related to the coronavirus pandemic; and  

(3) "open WiFi hot spots to any American who needs them." 

Moran asked what the cost to ISPs had been of waived late fees and payments, and whether there was any plan for them to recoup that money, particularly the smaller ISPS, essentially small businesses, who were also suffering economic issues during the pandemic.   

Pai said he had had conversations with companies and associations that the pledge "can be a hardship." He said he did not have numbers for lost revenues, but would be happy to work with Congress to find a funding vehicle, though he suggested that could be for "continuing" those connectivity commitments. 

He said he would defer to Congress on the appropriate amount and vehicle for such compensation, but offered his FCC team to work on it with them. 

Moran asked if the FCC had anticipated this would just be a payment "pause," after which customers would be expected to pay when they could? 

Pai agreed it was a "pause," but what the companies did afterwards would be up to them. He said the FCC's focus was in keeping connectivity. 

Verizon has topped the list of how the top 100 largest employers responded to the pandemic. Two ISPs made the top 10.

The magazine looked at public companies from mid-March through May 7, looking at 22 categories from attendance policy changes to community relief and rated them on scale from one to five, five being the highest. With an average of 3.87 Verizon came out on top.

Verizon got particularly high marks for its sick leave policies and also scored well with dependent care efforts and community contributions.

Forbes also said the company had not laid off any of its workers while committing $54 million in donations to charities and nonprofits.

Specifically, Forbes broke out the following efforts:

•"Offered extra compensation for full-time employees still working in the field or offices.

• "Held back on cutting service for customers struggling to pay because of the pandemic.' [That was also an element of an FCC pledge almost all ISPs agreed to.]

• "Launched a COVID-19-specific leave-of-absence policy that provides 100% of pay for up to eight weeks, reduced to 60% of pay for up to 16 weeks."

AT&T came in number three on the list at 3.83 thanks to work-from-home-policies, and a $10 million donation to remote learning, among other efforts. T-Mobile was number five at 3.77.

The highest-ranked cable ISPS was Charter, which came in at number 12.

Of particular note was its decision to permanently raise its minimum wage to $20 an hour over the next two years, and its donation of $12 million worth of commercial time to COVID-19 public-service announcements.

Other top 20 notables were Alphabet (Google) at 16, Apple at 18.

Public Knowledge's message to the Senate Wednesday (May 13) will be that broadband is an essential service currently without universal access, a digital divide that must be closed in a COVID-19 reality with money prioritized to municipal broadband and co-ops and with Congress removing limitations on "overbuilding." 

Related: Groups Petition FCC for Broadband Billions During Pandemic

Public Knowledge says that any government money toward that end should be conditioned either on funding competing service in undserved areas--municipal broadband and co-ops-- or mandating that ISPs serve areas they do not currently take subsidies to build out because they are unprofitable over time. 

That is according to the testimony of senior advisor Gene Kimmelman for a hearing in the Senate Commerce Committee on broadband and COVID-19. He said Congress' must not only look at short term measure but long-term investments in expanding access to those in need in all communities, rural, suburban and urban, and by access he means to "reliable, resilient and sufficient" broadband service, and to both unserved and underserved.  

Kimmelman said government policies creating more affordable broadband should supersede the state bans or impediments to municipal broadband. 

Related: Comcast Extends Connectivity Pledge

He suggested Congress may need to allocate as much as $80 billion for a universal buildout, citing FCC estimates that that is what it will cost to deploy nationwide broadband. He said Congress should prioritize municipal broadband and co-ops when handing out the money. 

ISPs have traditionally pushed back on such efforts as government-subsidized overbuilds of their existing service that often aren't sustainable as ongoing operations once the build-out subsidies run out. 

He also said Congress should force the FCC to come up with better broadband availability data and to treat state broadband grants as complements, not replacements, for federal efforts. The FCC has said a new broadband buildout fund should be reserved for areas not already getting broadband grants from other sources. 

Related: COVID-19 Bill Should Build Lasting Broadband Legacy

And while there has been an emphasis on digital learning for K-12, Kimmelman said Congress should also pass the Connectivity for Higher Education Students in Need Act, which provides money for post-secondary schools. 

Kimmelman's other asks included a ban on data caps, reinstating FCC copper retirement rules, and requiring the FCC to collect detailed data on broadband pricing. 

Former FCC chairman Tom Wheeler says that the current health crisis as exposed both the brilliance of the Internet's architecture, but also the pressing need to get that network to all Americans. 

Wheeler was praising ISPs last week for keeping the internet up and running during the crush of COVID-19 coronavirus-related traffic, a critical service he suggested must now be considered a necessity for all Americans. 

In an online post, "Why the Internet Didn't Break," for the Brookings Institution, where he is a visiting fellow, Wheeler gave credit to the nation's broadband providers. "The fact we can work from home is the result of hundreds of billions of investment dollars and construction and operational skill." 

Wheeler is also the former head of NCTA-The Internet & Television Association and CTIA-The Wireless Association, both key players in that all-important buildout. 

Wheeler spent much of his FCC tenure calling out ISPs for being the potential choke points in an open internet, and his FCC eventually imposed regulations on access that the current FCC scrapped. 

But his Brookings post was not focused on ISP business practices, but on the architecture of the internet that allowed it to handle the new traffic load including the fact that it was built with the operationally flexibility to handle traffic surges and that its architecture is an interconnection of nets, a system he says has worked brilliantly during the present crisis. 

But when it came to the politics of the issue, Wheeler was on familiar ground. He said where the internet WAS broken was the digital divide, where at least 20 million-plus people didn't have access to broadband and likely more because the FCC numbers were "notoriously suspect."  

The Wheeler FCC, in its annual assessments of broadband buildouts, consistently concluded it was not being deployed to all Americans in a timely fashion, basically because it had not been deployed to all Americans. 

In the Brookings piece, Wheeler also said for millions more people broadband was too expensive, taking a shot at the recent CARES Act allocation of $125 million for rural telecom loans because those loans did not require the networks getting the money to meet "minimum" thresholds for high-speed service. 

The bill defines high-speed as 10 Mbps download, 1 upload. In its home broadband guide, the FCC advises that for two people or devices using the Internet, even moderate use--basic functions like email, browsing, basic video, VoIP, Internet radio plus one high-demand application like video streaming, online gaming, or telecommuting--needs 12-25 Mbps, and if more than two, 25 Mbps-plus.  

Related: CARES Act Buttresses Rural Broadband Funding 

Wheeler pointed to the Lifeline broadband subsidy program when talking about price as a barrier, saying "the Trump FCC has cut back the number of companies that can participate in the program, making it harder for those who need the service." 

Given the current crush of telework and telemedicine and distance learning in addition to all that high-def binge watching, Wheeler says, the Internet is now indisputably a necessity for all:  

"Three weeks ago, everyone’s point of reference for high-speed broadband networks was the one-way delivery of video services such as Netflix. Henceforth, broadband will be recognized for what it is: a critical two-way connection that can no longer be considered a luxury." 

