February 2017

FCC REFORM

REPUBLICANS ARE READY TO TAKE DOWN THE FCC
[SOURCE: The Verge, AUTHOR: Jacob Kastrenakes]
Newly-appointed Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai has already chipped away at network neutrality, slowed a program that assists low-income households with broadband access, and hurt efforts to reform exorbitant calling fees for inmates — and that’s just his first two weeks on the job. The chairman of the FCC has exceptional power over what the commission does and how it functions. And that means Chairman Pai, more than anyone else right now, has control over the fate of not just hot-button issues like net neutrality, but the competitive landscape of the cable and wireless industries. Pai’s oft-repeated mission statement has been to “[eliminate] unnecessary and burdensome rules” at the commission. But so far, that’s meant scaling back vital protections for the internet that advocates and millions of consumers loudly fought for and won. As Chairman Pai continues to tweak regulations, he has the ability to undermine core tenets of net neutrality and broadly reshape the FCC in the process. Some Republicans have long hoped to turn the FCC into a toothless management office, and these early actions demonstrate Pai’s power to help them do it. There are two ways Republicans can go about curtailing the power of the FCC. The more transformative method is to overhaul telecom law in order to strip out its strength as a regulator and its mandate to look out for the public good. The easier, if less transformative method — since core functions of the FCC are ultimately dictated by law — would be to have the FCC reorganize itself, which it can do in small ways on its own and in larger ways with a nod from Congress.
benton.org/headlines/republicans-are-ready-take-down-fcc | Verge, The
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FCC SHAKE UP
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Harper Neidig]
Ajit Pai, the new Republican chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, is quickly making his mark on the agency, shaking up its operations and rolling back Obama-era initiatives. His moves have drawn Republican praise but alarmed Democrats and consumer groups and set the stage for the fights ahead. Gigi Sohn, a former aide to former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, said Pai's moves were a severe blow to the Lifeline program and saw it as a call to action. "The way you undermine this program without doing anything too drastic would be to not let any other providers participate, which would drive the prices up," said Sohn. “He uses the process reforms as a smokescreen to try to steer people away from the fact that he is dismantling pro-consumer, pro-competitive and pro-social policies from the previous administration.”
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/319053-new-chairman-quickly-shakes-...
Ajit Pai Starts To Roll Back Latest Internet Regulations From Obama's Team (NPR)
benton.org/headlines/new-chairman-quickly-shakes-fcc | Hill, The | NPR
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AN ANTI-CONSUMER AGENDA AT THE FCC
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] As President Trump rushes to dismantle Obama-era rules that protect Americans, he has an energetic helper over at the Federal Communications Commission. Its new Republican chairman has started undoing policies of his predecessor that were intended to make phone, cable and internet service more fair and more affordable. Ajit Pai, who was a commissioner before he became chairman, is trying to wipe away network neutrality rules put in place by Tom Wheeler, the former chairman, to prevent broadband companies from creating fast and slow lanes on the internet. Chairman Pai has scrapped a proposal to let people buy cable-TV boxes instead of renting them at inflated prices from companies like Comcast. Many of Pai’s moves would hurt the people who have the least power. For instance, he has backed away from rules to lower the exorbitant rates for prison phone calls. And he has suspended nine companies from providing discounted internet service to poor people through a program known as Lifeline. Congress created the FCC to help all Americans obtain access to communication services without discrimination and at fair prices. Pai’s approach does exactly the opposite.
benton.org/headlines/anti-consumer-agenda-fcc | New York Times
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FCC DOES NOT WALK THE WALK
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai extolled the importance of bridging the digital divide. Soon after, he opened another gap, this time between his words and his actions. The FCC removed nine companies from the roster of its Lifeline program for low-income broadband consumers, and it retracted four reports — two directly related to the digital divide — from its record. The FCC offered no immediate explanation for either change. The revocation of the reports — one of the four focused on expanding WiFi networks in primary and secondary schools and libraries, and another on improving the nation’s digital infrastructure — only lends credence to concerns about Pai’s stated commitment to closing the digital divide. It certainly throws cold water on his claims to transparency. And these aren’t the only reasons to fear the FCC is headed in a disturbing direction. Chairman Pai has also expressed eagerness to roll back other Obama-era changes to the agency that make for a freer and fairer Internet. That’s one area where we can hope that, once again, he does not mean what he says.
benton.org/headlines/fcc-talks-talk-digital-divide-and-then-walks-other-direction | Washington Post
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PRIVACY

