Federal Communications Commission

You’re going to hear a lot in the next few months about the Federal Communications Commission's broadband mapping fabric. This blog describes what that is and describes the challenges of getting a good mapping fabric. The first set of broadband map challenges will be about the fabric, and I’m not sure the FCC is ready for the deluge of complaints they are likely to get from every corner of the country. I also have no idea how the FCC will determine if a suggestion to change the fabric is correct because I also don’t think communities can count passings perfectly.

On September 15, 2022, the National Tribal Telecommunications Association (NTTA) sent letters to Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, Commissioners Carr, Starks and Simington, and Chief of the Wireline Competition Bureau Trent Harkrader attaching a white paper on examining the need for ongoing broadband support on Tribal lands. According to NTTA, the paper examines the need for ongoing support to assist in eliminating the digital divide that currently exists between broadband availability on Tribal lands and the rest of the United States.

On September 8, 2022, Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel penned responses to two groups of lawmakers who had written to Rosenworcel about the future of the Universal Service Fund.

The Federal Communications Commission announced that the charter of the Consumer Advisory Committee will be renewed for a two-year period pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) and following consultation with the Committee Management Secretariat of the General Services Administration. In keeping with its advisory role, the FCC Consumer Advisory Committee will continue to provide recommendations to the FCC on consumer topics, as specified by the agency, gather data and information, and perform analyses that are necessary to respond to the questions or matters before it.

Unlike other advertisements for goods and services, there are no federally set standards for measuring broadband service speeds. This means there is no clear way to tell whether customers are getting what they pay for. To protect consumers, the FCC will need to invest in building a set of broadband speed measures, maps, and public data repositories that enables researchers to access and analyze what the public actually experiences when people purchase broadband connectivity.

The Federal Communications Commission announces the release of Data Specifications for Bulk Fixed Availability Challenge and Crowdsource Data, which provides guidance as to the requirements in the FCC's rules and orders for filing bulk challenges, as well as bulk crowdsource information, to the fixed broadband availability data that will be published on the FCC’s Broadband Maps as part of the new Broadband Data Collection (BDC). The Data Specifications for Bulk Fixed Availability Challenge and Crowdsource Data, which also explains how to make the required filings in the BDC system, is avail

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) allocated $65 billion toward addressing disparities in broadband access across the nation. A key component of the legislation, the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), subsidizes broadband subscriptions for low-income households. However, participation in the program has been low so far, suggesting that the ACP may not yet be reaching many of the underserved households that the legislation targeted.

Sen Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) and Rep Doris Matsui (D-CA) led Sens Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Ed Markey (D-MA), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) to introduce the Digital Equity Foundation Act, legislation to establish a nonprofit foundation to leverage public and private investments to make progress closing the divide on digital equity, digital inclusion, and digital literacy.

A big piece of what the Federal Communications Commission does is to weigh competing claims to use spectrum. One of the latest fights, which is the continuation of a fight going on since 2018, is for the use of the 12 GHz spectrum. The big wrestling match is between Starlink’s desire to use the spectrum to communicate with its low-orbit satellites and cellular carriers and wireless internet service providers (WISPs) who want to use the spectrum for rural broadband. Starlink uses this spectrum to connect its ground-based terminals to satellites.

Until recently, the only source for broadband availability data was the Form 477 data collected (since 2014) by the Federal Communications Commission. These data are collected by the FCC from broadband providers at the census block level (averaging about 20 homes). Under an “all-in” assumption, a census block is deemed to have broadband (at a specified speed threshold) if a provider serves (or could serve in a few months) a single location within the block. This assumption tends, of course, to overstate broadband availability.