FCC chairman Ajit Pai likes what he is hearing from ISPs and their trade associations about their ability to handle the additional broadband load during the COVID-19 pandemic's shelter-in-place mandates.  

He said Thursday (April 2) that he had spoken to broadband and phone companies, who said network usage was up by about a third for fixed networks and 10%-20% for cellular networks in the past few weeks. Not surprisingly, they said there was increased demand during daytime hours. 

He said the gist of the status report was they were handling the traffic and expected to be able to continue to do so. 

He divvied up the credit for that performance between the industry and FCC. 

"It appears that our nation’s communications networks are holding up very well amid the increase in traffic and change in usage patterns," he said in a statement on the calls. "That’s thanks in part to networks being designed to handle ever-higher peak traffic loads and in part to a market-based regulatory framework that has promoted infrastructure investment and deployment." 

He thanked the companies for meeting changing demand in a demanding time of change and working with the FCC to keep the country connected. He said that no provider expressed concern that they would not be able to handle the load. 

He also gave a shout out to communications workers on the front lines "for their efforts in helping Americans get connected, stay connected, and troubleshoot any problems during these challenging times.” 

On Pai's call with trade associations were ACA Connects, Cloud Communications Alliance, Competitive Carriers Association, CTIA—The Wireless Association, INCOMPAS, NCTA—The Internet & Television Association, NTCA—The Rural Broadband Association, Rural Wireless Association, Satellite Industry Association, Wireless Internet Service Providers Association, and Western Telecommunications Alliance. 

He also talked to Altice USA, AT&T, CenturyLink, Charter, Cincinnati Bell, Consolidated Communications, Comcast, Cox, DISH, Frontier, Hughes, Mediacom, Northwest Fiber, Sprint, T-Mobile, TDS Telecom, TracFone, U.S. Cellular, Verizon, ViaSat, and Windstream.

Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.), ranking member of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, said wireless broadband providers need to do more to help families connect to broadband during the coronavirus pandemic. 

While he praised the efforts to date, including waiving overage fees and encouraged "all providers [to] temporarily make as much data available as possible, as quick as possible."  

But he also called on them to provide more data for mobile hot spots during the COVID-19 crisis. 

"This is an unprecedented time, and wireless providers have already stepped up to the plate in a big way," he said. “But more can be done. Increasing data caps for hot spots is the fastest way to connect Americans temporarily who do not have WiFi at home." 

He said that was in the short term, but in the long term. "We must not lose sight of the bigger problem: the need to deploy broadband in the long-term," he said.

The FCC said that 116 more broadband and phone providers have signed on to FCC chairman Ajit Pai's 'Connectivity for Americans' pledge.

That is on top of the 69 providers that initially pledged:

(1) "not to terminate service to any residential or small business customers because of their inability to pay their bills due to the disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic; 

(2) "waive any late fees that any residential or small business customers incur because of their economic circumstances related to the coronavirus pandemic; and 

(3) "open [their] WiFi hotspots to any American who needs them." 

“It’s critical that Americans stay connected throughout the coronavirus pandemic so that they can remain in touch with loved ones, telework, engage in remote learning, participate in telehealth, and maintain the social distancing that is so important to combatting the spread of the virus,” said Pai of the new signups. “The Keep Americans Connected Pledge is a critical step toward accomplishing that goal and I thank each one of these additional companies that have made commitments to ensure that Americans can remain connected as a result of these exceptional circumstances.” 

The FCC also said TIA—The Telecommunications Industry Association has endorsed the pledge. In addition to some major ISPs, TIA's members include everyone from General Motors and LG to Telecom Brokers and the Department of Homeland Security.

To check out the entire list of new pledge signatories, go here.  

Image via ncta.com.

Democratic Legislators were weighing on from the Senate side on what ISPs should be doing in the face of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. 

In a letter to the CEO's of AT&T, CenturyLink, Charter Communications, Comcast, Cox Communications, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon--a similar effort came from the House side--led by Sen. Mark Warner (D-Wash.), the senators called on ISPs to suspend fees and "restrictions" (like overage charges) that could "limit telepresence options. 

Verizon Says It Is Ready for Broadband-Related Virus Ramp-UP 

They also want free, or "at cost" broadband for students without current online access. Comcast, for one, has offered 60 days of free broadband for low-income residents in its service area currently without broadband service. AT&T has suspended overage charges, and NCTA-The Internet & Television Association says all its members are working on ways to help during the crisis. 

"[W]e ask that you temporarily suspend broadband caps and associated fees or throttling for all communities affected by COVID-19 and work with public school districts, colleges, and universities to provide free, or at-cost, broadband options for students whose schools close due to COVID-19 who don’t have access at home," they said. That would arguably be all communities since the effects of the virus are countrywide. 

Related: Rosenworcel Calls for Aggressive FCC Action 

Also signing on to the letter were Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Angus King (I-Me.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), and Gary Peters (D-Mich). 

Perhaps tellingly, there were no Republicans on the letter, whose talk of throttling and data caps invoked the net neutrality fight that split the parties. 

BuzzFeed was reporting Thursday (Oct. 3) that a years-long investigation had uncovered millions of bogus comments favoring ISP deregulation filed by two companies working for Broadband for America, the pro ISP-deregulation group which claims the major ISP trade groups--NCTA-The Internet & Television Association, CTIA, USTelecom, and ISPs AT&T, Comcast, Charter and Cox among its members. 

The story did not suggest BFA orchestrated the use of bogus comments, only that the companies working for it appeared to have generated them. 

There were bogus comments aplenty on both sides of the net neutrality issue in the FCC docket, which contained a record-shattering 22 million comments, millions of which have since been exposed as fraudulent. 

The Buzzfeed story cites data scientist Jeff Kao who estimated that 99.7% of the “organic” comments--not prewritten or duplicate comments, favored retaining the Obama-era rules against blocking, throttling and paid prioritization, rules that the FCC under Ajit Pai successfully overturned, a decision a federal court upheld two days before Buzzfeed published its investigative piece.  

Broadband for America had said it commissioned its own study back in 2017, the chief takeaway from which was that 69.9% of the comments were in favor of repealing Title II, when "fake and unverifiable" international comments were factored out. 

But that was focused on international comments.

NCTA declined to comment on the BuzzFeed story. BFA, and other companies and associations identified as members by BFA, had not returned requests for comment at press time.

Free Press, which opposed the ISP deregulation and has had big questions about the legitimacy of the net neutrality comment process, weighed in on the story.  

“We had long suspected the broadband industry was behind the illegal effort to fake public opposition to Net Neutrality," said Free Press Senior Director of Strategy and Communications Timothy Karr. "Thanks to this invaluable investigative reporting, we can see the money trail that reportedly leads from the largest cable and phone companies through their front group Broadband for America and into the hands of those paid to defraud the public." 

“This is not only outrageous, it’s exactly the kind of violation that federal and state authorities have been investigating. The proper authorities must take the next step and hold those involved to account. And Congress must demand answers from Chairman Pai on what he’s doing to prevent fraud and evaluate real public input.” 