PRIVACY THREAT
[SOURCE: Slate, AUTHOR: Rep Frank Pallone (D-NJ), FTC Commissioner Terrell McSweeny]
[Commentary] For years, the Federal Trade Commission has been the lead federal agency in protecting the privacy and data-security rights of the American consumer by bringing cases against companies that act against consumers’ privacy interests. The FTC has also advocated for telling consumers about the data being collected about them and for offering people a choice before sensitive information—like data about their health, finances, children, or geolocation—is gathered and shared. But the system has worked because the FTC has not acted alone. Other federal agencies (including the Federal Communications Commission) and state attorneys general have been helpful in this mission. In October, the FCC took the historic step of enacting basic consumer-privacy rules for internet service providers and wireless carriers. These new rules were aimed at providing people with a choice about whether to allow their carriers and cable companies to use and share their sensitive personal information. They are remarkably similar to the enforcement practices of the FTC’s long-standing and successful privacy program. Unfortunately, with the change in administrations, one of the first orders of business for the cable and broadband companies (not to mention the Trump White House and congressional Republicans) is to rescind these rules. But removing them would essentially leave the cable and phone companies without any privacy regulator.
[Rep. Frank Pallone is the ranking member of the House Commerce Committee. Terrell McSweeny is a commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission.]
benton.org/headlines/new-rules-intended-protect-your-online-privacy-are-already-under-threat | Slate
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BROADBAND PRIVACY ON THE CHOPPING BLOCK
[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) says there could be a resolution on rolling back the Federal Communications Commission's broadband privacy framework as early as Feb. 13. "We are talking and working with the Senate on this," she said. "I think using the [Congressional Review Act] to invalidate the rulemaking] is fine. That would be the most expedient way to address the concerns and we are working with the Senate to make sure we can do that." Chairman Blackburn she would try to make sure that there was no privacy gap given that once the FCC reclassified ISPs under Title II common carrier regulations, the FTC was prevented from regulating broadband privacy due to its common carrier exemption. "I would think there would be a way to work through that so you don't have a gap in oversight."
benton.org/headlines/chairman-blackburn-broadband-privacy-rule-rollback-could-start-soon | Broadcasting&Cable
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UNIVERSAL BROADBAND

SENATORS CONCERNED ABOUT LIFELINE
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Corey Booker (D-NJ) are leading more than a dozen senators (all Dems except independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont) calling on Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to reverse his decision to withdraw Lifeline broadband subsidy authorizations from nine companies. Chairman Pai said the decision was due to 1) procedural errors, 2) because they were issued in the waning hours of the previous Administration, something Republicans warned against, and 3) because he suggested the FCC needed to hit the pause button on expanding the low-income subsidy program until it got a better process for monitoring for waste, fraud and abuse. The senators -- who also included Al Franken (D-MN), Ed Markey (D-MA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) -- said they were deeply troubled by the action. They said the chairman was undermining the program, making it more difficult for low income residents to afford critical communications services, and appearing to run counter to his pledge in the first days of his chairmanship to make closing the digital divide a priority under his watch. The senators pointed out that the customers of at least one of the nine would have to be disconnected. Evoking section 706 of the Communications Act, they said that the FCC has an obligation to ensure “consumers in all regions of the country, including low-income consumers” have access to “advanced telecommunications services,” and asked him to reconsider the decision.
benton.org/headlines/democratic-senators-push-fcc-chairman-pai-reverse-lifeline-decision | Multichannel News
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E-RATE OVERBUILDING
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly]
Federal Communications Commission member Michael O’Rielly has a few questions for the Universal Service Administrative Company. He is seeking assistance in identifying and eradicating the use of E-rate funds to overbuild existing broadband networks. Commissioner O’Rielly asks USAC to answer 10 questions no later than Feb 17.
How many E-rate applicants have requested funding to self-construct networks?
How many of these requests are for overbuilds?
Do the providers who are being overbuilt receive Universal Service Fund support?
Do any of the applicants propose to overbuild their own networks?
How many self-construction requests were denied on cost-effectiveness grounds?
How many self-construction requests have been approved?
Please detail USAC’s procedures to determine if these requests are cost-effective.
Please provide USAC materials that explain the self-construct option.
Please provide USAC materials concerning back-up networks.
Is it USAC’s view that E-rate funds may be used to build backup networks? If so, please point to provisions in FCC orders.
benton.org/headlines/fcc-commissioner-orielly-letter-usac-potential-e-rate-overbuilding | Federal Communications Commission
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NETWORK NEUTRALITY

