Telecom

WASHINGTON - House Democrats are urging President Joe Biden to permanently close the nation’s digital divide by targeting federal investments in broadband to the hardest to reach areas, while also providing a permanent, federally-funded broadband benefit program to financially vulnerable... Read More

A panel representing the last five decades of Federal Communications Commission leadership took the helm at Monday’s Multicultural, Media, Telecom and Industry Council’s FCC symposium discussing broadband for the nation.  Despite a pending $65 billion infrastructure plan to fund further... Read More

WASHINGTON- Legislators want to jolt tech-related economic growth outside of the coastal regions, and according to speakers at a panel event this week, doing so would help ensure American relevance on the global market while lessening some of the inequality... Read More

Boston, Massachusetts and Raleigh, North Carolina could become the nation’s next designated innovation zones and test beds for advanced wireless technologies, under a proposal put forward Wednesday by the Federal Communications Commission. The designations, if advanced, would help spur the... Read More

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden issued a far-reaching executive order promoting competition in the American economy last week, one provision of which encourages the Federal Communications Commission to restore net neutrality rules undone by the Trump administration. Net neutrality refers... Read More

The Federal Communications Commission affirmed a $25,000 fine Tuesday against Mobile Relay Associates for overuse of a shared spectrum channel and causing interference to other FCC licensees.  The first notice of violation against the radio communications company was issued in... Read More

WASHINGTON -- Legislation intended to prevent China from threatening U.S. telecom networks was front and center Wednesday during a meeting of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology. Introduced by House Republican Whip Steve Scalise, R-La. and... Read More

Congressional leaders and a media advocacy group are urging the Federal Communications Commission to examine how policy decisions and programs have disparately harmed Black Americans and other communities of color, according to a letter sent Tuesday to the acting FCC... Read More

A day after the White House and a bipartisan group of Senators came to an agreement on a major infrastructure proposal, three federal agencies began laying the groundwork for distributing the $65 billion that is expected to be in the... Read More

WASHINGTON - The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday unanimously adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Notice of Inquiry intended to secure the nation’s communications networks against cyberattacks. With seven ransomware attacks per hour in 2020, a total of 65,000,... Read More

A small community in Lincoln County, Maine, was recently denied a broadband deployment grant by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as satellite service provider ViaSat had already won the area in a Rural Digital Opportunity Fund auction by the Federal... Read More

Rep. Derek Kilmer, D- Wash., on Thursday cheered word that the Biden administration is allocating nearly $1 billion for grants to expand broadband access on tribal lands. The anouncement of the funding was made by Vice President Kamala Harris, Commerce... Read More

The Federal Communications Commission must be more “forward-looking” as the agency thinks of spending billions on high-speed broadband deployment, said Austin Bonner, wireline legal advisor for FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, at a Federal Communications Bar Association lunch-and-learn event Wednesday. In... Read More

WASHINGTON - Carolyn Roddy, a legal advisor at the Federal Communications Commission, knows all about the ins and outs of making changes to one’s telephone service. But she admitted even she was surprised by the jump in rates her 96-year-old... Read More

As talks resumed between the White House and GOP lawmakers on Friday over President Joe Biden’s $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan, a new coalition announced its intention to push hard for a key element of the plan -- expanding broadband access... Read More

Telecom giant AT&T may expect smooth sailing through the federal review of its deal spinning off WarnerMedia to Discovery, but four antitrust experts disagree that it is such a clear-cut case. And the deal is likely to get scrutinized by... Read More

WASHINGTON - Before the pandemic, a rural community’s public library in Vermont always saw its parking lot full on Sundays, even though it was closed. The parking lot was filled to the brim with school children finishing their classwork or... Read More

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration will continue its “zero trust” approach, which assumes any hardware or software technology cannot be trusted, when it comes to grappling with issues surrounding artificial intelligence, according to the agency’s top official today.  “AI... Read More

WASHINGTON -- Any policy aiming to truly address the nation’s broadband access crisis must be accompanied by robust federal funding to ensure these efforts are sustainable, according to one of the country’s top telecom executives. Speaking at the AT&T Policy... Read More

WASHINGTON — The term 5G is all over telecommunications these days. It comes with the promise of data speeds up to 100 times faster than current connections and the ability to support devices that will perform functions not yet imaginable.... Read More

WASHINGTON - The Federal Communications Commission's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau has granted requests from AT&T and Verizon to use additional spectrum to help meet escalating wireless demand during the coronavirus outbreak. AT&T has been granted authority to operate in the AWS-4... Read More

With what seems like an annual tradition, consumers flip on their TV to catch a playoff game or some other “must see TV” program only to find the station blacked out in the pay TV provider’s lineup because the provider... Read More

Intellectual property policies could get a major court test this year as a real estate services company appeals a massive $706 million judgment that it stole trade secrets from a San Francisco-headquartered REtech company. At the dispute’s onset, the jury... Read More

WASHINGTON - The Attorneys General from ten states including New York and California filed a lawsuit this week to stop the proposed merger between telecommunications companies T-Mobile and Sprint. In a federal complaint filed in New York on Tuesday, the... Read More

The Federal Communications Commission and Congress have long sought to map specific regions’ access to broadband services in order to help policymakers identify unserved areas. The Broadband Data Improvement Act of 2019, introduced last week in the House of Representatives... Read More

Nearly 50 Democratic House members have signed a letter seeking the formation of a bipartisan working group to draft compromise legislation that would restore at least some form of net neutrality. The 47 signers of the letter to Speaker Nancy... Read More

Representatives Joe Cunningham, D-S.C., and Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., co-chairs of the Blue Dog Task Force on Infrastructure and Job Creation, joined with Representatives Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., and Xochitl Torres Small, D-N.M., their counterparts on the Blue Dog Task Force on... Read More

House Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-S.C., has launched a new House Task Force on Rural Broadband to provide coordination and leadership to end the rural-digital divide. The Task Force will work to advance solutions to ensure all Americans have access... Read More

Representative Frank Pallone Jr., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said Tuesday it’s time for Congress to provide regulators and the telecom industry with tools to protect American consumers from the scourge of relentless robocalls. “We all know... Read More

This week, bipartisan legislation was introduced in the House of Representatives to toughen the United States’ position against national security threats posed by technology competitors like China. The bill is sponsored by Representatives Will Hurd (R-TX), C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger (... Read More