“As the D.C. Circuit recognized this week, the FCC’s decision to abandon the heavy-handed, utility-style Internet regulations imposed under the prior Administration was well-grounded in the law and the facts contained in the record," said a spokesperson for FCC Chairman Pai. "The Restoring Internet Freedom Order was based on a careful examination of the law and the facts, not substance-free form letters, such as the nearly 8 million identical one-sentence comments supporting Title II regulation that were tied to email addresses from FakeMailGenerator.com."

The FCC's net neutrality comment docket has been a flashpoint for net neutrality activists and the subject of outside investigations, including by the New York State Attorney General and the FBI.  

Related: Rep. Pallone Says FBI Investigating FCC Comment Docket  

Pai has conceded there were opportunities for mischief in the docket—which ultimately manifested itself in bogus comments, including ones from a Russian addresses—but he signaled that was the price of erring on the side of inclusiveness. But just how many were filed, and what the FCC's procedures for at least trying to verify their veracity, became an ongoing dialog, though some Dems would say monologue, with the FCC in the run-up to the FCC's December 2017 vote to roll back net neutrality regs.  

In a letter to the Hill, Pai had explained that to enable the filing of bulk comments, the FCC system in 2016 was reconfigured to allow automated submissions, and that while it uses commercially available tools to protect the system from cyber attacks, it "is fundamentally an open, public-facing system, which limits our ability to shut down inappropriate bots accessing [it]." 

There is also no limit to the number of comments that can be filed, other than a size limit of 25 MB for each comment, and five files per submission, including attachments. 

The FCC is expected to take public comments into consideration, though in an age of millions of such comments, it is arguably a practical impossibility.

Fortunately, how many comments are filed is not supposed to be a determinative factor in decision-making, any more than the loudest voice or the biggest pockets are supposed to decide whether or not a policy is good or bad.  

The Maine legislature has voted to approve an online privacy bill, which now goes to governor Janet Mills for her signature. 

The bill, "An Act to Protect the Privacy of Online Customer Information," which passed unanimously, applies only to ISPs. Such provider may not use, disclose, sell or allow access to customer personal information without the consent of the customer--opt in--and may not refuse service to those who don't consent to such sharing or charge more for customers who don't allow that use.

ISPs can do all that with non-personal information unless the customer disallows it (opt out).

There are plenty of exceptions, for: provision of access service, to market service to that customer, to prevent fraud and abuse, or to provide geolocation info for emergency services, for relatives in the case of risk of death or serious harm to the customer, to provide emergency services.

The bill includes requirements for clear notice of terms of service and reasonable measures to protect personal info from unauthorized use. 

Its provisions stop at state lines, which is one of the reasons ISPs are pushing for national privacy legislation that would preempt what they call a "patchwork" of different state regs. 

The bill's provisions apply to ISPs "operating within the state when providing broadband internet access service to customers that are billed for service received in the state and are physically located in the state."

Mills ran on a platform that included expanding broadband access and last year praised Spectrum for its investment in the state.

Various states have been adopting privacy bills since congress invalidated a former FCC's broadband privacy rules and the FCC under new management ceded primary regulatory oversight of broadband access to the Federal Trade Commission.

WASHINGTON — The Federal Communications Commission is currently making its periodic assessment of just how competitive the market for communications services is, with an added impetus from Capitol Hill.

There is a lot riding on the answer, particularly in an increasingly over-the-top video marketplace. Comcast’s $38 billion-plus purchase of control of Sky, for example, is being billed more as about assembling a collection of programming assets that can be combined with other over-the-top offerings than it is about a satellite video service, MoffettNathanson principal and senior analyst Craig Moffett said.

At stake in the inquiry is how much regulatory power the FCC can wield over internet service providers, and how much the wired and wireless broadband markets can consolidate without running afoul of antitrust laws.

The FCC, even under the deregulatory Republican chairman Ajit Pai, has not rushed to declare that the competitive broadband marketplace includes both wired and wireless service — not for a lack of trying by both of those constituencies.

Two-Track Inquiry

But the agency is taking comments from stakeholders as part of a dual-track inquiry. The first track is the annual Section 706 report on whether advanced communications are being deployed in a reasonable and timely manner, conducted per a longstanding congressional directive.

The other is a new report mandated by the FCC’s recent reauthorization legislation that requires a report on the state of competition in the communications marketplace by year-end. That report must be published on the agency’s website and sent to Congress.

Cable and telco broadband providers have argued that their respective markets — fixed and mobile wireless broadband — are already competitive. They also argue that they’re competing with each other, and that will be even more the case with the advent of the 5G wireless specification and its increased data-delivery speeds.

The FCC has yet to concede that wireless is a substitute for wired broadband, given slower wireless speeds, but that’s only a tentative conclusion until all the comments are in and the reports are released.

If the FCC does not conclude that advanced services are being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely manner, Congress has given the agency the power to achieve that end — including by regulating price and conditions. If it concludes that either the fixed or wireless markets are not competitive, industry players will have a harder time justifying mergers that reduce the number of competitors.

By contrast, an FCC finding that wireless and fixed broadband providers are market competitors enlarges the market and makes it easier to combine companies.

While the newly created report on market competition the FCC is producing is focused on competitiveness in the fixed broadband marketplace, NCTA–The Internet & Television Association saw no problem in pitching the agency on including wireless in those market calculations.

In fact, NCTA said the FCC has missed the mark by narrowing the inquiry. “Although the Notice only asks for information regarding fixed broadband services, RAY BAUM’s Act has no such limitation and, in fact, requires the commission to prepare a comprehensive analysis that addresses all facets of the communications marketplace.” (RAY BAUM’s Act, or the Repack Airwaves Yielding Better Access for Users of Modern Services Act of 2018, is the FCC reauthorization legislation passed earlier this year.)

The specific language of the act does require the FCC to “consider all forms of competition, including the effect of intermodal competition, facilities-based competition, and competition from new and emergent communications services, including the provision of content and communications using the Internet.”

USTelecom, representing Verizon Communications, AT&T and other mobile broadband providers, agreed. “The commission should not limit analysis narrowly to ‘fixed’ broadband, because mobile technology is increasingly competing for fixed broadband business and traditional notions of fixed broadband are changing,” the trade group told the FCC.

Given that charter, cable operators said, the FCC needs to look at the over-the-top competition as well, given that Google, Facebook and Amazon “are among the largest, most dominant companies in the world.”

Add the so-called FAANG companies (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google) and wireless behemoths like Verizon and AT&T to the relevant competitive market for broadband and cable services, and there would arguably be plenty of room for further consolidation.

The NCTA even argues that the more ISPs increase their network reach, the stronger competitors that edge providers will become in provisioning video and data. That’s because they are riding on network buildouts to build their audiences.

“As broadband providers continue to increase the reach and capability of their networks, these online service offerings will only become more potent competitors to regulated voice and video services,” the NCTA told the commission.

Edge providers are showing up just about everywhere ISPs are talking to the government about the current regulatory landscape.

Cable operators and other service providers are tired of being targeted as the snake in the internet garden, and want the FAANG companies to be recognized as 800-pound competitive gorillas. Even Congressional Democrats, who’ve long talked up thegarage-innovator status of edge providers, are starting to see them that way.

