Federal Communications Commission

The Federal Communications Commission is committing nearly $78 million in funding rounds through the Emergency Connectivity Program (ECP), which provides digital services for students in communities across the country.

As the battle over the use of the 12.2 GHz to 12.7 GHz rages, the 5G for 12 GHz Coalition once again said that the Federal Communication Commission should change its rules and allow terrestrial 5G transmission in this frequency band. Current rules allow for downlink only use for satellite TV. The push for 12 GHz began in October 2020 with a letter to then-FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. Since that time, incumbents AT&T and SpaceX have opposed the shared spectrum use on grounds that terrestrial 5G would interfere with their services, disrupting transmissions to customers.

The Federal Communications Commission set guidelines for two pilot programs aimed at increasing both awareness of and participation in the Affordable Connectivity Program, which provides a discount of up to $30 per month toward internet service for eligible households (and up to $75 per month for households on qualifying Tribal lands). On October 11, the FCC provided an update on the implementation of the pilot programs.

Although Rep Ro Khanna (D-CA)'s district includes a wide swath of the tech industry's homes in towns like Sunnyvale, Cupertino, Santa Clara, and Fremont, he is an advocate for laws that would curb Big Tech's power. Among the restrictions Rep Khanna favors would expand privacy protections beyond California's existing law as well as a change in antitrust law that would shift the burden of proof in large deals, requiring the acquiring company to prove a deal won't hurt competition. Members of Congress have proposed new bills around privacy and antitrust and children's online safety, but so far

The Federal Communications Commission has been without a Democratic majority for the entirety of President Biden’s 21-month tenure, hamstringing efforts to restore open internet protections and close the digital divide. Breaking the deadlock at the Federal Communications Commission hinges on confirming Gigi Sohn [Senior Fellow and Public Advocate at the Benton Institue for Broadband & Society], a longtime public interest advocate and former Democratic FCC official who was first nominated by the White House nearly a year ago.

Dish Wireless wants to conduct tests using the 12 GHz band to evaluate coexistence in the band – it’s just waiting for the FCC to say yea or nay.

The Federal Communications Commission said it was ready to authorize Starry's winning Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) bids in eight states. However, the company has told the FCC that it plans to default on all its winning bids, including those in one additional state. Starry had a winning bid totaling about $269 million. The news of the default came in an FCC public notice that also listed some other companies that had informed the FCC of plans to default on at least a portion of their winning bids. Defaulting companies are subject to a base forfeiture of $3,000 per census block group

Nearly 450,000 residents in the state don't have adequate broadband, according to the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development. The office has been tracking the data for years and will roll out its own map in the fall of where Tennesseans lack access to high-speed internet of at least 100 Mbps downstream and 20 Mbps upstream. This measurement is new for the department, so new that the Federal Communication Commission doesn't have that measurement on their own maps, which they believe will show up in the next iteration of data in late 2022 to early 2023.

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau, in conjunction with the Office of Economics and Analytics, has authorized Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (Auction 904) support for 1,865 winning bids. This is the 14th round of funding authorization for the RDOF program. All information, including the winning bids found in Attachments A and B, can be found here.