PSTN-to-IP transition

The Federal Communications Commission enacted reforms that will better enable providers to invest in next-generation networks. The FCC is also seeking comment on additional reforms, including how the FCC can expedite rebuilding and repairing broadband infrastructure after natural disasters.

One set of changes approved govern access to utility poles and conduits, which can be a costly and time-consuming barrier to broadband deployment. Changes include rules that:

Nov 16, the Federal Communications Commission majority will continue down its destructive path of adopting a series of actions that fail to put consumers first. They will make it more difficult for low-income Americans to access affordable communications services; they will adopt a so-called ‘voluntary’ television standard that has even more outstanding and unanswered questions than the February Notice of Proposed Rulemaking; they will shred consumer and competition protections in times of technology transitions; and they will open the door to massive media consolidation at the expense of l

[Commentary] Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai is setting a record pace for deregulating the communications industries. Believe it or not, things are about to get worse in Nov. Starting with the FCC’s open meeting on Nov 16, the agency is poised to approve or propose no fewer than four decisions that will deregulate consolidated industries, remove consumer protections, and widen the digital divide:

A group of Democratic senators sent a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai raising concerns about a proposed rule that could harm rural consumers by undermining existing protections for landline service.The Accelerating Wireline Broadband Deployment by Removing Barriers to Infrastructure and Investment Report and Order lessens notifications to consumers about changes to their landline service (virtually eliminating advance notice of copper retirement to retail customers), eliminates rules put in place to protect consumers, and changes the definition of “service” to

The Federal Communications Commission will vote Nov 16 on a plan that, according to Chairman Ajit Pai, will strip away regulations that prevent telcos from upgrading their networks. But in doing so, the Republican-controlled FCC plans to eliminate a requirement that telcos provide Americans with service at least as good as the old copper networks that provide phone service and DSL Internet. The requirement relates to phone service but has an impact on broadband because the two services use the same networks.

Following 2012's Hurricane Sandy, Verizon has put together a new set of flood barrier and network transformation methods that are designed to achieve two goals: keep its wireline network operational and hasten its ongoing copper-to-fiber migration. During Sandy, which flooded several of its service and central offices, the service provider reported $1 billion in damage due to water and related storm damage.

Public Knowledge joined Communications Workers of America and 20 rural, consumer, civil rights, labor, and other groups in a letter urging Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to retain the agency’s tech transitions rules that protect consumers while providers like Verizon transition from copper to fiber networks. The agency plans to roll back these consumer protections on November 16, effectively downgrading rural America.

The Federal Communications Commission is intervening in a court case in order to help Charter Communications avoid utility-style consumer protections related to its phone service in Minnesota. The FCC and Charter both want to avoid a precedent that could lead other states to impose stricter consumer protection rules on VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) phone service offered by cable companies. The FCC has never definitively settled the regulatory status of VoIP.

President Trump-appointed Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai has rubberstamped the elimination of several policies and protections that are critical to closing the digital divide. Among these now-battered policies is an item that will be decided on in November and will give telecom giants a green light to abandon their rural customers.

CenturyLink is joining the chorus of incumbent telecommunication companies that want the copper retirement and legacy service discontinuance process to be simplified to facilitate the build out and expansion of next-gen fiber and IP-based services.

In an Federal Communications Commission filing, CenturyLink has asked the regulator to streamline the Section 214 and copper retirement processes. “CenturyLink expressed wholehearted support for the Commission’s proposals to expedite and streamline the Section 214 and copper retirement processes,” Century wrote. “The migration to next-generation facilities and services is both natural and desirable. The Commission therefore should eliminate prior approval requirements where possible and streamline those that remain.”