Now it will be up to the FCC to help decide who is competitive with whom.

Cable operators and other broadband providers want to use the Farm Bill to remove a long-time thorn in their sides, broadband subsidies that allow for major overbuilding of existing providers.

In a letter to the chair and ranking members of the Senate Agriculture Committee, the heads of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, the American Cable Association, USTelecom, and ITTA-The Voice of America's Broadband Providers, said that while they are considering the new Farm Bill, they should consider reducing the allowable overbuilding in the Rural Utility Service broadband loan program.

Helping light a fire under the push for change is that Congress, in the RAY BAUM's Act, made $600 million available for rural broadband deployment, which will be administered through RUS.

The RUS program only requires 15% of an applicants targeted service area to be unserved, meaning 85% of the funds could be used to build where therea are already up to two providers.

"This practice does nothing to help those in rural America who still don’t have broadband service. Additionally, this government subsidization of a competitor in a market already served by one or two providers is an inefficient use of scarce funding and puts a thumb on the competitive scale, undermining future efforts to sustain existing networks or to build out broadband networks in high-cost areas, especially when those networks are built with private risk capital," they told Sens. Pat Roberts and Debbie Stabenow, chair and ranking member, respectively, of the committee.

NCTA et al. want the Senators to use the bill to modify RUS to limit funding to areas where 100% of residents have no broadband service (defined as no service of at least 10 Mbps downstream, 1 Mbps upstream), or where at least 90% don't have such service.

INCOMPAS, whose members include computer companies, wants the House Communications Subcommittee to know just where it stands on paid prioritization: firmly against it.

That came in a letter from the group on the eve of an informational hearing Tuesday (April 17) on the practice.

INCOMPAS said paid prioritization, an umbrella term that covers a variety of business plans involving charging for prioritizing web traffic, gives internet service providers the incentive to "monetize network congestions," leading to a world of fast and slow lanes where ISPs pick the winners and losers.

“The ink isn’t even dry on the FCC’s proposal to end net neutrality, and ISP lobbyists are already urging Congress to allow for paid prioritization. You can have an open internet, or you can have paid prioritization, but you cannot have both," said INCOMPAS general counsel Angie Kronenberg.

ISPs have long argued, even before the FCC voted last December to eliminate the rule against paid prioritization, that there should be some flexibility for what they say is a pro-consumer way of differentiating among services, like, say paying more for express shipping over standard delivery. They also argue it would not slow or degrade other traffic.

ISPs have said, generally, that they can support prohibiting anti-competitive pair prioritization, but want the opportunity to explore what they see as potentially pro-consumer prioritization.

Most net neutrality activists view "pro-consumer prioritization" as an oxymoron, beyond the kind of network management that prioritizes internet phone service, for instance, or emergency communications.

INCOMPAS pointed to a survey it conducted that found 72% of voters oppose paid prioritization.

WASHINGTON — Facebook chairman and CEO Mark Zuckerberg was shown the Capitol Hill woodshed last week, and edge providers may never be the same.

“U.S. policymakers were so enamored by Silicon Valley over the last decade that they turned a blind eye to their abuses,” Roslyn Layton, visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, said of what has become a bipartisan push for privacy protections aimed at edge providers.

Related: Law Limits Cable’s Use of Customer Information

Edge providers, which include Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google, often referred to as FANG, use a customer’s internet service provider to deliver their service.

But whether they are “abuses” or, as Zuckerberg suggested in his testimony, online tools developed for good but hijacked by the bad guys, the eyes of Washington lawmakers are open and looking toward possible regulation or legislation to give online users — that is, most of us — some degree of control over where our personal data is going and what it is being used for.

Privacy on the Edge: Legislators' Questions

Zuckerberg made clear that Facebook does not sell data to advertisers, but it does depend on targeting ads based on user data to bring in the $40 billion in business it did last year.

Expect to hear the phrase “opt-in” a lot in the coming days, as policymakers try to come up with the best way to give users control of information. Ahead of the hearing, Sens. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) introduced the Privacy Bill of Rights bill with opt-in for everyone.

Opting In to Opt-In

ISPs have said they can live with a regime in which customers pro-actively opt in to share personal info, as long as it applied to companies like Facebook and Google, as well as Comcast and Charter Communications.

Zuckerberg said he also agreed in principle, though he frequently used terms like “generally agree,” “the details matter” or something “useful to discuss” to avoid definitive endorsements of any particular legislative or regulatory approach. He did signal that he thinks regulation is inevitable — likely one reason he was talking not about whether there would be regulation, but making sure it was the “right” regulation.

Zuckerberg tried to draw a distinction between ISPs and the edge — he said it is lack of ISP competition versus choice in platforms — and suggested regulation should take that into account. The Facebook CEO said he certainly did not think of his company as having a monopoly. But he was not getting a lot of agreement from the legislators in attendance, most of whom are on Facebook and rely on it to reach constituents.

Facebook and others are now tasked with figuring out how to make terms of service contracts clearer, another issue that drew a lot of attention last week and multiple calls for transparency.

Related:(Law) Schooling Facebook | Facebook Boosts Political Ad Disclosures

The scrutiny of Zuckerberg from both parties in both houses of Congress certainly felt like the final crash of a drumbeat that has been building, fueled by data breaches, fake news, election meddling and third-party monetization of online information.

ISPs and others have said there needs to be a shift in the attitude of Washington toward the garage innovators that have long since morphed into data-collecting behemoths that threaten privacy like never before.

Reckoning, and Rules, Draw Closer

That day of D.C. reckoning for Facebook and other edge providers seems close at hand, the Facebook chairman’s serial apologies notwithstanding. Perhaps the larger question, in the face of European regulators who have moved much more aggressively, is: Can a Congress so stifled by partisan rancor pass any meaningful legislation soon?

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) cited a long history of mea culpas, which is why she said self-regulation just won’t work. Those included apologies from 2003, 2006, 2007, 2010, 2011, 2017 and 2018. On the subject of the protections that Zuckerberg said Facebook was supplying users at the point of decision, Schakowsky asked, “Who is going to protect us from Facebook?”

Zuckerberg spent almost 10 hours over two hearings on April 11 and 12 apologizing for breaching the trust of Facebook users, saying the company had taken many steps to correct the problems with data sharing and third-party access to data, and outlined some of the changes it has made. But that rang hollow with many legislators.

They pointed to the company’s 20-year, 2011 consent decree with the Federal Trade Commission, in which it promised to give users notice and opt-in control of sharing of their data with third parties.

Zuckerberg said he did not think that access to data by Cambridge Analytica — the data firm controlled by right-wing donor and President Donald Trump supporter Robert Mercer — in violation of Facebook’s policies violated that decree, but he did say it was a mistake not to inform the FTC about the incident. Reports in The New York Times and U.K. newspapers The Observer and The Guardian cited documents which said Cambridge Analytica used data improperly obtained from Facebook to build voter profiles.

The FTC is currently investigating Facebook over that incident, as are U.K. authorities.

