USTelecom was celebrating passage Thursday (Dec. 19) of the Broadband Deployment Accuracy and Technological Availability (DATA) Act, which passed the Senate unanimously as Congress wraps up business before the holiday break.  

The bill passed the House earlier this week. 

“The House and now the Senate have both decisively acted to transform the country’s obsolete broadband maps to get a clearer picture of who has – and who still lacks – access to broadband, the 21st century’s indispensable resource," said Jonathan Spalter, president and CEO of USTelecom. "Under the leadership of Senators Wicker, Peters, Thune and Klobuchar, Congress has adopted a state-of-the-art technology and data driven plan to modernize the national broadband coverage maps with the express purpose of increasing deployment in rural America." 

The bill requires the FCC to issue new rules "to require the collection and dissemination of granular broadband availability data and to establish a process to verify the accuracy of such data, and more."  

The bill essentially pushes an effort already underway at the FCC. The commission voted earlier this year to come up with a more granular broadband data collection process that could be crowd-vetted.  

Virtually all sides agree that the FCC's broadband mapping is unwerwhelming and needs improvement, especially since it is used to determine where broadband deficits need addressing and whether the FCC is fulfilling its Congressional mandate to deploy broadband on a reasonable and timely basis.  

The bipartisan Secure Data Act was reintroduced in the House Thursday (May 10).

The bill would prevent law enforcement agencies and courts from forcing tech companies to put encryption work-arounds (so-called "back doors") into communications devices so they could be accessed in investigations into criminal activity.

Products covered by the bill are "any computer hardware, computer software, or electronic device that is made available to the general public."

Related: DOJ's Rosenstein Hammers Warrant-Proof Encryption

Encryption is about securing user data on devices; backdoors are about circumventing those when law enforcement argues it is necessary.

Co-sponsoring the bill were Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), who reitroduced the act, joined by original sponors Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y), Ted Poe (R-Texas), Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.).

"U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies have requested, required, and even sought court orders against individuals and companies to build a 'backdoor,' weakening secure encryption in their product or service to assist in electronic surveillance," Lofgren and Massie said in a joint announcement. "Today’s legislation comes on the heels of a troubling Department of Justice Office of Inspector General report calling into question the Federal Bureau of Investigation's handling of Syed Rizwan Farook’s locked iPhone in the wake of the 2015 San Bernardino attack which suggested that FBI officials did not pursue available technical solutions to access Farook’s iPhone because the FBI preferred obtaining a precedent-setting court judgement compelling Apple to weaken their product encryption."

There is an exception for requests under CALEA, the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act.

"The Secure Data Act will help ensure that in a time of heightened threats to national and digital security, users and businesses are able to rely on strong encryption without the risk of imposed vulnerabilities," said the Computer & Communications Industry Association. "Trust in the integrity and security of the internet, including its infrastructure and users, is essential to its vitality as a global platform for free expression and commerce. A fundamental aspect of that security is the encryption that protects sensitive information, communications, and transactions at rest and in transit."