Zuckerberg, sounding like an ISP CEO pitching a voluntary network neutrality regime, argued last week for voluntary measures to address the company’s various issues, like mistakes in taking down conservative and political speech that did not violate its community standards, the weaponization of the platform by foreign election-meddlers, better informing viewers of how their data was being used, and more. But he also did not rule out regulation.

Seeking the Right Rules

Zuckerberg said he was not opposed to new privacy regulations, but that they had to be the “right regulation.” He seemed at least open to the possibility of a law requiring user opt-in permission for sharing their data with third parties, but said the details of such legislation were important.

And while Republicans are generally on the side of voluntary industry initiatives, this issue could be an exception.

Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana put it bluntly: “Mr. Zuckerberg, I come in peace. I don’t want to vote to have to regulate Facebook. But, by God, I will.”

Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.) told Fox News Channel that he wasn’t ruling out calling Twitter and Google to Washington for hearings, and sought input from Zuckerberg as to which other tech CEOs should get an invitation to testify in Washington.

Republicans are especially concerned that the left political leanings of many Silicon Valley executives translate to a bias against conservative views, a point that Zuckerberg conceded was valid. That is why some Republicans are not ready to push Facebook and others to take more control of their online content.

Just how Facebook’s new artificial intelligence algorithms decide what hate speech is, and what news to place in user’s News Feeds, is a topic of ongoing discussion, but only one of many raised by Washington’s new interest in drilling down into the edge business model.

The Facebook CEO told Congress that examples of conservative speech being censored were mistakes that had been corrected. He said mistakes involving liberal speech were also made, but that there was no directive from corporate to weed out any speech based on its politics, only on whether it was hateful or threatening. There, too, Facebook could do a better job, Zuckerberg said.

But “we’ll do better” solutions to problems involving billions of interactions among billions of people are unlikely to stem the tide.

Regulation and legislation are now clearly on the table for the Big Four edge providers — Facebook, Google, Twitter and Amazon — as Americans come to the realization of just how much of their data is being harvested and shared online. There was talk last week about hauling Twitter and Google before Congress as well.

ISPs have been arguing that any legislation or regulation of the ’net needs to include the edge, which makes more money off of, and collects far more data, from users. That argument has clearly found an audience.

If the current climate in Washington is any gauge, the death of privacy is a hot-button issue, and fueling the outrage in this partisan city are details that the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica data-mining issue involved selling the information to the Trump presidential campaign.

But it goes beyond privacy to ad dollars, the ones Facebook and others are attracting with all those billions of eyeballs, and the data being mined and monetized by relatively unregulated edge providers while their broadcast and cable competitors for those ads dollars remain regulated.

The buzz inside and outside D.C. last week over Zuckerberg’s appearance certainly made it seem like a flashpoint in the policy battle between ISPs and edge providers, though the focus was on Web users and their data.

Issue in the Spotlight

News networks blocked out coverage, on-air and online, for Zuckerberg’s testimony. The Open Markets Institute even launched a website to live-stream the hearings, and an #AskZuck digital ad campaign to get the online public to suggest questions that they wanted answered, with representatives of Free Press and the ACLU on hand to provide input as well.

“Facebook is a corporate monopoly whose business model is surveillance and user manipulation,” Open Markets Institute executive director Barry Lynn said. “It is a threat to our democracy.”

The group also launched a petition to express the sentiment that the edge not be let off the hook after the hearing lights were turned off “and Facebook’s lobbyists flood in.” The institute’s advisory board includes Tim Wu, who famously coined the term network neutrality.

That “don’t trust but verify” sentiment was echoed by several legislators during the Zuckerberg hearings as well, though Rep. Billy Long (R-Mo.) warned Congress did only two things well, nothing and overreacting, warning Zuckerberg to expect the latter.

Facebook supporters weren’t waiting until after the hearing to stick up for the social-media site. The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation was trying to head off a stampede toward regulating the edge before Zuckerberg even took the stand. The group, whose board members include representatives of Apple, Twitter, Amazon and Google, said Congress should resist the urge to legislate “how tech companies design their services.”

Instead, it said, “Members of Congress and regulators should hold Facebook accountable for its public commitments and past promises, and ensure that the company [Facebook] continues its transformation into a more responsible corporate citizen.”

Congress has now made privacy an issue, and is unlikely to look away soon.

“Facebook failed us,” Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, said bluntly. That’s something Zuckerberg has all but acknowledged, chalking it up to a young, idealistic company whose growth and reach raced ahead of its ability to address data protection. But to Nelson that sounded more like nails on the chalkboard than chalk.

“Not only did they fail to safeguard the personal information of millions of users, they concealed it from us — and this is not the first time the company mishandled user information,” Nelson said. “Only now are they coming clean and informing those who have had their information compromised and telling us they are going to make things right.”

“The startling consumer abuses by Facebook and other tech giants necessitate swift legislative action rather than overdue apologies and hand-wringing,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said of the need for legislation to give users opt-in control.

Still, not everyone was on the “regulate the edge” bandwagon, particularly in the House, where several members in addition to Long warned of overreacting.

Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.), chairman of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, who presided over one of the Zuckerberg hearings last week, told an audience at the NAB Show in Las Vegas earlier last week that the CEO was an incredible innovator. He said he was more in favor of cleaning out the regulatory underbrush so that all flowers could bloom in that landscape of permissionless innovation and light-touch regulation.

Hill Democrats, at least, have fought hard against that approach and refused to take ISPs at their pledges to protect internet privacy and openness, pledges that can be enforced by the Federal Trade Commission. Many of them seemed similarly unwilling to take edge providers at their word, particularly given that litany of past transgressions and apologies.

Putting an extra urgency on U.S. policymakers to figure out how to treat online data collection and privacy is the European Union’s upcoming General Data Protection Regulation, which take effect in May.

“These will likely become the global standard unless the U.S. acts quickly,” Layton said.

Broadband, long the segment of the cable business that has propped up declining video performance, is showing signs of slower growth, a byproduct of both its immense popularity and a fiber push by telco competitors that threatens to take back share.

Cable has long dominated broadband, accounting for well above 90% of overall growth for at least a decade and more than 100% of new subscribers since the first quarter of 2015, according to MoffettNathanson principal and senior analyst Craig Moffett. While that dominance didn’t decline dramatically in the most recent third quarter — 111% compared to 123% in Q3 2016 — it is starting to become more pronounced for large and small providers alike.

Related: Barclays Downgrades Cable Sector to ‘Neutral’

At Comcast, broadband additions slowed to 818,000 in the first nine months of the year, 17.2% behind last year’s pace of 988,000 adds. The same has held true for Charter Communications, with 908,000 broadband additions in the first nine months of 2017, down 17.9% from a year ago.

Broadband-centric MSO Cable One actually lost high-speed internet customers in its legacy systems in the last two quarters of this year — about 3,300 subscribers — and its broadband sub base is growing at a 1.7% annual rate, according to Moffett, considerably lower than the 2.9% growth rate of six months ago.

Overbuilder WideOpenWest, another provider that has concentrated on broadband, reported its first quarter of positive broadband subscribers in nine months in Q3, with 2,400 customers.

Double-Digit Decline in Adds
In the cable sector as a whole, broadband additions have declined 15.5% from 2.74 million in the first nine months of 2016 to 2.32 million in the first nine months of this year, Moffett noted in a recent report.

The stocks are beginning to reflect the sluggish broadband growth, too. WOW stock has fallen 44% in the past six months, followed by Comcast (down 11.8%), Cable One (down 4.5%) and Charter (down 3.8%). Altice USA, which went public in June, has dipped 44% since then, but much of that decline has been due to leverage concerns for its parent company, European telecom provider Altice N.V.

Overall, though, cable valuations are down. Pivotal Research Group CEO and senior media & communications analyst Jeff Wlodarczak said that trend is expected to continue. “Cable multiples are contracting over concerns about pay TV, slowing overall data market growth and competition,” Wlodarczak said. Add in WideOpenWest’s leverage (about 5 times cash flow) and the fact that it overbuilds some of the largest cable operators and telcos in the country, and the decline becomes less shocking.

And it doesn’t take much to spook the market. When Comcast said prior to releasing Q3 results in September that because of recent hurricanes and competitive factors it would lose 100,000 to 150,000 video customers in the period, shares fell as much as 7% to $38.60. The stock has not yet fully recovered — priced at $36.25 per share on Nov. 28 — even after results came in at the middle of the new guidance (a loss of 125,000 video customers). Part of the reason for that could be slower-than-expected broadband additions at 214,000 customers, behind the 330,000 additions in the prior year.

The shift started happening in the beginning of the year, when the two biggest telcos, AT&T and Verizon, reported net gains in broadband subscribers. It was the first time in almost two years that has occurred, other than a small increase in Q3 2016.

As AT&T continues to build out its fiber network, the gap is closing. In 2015, as part of the conditions around its purchase of DirecTV, it pledged to build out 12.5 million more homes with fiber by the end of 2019; now it says it will pass 14 million homes. Overall, AT&T said it expects to offer speeds of 50 Megabits per second or greater to 50 million homes by 2020. Those efforts have helped lift AT&T’s total broadband subscribers into positive territory for all three quarters this year. As Verizon’s losses decline, cable’s advantage should shrink.

Reversal of Fortune for Telcos
Cable is still expected to dominate, just not as much. Telsey Advisory Group analyst Thomas Eagan estimated telcos could end the year gaining 6.7% in broadband customers, compared with a loss of 8% in 2016. The shift is also cutting into trading multiples for the stocks. Wlodarczak noted that trading multiples have contracted between 0.5 times and 2 times in the first half of the year and will continue to fall.

Eagan also noted that Comcast’s trading multiple has dropped from about 8.2 times cash flow in the summer to 7 times after it released Q3 results. But despite the slowdown, he said, there is still plenty of growth ahead for cable broadband. “To me, it means they are underpenetrated and there is a lot of runway left,” Eagan said.

The ranking members of the House Energy & Commerce Committee and Communications subcommittee have called on the Republican chairs to add some witnesses to a planned Sept. 7 hearing on network neutrality.

E&C Chairman Greg Walden announced the hearing Tuesday, July 25, and said invitations had been sent to Amazon, Facebook, Alphabet (Google), Netflix, Comcast, AT&T, Verizon and Charter.

In response to that announcement, ranking E&C member Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) and Communications subcommittee ranking member Mike Doyle (D-Pa.) said the hearing was light on entrepreneurs, small business, consumers and others.

They said they didn't think the committee "could have a serious discussion of this important issue without including the real people affected by the FCC’s proposals," they wrote to Walden and subcommittee chair Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.).

They pointed out that, as the Republican leadership had emphasized, the heads of eight of the largest companies in the world with a combined $2.5 trillion in market cap.

They said that was hardly representative of the entire internet ecosystem the hearing was billed as exploring.

(Photo via ibmphoto24’s Flickr. Image taken on May 5, 2011 and used per Creative Commons 2.0 license. The photo was cropped to fit a 4x3 aspect ratio.)

Hotwire Communications secured bragging rights as the fastest “major” U.S. ISP, according to a new study from PCMag that calculates both upstream and downstream speeds to come up with what it calls its “PCMag Speed Index.”

Among the majors, Hotwire’s PCMag Speed Index of 91.3 Mbps outpaced Suddenlink (now part of Altice USA), Verizon Fios, and Comcast, which dropped four spots compared to PCMag’s 2016 study, which had Comcast and Verizon Fios sharing the honors.

RELATED: Comcast, Verizon Fios Tie as Fastest ‘Major’ U.S. ISP: Study

PCMag called the latest round of results an “upset” because Fios had been toppled from the pedestal for the first time in seven years, but noted that Hotwire didn’t make earlier lists because it didn’t get enough tests to make the cut.

“Hotwire is a unique provider: It offers a 10-gigabit service called HotwireFision via fiber to the premises — and those premises are residential communities, be they for families, seniors, students, and some businesses,” the magazine noted in the study.

Google Fiber, meanwhile, stayed on top when all U.S. ISPs were factored in, with a speed index of 324.5 Mbps, ahead of EPB Fiber Optics (136.1 Mbps), Hotwire (91.3), Midco (83.6 Mbps), Grande Communications (71.8 Mbps), RCN (70.8 Mbps), Sonic (66.6 Mbps), Armstrong Cable (61.8 Mbps), Comporium (52.6 Mbps), Suddenlink (49.1 Mbps) and Verizon Fios (48.3 Mbps).

PCMag’s study also listed the fastest ISPs by region.

-Google Fiber was tops in the North Central U.S., followed by Midco and Mediacom Communications.

-RCN led the Northeast region, followed by Armstrong, Comcast and Verizon Fios.

-Comcast was the best in the Northwest, beating out Cable One, Wave Broadband and Charter Communications.

-Google Fiber also led the way in the South Central U.S., ahead of Grande Communications, Suddenlink, Comcast and Verizon.

-EPB Fiber Optics led in the Southeast, ahead of Hotwire, Comporium, Verizon and AT&T Fiber.

-Sonic was the speediest in the Southwest, edging out Cable One, Comcast, Charter and Cox Communications.

PCMag determined speed/throughput using data collected from user data collected from the publication’s Speed Test tool. After tabulating download and upload speed data, the study implements a weighted score that uses 80% of the download speed and 20% of the upload speed to generate the PCMag Speed Index.

Regarding the weighting, PCMag said it reasons that “downloads are at least 80 percent important to your using the web, we have arbitrarily decided.”

WASHINGTON — Internet service providers that have been sparring with congressional Democrats over an opt-in broadband privacy regime now have a Republican to contend with. But the consequences of a new bill backed by House Communications Subcommittee chair Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) would have a bigger impact on edge providers and advertisers.

In trying to prevent the FCC from applying that opt-in to ISPs, one of the bigger arguments providers have made is that those opt-in rules didn’t apply both to them and to edge providers such as Facebook or Google, which have a dominant share of the targeted advertising that relies on such data.

In the Balancing the Rights of Web Surfers Equally and Responsibly [BROWSER] Act, Blackburn has proposed to change that, retaining the FCC’s extension of “sensitive” information that requires opt-in consent for sharing beyond financial and health and children’s data to include web browsing, while moving enforcement of all broadband privacy under the Federal Trade Commission.

Related: Rep. Blackburn Defends Broadband Privacy Bill

ISPs have been quiet on the bill — NCTA-The Internet & Television Association said it was still vetting the measure at press time and would have no comment — but groups representing advertisers and edge providers certainly have not been.

The Association of National Advertisers is no fan of Blackburn’s BROWSER Act, sponsored by the Republican House Communications Subcommittee.

Among other things, the ANA says Blackburn’s bill repeats the “fatal mistake” of overbroad classification of sensitive information (it does not say “of web browsing,” which they feel is key), and what the industry trade group calls a “vague and confusing” opt-in regime that would “bombard consumers with annoying consent notices.”

If FCC chair Ajit Pai succeeds in rolling back classification of ISPs as common carriers under Title II of the Communications Act, the Federal Trade Commission will again have enforcement authority over both edge providers and ISPs. Blackburn’s bill could beat the rollback to the punch, designating the FTC as the sole enforcer of online privacy.

Edge providers don’t want either the FCC or the FTC to start requiring them to get opt-in permission to share and monetize browser histories.

The Internet Association, whose largest members are Google, Amazon and Facebook, said the bill “has the potential to upend the consumer experience online and stifle innovation.”

Blackburn has fired back at her critics. “I thought the Internet Association would be more supportive of protecting consumers,” she told The Hill. Edge providers have, however, made clear their opposition to extending regulations to their neck of the ’net, arguing that ISPs have a unique gatekeeper position.

“I think if you ask the American people if they’re OK with having less control over their online privacy so companies can sell their data, they’d say no,” she said.

Consolidation among communications service providers (CSPs) has been on the upswing for years. And, with a convergence-friendly regulatory climate now in place in the U.S., mergers and acquisitions (M&As) could shift into overdrive.

There are many compelling reasons why CSPs are chomping at the bit to combine forces. Subscriber and revenue growth, cost savings, and access to new technology for rolling out emerging Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G wireless services top the list. Other motivations include broadening geographical distribution (e.g., Charter Communications’ merger with Time Warner Cable), market expansion (AT&T and DirecTV), content access (AT&T and Time Warner), and boosting mobile advertising (Verizon, scooping up AOL and Yahoo).

Moreover, through consolidation, CSPs can lower customer acquisition costs, improve retention rates, and increase average revenue per user (APRU). All worthy goals. But to achieve them, CSPs must go the extra mile to stay connected to the needs of subscribers, even as their companies expand. The kicker? It’s hard enough for them to do that already, and consolidation only makes it harder. Here are four ways CSPs can bake customer centricity into their consolidation strategy.

Make customer experience a top priority
Back in the day when CSPs had few competitors, they could take their subscribers for granted. And most did. That’s no longer a viable tactic. Thanks to cord-cutting options and disruptive newcomers like Google and Facebook, CSPs are seeing their subscribers—and their revenues—fleeing by the millions. And yet, despite efforts in recent years to improve services, telecoms, mobile carriers, cable operators, and internet service providers still occupy some of the lowest rungs in the latest industry comparison surveys, such as net promoter scores (NPS).

One of the best ways CSPs can boost customer satisfaction is by establishing formal customer experience (CX) programs. A holistic approach that encompasses the entirety of a customer’s history with a company over time, CX orchestrates all customer-related activities across all functional areas and lines of business. CX is the difference between noting that a customer service issue was resolved (something most operators already do) and capturing that a customer is still unhappy that there was a problem in the first place (something almost none of them track).

To provide consistently rewarding customer experiences, CSPs will need to overcome the dysfunction stemming from their historically fragmented processes and departmental silos, layers of complexity that greatly increase with M&A activity, by the way. They must also overhaul their creaky legacy operations and business systems, collectively known as OSS/BSS. Augmented with cloud-based options, these tired solutions can deliver the real-time digital agility CSPs need to respond smartly to subscriber demands.

Use data to serve customers, not just bill
CSPs have more data about their customers than practically any other industry. But so far, most have used that data for only narrow, blatantly self-serving purposes, such as documenting data consumption for billing or creating more targeted mobile ads. And yet hidden within that data are insights into customer behavior, preferences, and opinions that reveal how subscribers feel about a provider overall.

For example, with cognitive analytics, like those from IBM Watson, providers can predict which customers are likely to churn and take proactive steps to retain them. Data analytics can also detect which services give subscribers the most trouble, or which subscribers would be most receptive to upsells—handy information to have when you’re expanding offerings through consolidation.

The problem is, many providers can’t gain those insights because subscriber data is buried in separate systems for CRM, billing, accounting, and provisioning, among others. Again, cloud-based platforms can help them bridge information silos. With that data, they can deepen customer connections and increase retention by offering more intuitive services, surgically targeted incentives, and delight-inducing rewards based on customer usage history.

Expand customer self-service
Many of today’s subscribers are not just digitally savvy, they’re also more technically capable. Above all, they’re impatient. They want to explore service options, place orders, renew, and have everything fulfilled instantaneously, using any device or channel. Ideally with minimal clicks or agent intervention. CSPs have been slow to deploy self-service options that are on par with digital trendsetters like Amazon or eBay.

Self-service becomes even more critical as CSPs ramp up deployment of new smart home, connected car, mobile video, and augmented reality services that M&A deals make possible. These new services, along with new devices, product bundles, and pricing plans that accompany them, can be very confusing for subscribers. CSPs can help them navigate new offers and increase conversions by deploying brainier chatbots, richer online FAQs, and interactive guides that truly empower subscribers to get answers, resolve problems, and complete transactions without assistance.

Make customer service more personal
Establishing truly personal connections goes a long way to keeping customers loyal when competitors start waving the latest race-to-the-bottom pricing deal or multi-play bundle. Indeed, according to a 2016 Accenture report, 75% of consumers are more likely to buy from companies that know them by name, make recommendations based on past purchases, or know their purchase history.

Personalization becomes even more essential with consolidation, because customers can often feel overlooked or ignored as providers gain new subscribers and capabilities.

Technology now makes it possible for CSPs to bring old-school personal service to every subscriber interaction and touch point. For example, emails and chat sessions can be pre-populated with personal greetings. Newer omnichannel contact center solutions can capture all information on first contact, so subscribers never have to repeat themselves from one agent to the next. And a subscriber’s social communications can be merged with CRM and contact center solutions so nothing falls through the cracks.

It’s all about the customer
All indications are that M&A activity is here to stay. Comms are banking on consolidation as they jockey for best position in pricing, packaging, bandwidth, coverage, and content deals. The specifics may change, but those battles will continue. When all is said and done, however, the CSPs that will consistently grow their subscriber bases and revenue streams are those who ensure that their customers always come first, no matter how often they merge, how much technology morphs, or which disruptions come down the pike next.

About the Author:
Brendan O'Brien is chief innovation officer and co-founder at Aria Systems, a leading cloud-billing provider. In 2002, he introduced the world to cloud billing and innovated database-driven, enterprise-grade web applications before the concept of “cloud” was on the horizon and is among the industry's foremost thinkers on IoT and recurring revenue.

Photo by Jose Luis Pelaez Inc./Getty Images

The Phoenix Center has released a new study, backing up a previous study by the company, on the impact of Title II classification of ISPs on telecommunications investment.

The new study, which addresses comments on the study released last month, concludes that without reclassification, investment in total fixed assets would have been about $30 billion more annually, while investment in equipment and property would have been $20 billion more.

"Reclassification has weighed heavily upon the broadband industry for years," said study author and Phoenix Center chief economist Dr. George S. Ford in releasing the new report, Net Neutrality, Reclassification and Investment: A Further Analysis, which updates last month's Net Neutrality, Reclassification and Investment: A Counterfactual Analysis.

"A variety of proper statistical procedures applied to public data confirm sizable declines in investment in Internet networks," Ford added.

Ford said that since 2010 -- when Title II was first proposed by then-FCC chair Julius Genachowski (when ultimately a compromise was struck with ISPs to avoid reclassification) -- investment has been $150 billion to $200 billion less than it would have been without that regulatory overhand and eventual 2015 reclassification.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump last week signed into law the successful GOP congressional effort to nullify the Federal Communications Commission’s attempt, under former chairman Tom Wheeler, to regulate broadband privacy.

Advertisers celebrated the GOP win, saying the rules had categorized “innocuous” information as sensitive and in need of opt-in permission to collect and share, while Internet service providers promised they have protected, are protecting and will protect their subscribers’ personal data.

Here are some answers to questions raised last week by congressional Democrats and others about the official passage of the Congressional Review Act resolution and the official end of the FCC’s attempt to write new rules.

Q:So, what is the current status of broadband privacy?
A: The FCC’s Oct. 27, 2016, vote to impose new broadband privacy regulations are repealed, and “substantially similar” rules cannot be reimposed by the FCC unless Congress authorizes it in another bill. Just what would qualify as substantially similar is open for debate.

Broadband providers have pledged to abide by voluntary privacy principles in any event, and Comcast has said it will change its privacy policy to make the opt-out option more prominent and reassure its customers that it does not sell customers’ individual Web browsing information to third parties. Click here to check out exactly what industry trade groups representing ISPs have pledged to do to protect broadband privacy. here.

Q:What can ISPs legally do now that the rules have been nullified?
A: They can share a range subscribers’ personal information with third parties without users’ affirmative permission, including Web browsing and app use history, as well as geolocation data, and can require data sharing as a condition of service.

Q:What obligations are now nullified for ISPs?
A: They no longer must institute government-mandated data security procedures or provide data breach notifications according to a government-imposed schedule.

Q:How long had the rules been in effect?
A: Virtually none of the rules had been in effect in the two years since the FCC assumed broadband privacy authority under the Open Internet order.

The FCC last month stayed implementation of the data-security provisions. The opt-in requirements were not scheduled to take effect until the end of the year. One part of the rules — preventing ISPs from making data sharing a quid pro quo for service — had already gone into effect, according to an FCC spokesperson.

Q:Who has authority over broadband privacy?
A: The FCC still has authority over ISP privacy under Title II regulations. The Federal Trade Commission has authority over edge provider privacy, although a court decision has raised questions about whether the FTC can regulate an edge-provider subsidiary of a common carrier — for example, privacy authority over Yahoo as a subsidiary of Verizon would fall into a gray area.

Q:What’s next?
A: The FCC is free to draft new privacy rules as long as ISPs are still under Title II and the new rules aren’t “substantially like” the old ones. In fact, FCC chairman Ajit Pai and FTC chairwoman Maureen Ohalhausen said last week that they will work together on a new, rational and effective system for protecting consumer privacy.

Congressional Republicans want the FCC to roll back Title II reclassification of ISPs and return broadband privacy to the FTC’s purview. Pai and Ohlhausen also ultimately want authority to revert to the FTC. If that happens, congressional Democrats want to give the FTC rulemaking authority so that, if it chose — likely under a future Democratic administration — it could impose its own privacy regulatory framework. The FTC’s power is generally confined to enforcing laws already on the books via filing suit against false and deceptive practices, rather than writing new rules.

Democrats also want to free the FCC to reimpose similar privacy regulations. Sen. Ed Markey (D.-Mass.) and 10 other Democratic senators introduced such a bill last week, but it will almost certainly be a nonstarter in Republican-controlled D.C. Read more about that effort here.

FCC chair Ajit Pai and FTC chair Maureen Ohlhausen took to the electronic pages of The Washington Post late Tuesday to defend the rollback of the FCC's broadband privacy regulations, a move Congress enabled last week through a Congressional Review Act resolution and President Donald Trump made official with the stroke of a pen earlier this week.

In a co-bylined op ed, Pai and Ohlhausen said "professional lobbyists" had lit a wildfire of misinformation, which the two agency chairs wanted to quell  by stating "what's really going on."

They said the "Chicken Little" warnings made no sense, but that restoring broadband privacy oversight to the FTC did. That could happen either by removing the FTC exemption from regulating common carriers or by reclassifying ISPs so they are not considered common carriers under Title II or by doing both.

Pai has long argued that Title II reclassification of ISPs under the Open Internet order, which is how the FCC deeded itself broadband privacy oversight, was a mistake in need of correcting.

They said that despite "hyperventillating headlines," ISPS have never planned to sell browsing histories to third parties -- something ISPs were saying this week and have pledged not to do in voluntary privacy principles.

Pai and Ohlhausen also pledged to come up with a new system for protecting consumer privacy.

They took aim at the FCC approach, which required ISPs to get permission to share Web, app and geolocation data with third parties while edge providers -- under the FTC's privacy-by-design regulatory approach -- did not have to get that permission, as well as the argument that disparate treatment was justified due to ISPs' unique gatekeeper status or the lack of competition for service.

"If two online companies have access to the same data about your Internet usage, why should the federal government give one company greater leeway to use it than the other?" they wrote, citing privacy policy expert Peter Swire.

"As Peter Swire, President Bill Clinton’s chief counselor for privacy and President Barack Obama’s special assistant for economic policy, explained in a paper he co-wrote for Georgia Tech’s Institute for Information Security and Privacy, 'ISPs have neither comprehensive nor unique access to information about users’ online activity. Rather, the most commercially valuable information about online users ... is coming from other contexts,' such as social-media interactions and search terms," they said.

That would be the Googles and Facebooks of the world, the edge providers that don't need opt-in permission.

As for lack of competition, they argued that doesn't hold up, either.

"As a result, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Congress decided to disapprove the FCC’s unbalanced rules," they said.

"The American people deserve a comprehensive framework that will protect their privacy throughout the Internet," they added. "And that’s why we’ll be working together to restore the FTC’s authority to police ISPs’ privacy practices."