NET NEUTRALITY FACES HARD SELL IN CONGRESS
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Ali Breland]
Two key Senate Republicans say they are open to a bipartisan legislative compromise on network neutrality, but their effort faces skepticism from both parties. Since the election, Senate Commerce Chairman John Thune (R-SD) and Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), the chairman of a Commerce subcommittee on the internet, have said they are willing to work on a measure that keeps the core of the controversial internet rules, but also allows Congress to limit the Federal Communications Commission's powers. Some opponents think it would be easiest to undo the rules through the FCC, where Republicans have a majority. But under that approach, net neutrality could just be restored when Democrats take back the White House, some say. That uncertainty has many in the tech world hoping Congress can craft lasting rules and has Chairmen Thune and Wicker believing they have an opening. But many Democrats are also openly skeptical of a legislative fix.
benton.org/headlines/network-neutrality-fix-faces-hard-sell | Hill, The
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LOSING NET NEUTRALITY
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Christopher Mims]
[Commentary] In the near term it looks like advocates of network neutrality will be dealt a major blow. That’s because consumers are going to love the Trump administration’s potential first steps at dismantling net neutrality. It starts with an ever-widening array of services that are “zero-rated.” Zero-rating involves internet service providers giving customers free data services, such as unlimited video streaming. The real risk isn’t that deep-pocketed internet giants would be unable to pay for telecom play. Rather, it’s that any would-be next big thing will instead be smothered in the cradle. Even most opponents of net neutrality don’t believe we should do away with it completely. The consumer impact is difficult to predict. We’ve never really lived in a world without net neutrality. Doing away with the FCC’s current power to enforce net neutrality is like lawmakers tossing away an umbrella just because it’s not raining outside, forgetting that big carriers have every incentive to make it rain—for themselves.
benton.org/headlines/consumers-are-going-love-end-net-neutrality-first | Wall Street Journal
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SPECTRUM/WIRELESS

INCENTIVE AUCTION CLOSES
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission, AUTHOR: Gary Epstein, Jean Kiddoo]
Feb 10 marks the end of all clock phase bidding in the incentive auction. This is a noteworthy event for winning bidders and an appropriate moment to appreciate the auction’s success in using market forces to allocate spectrum to its highest and best use. With $19.6 billion in forward auction clock phase gross winning bids, the incentive auction will generate the second highest total proceeds of any Commission spectrum license auction in its 20-plus year history. The public stands to gain substantial economic benefits from mobile broadband utilizing the 84 megahertz of spectrum repurposed by this auction. In addition, the auction will provide more than $6 billion to the US Treasury for deficit reduction, more than $10 billion to broadcasters that chose to relinquish spectrum usage rights, and up to $1.75 billion for other broadcasters that incur costs in changing channels. And, for winning stations that will remain on the air through channel sharing or changing bands, auction proceeds will provide an infusion of capital for them to reinvest in programming and other activities. This is also a good time to lay out in greater detail what lies ahead in the coming months.
benton.org/headlines/fccs-incentive-auction-clock-phase-over-whats-next | Federal Communications Commission | Chairman Pai | Commissioner O'Rielly
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JOURNALISM

TRUMP-MURDOCH
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Jim Rutenberg]
[Commentary] The ties that bind the most powerful media mogul in the world to the leader of the free world just keep getting stronger. Or, more precisely, we keep learning just how strong they are. The question is where that leaves the rest of the world when they’re done divvying it up. The whole Murdoch’s highly influential news organizations were covering Trump’s campaign and transition, their executive chairman was entangled in a financial arrangement of the most personal sort — tied to his children’s financial (very) well being — along with the president’s daughter. Referring to her only as the president’s “daughter” fails to capture her true role. She is Trump’s most trusted confidante. And she is married to a key presidential adviser, Jared Kushner, who, as it happens, is so close with Murdoch that he even helped Murdoch set up his bachelor pad after his last divorce, The relationship between the president and Murdoch has implications well beyond The Wall Street Journal, given the global breadth of Murdoch’s media holdings, his history of putting them to use for political leaders who then help him with his own business needs, and Trump’s own reactivity to the news media. How it all affects the rest of us depends on how powerfully Murdoch’s news media properties swing behind the new presidential agenda and how much criticism of President Trump they’ll abide from their journalists and commentators. And all of that could depend on what Murdoch wants from the administration, and how badly he wants it.
benton.org/headlines/when-pillar-fourth-estate-rests-trump-murdoch-axis | New York Times
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WHITE HOUSE AND THE CONSERVATIVE PRESS
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Paul Farhi]
John Gizzi, the chief political correspondent for the conservative Newsmax Media news group, is enjoying newfound access at the White House. During the first two weeks of the Trump administration, press secretary Sean Spicer has picked him out several times from among the jostling mob of journalists seeking to question the administration. Gizzi’s change of fortune reflects a small but important change in the way Spicer, and the Trump administration generally, has approached the news media. Once relegated to a secondary role under President Barack Obama and President George W. Bush’s press secretaries, smaller, primarily-conservative news outfits — Newsmax, Townhall, the Blaze, the Daily Caller and Breitbart, among them — are now first among equals in Spicer’s daily encounters with the press. Reporters from once-favored mainstream news outlets haven’t exactly been shut out by Spicer. But at some briefings, he’s ignored the entreaties of journalists from The Washington Post, CNN and the New York Times — all of which President Trump has singled out for criticism — to call on reporters for outlets that used to be an afterthought. The White House also appears to have steered Trump’s TV interviews to favorable outlets, too.
benton.org/headlines/newsmax-cbn-townhall-new-faces-and-new-feel-white-house-press-briefings | Washington Post
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TRUMP AND MEDIA REPORTING
[SOURCE: Women’s Wear Daily, AUTHOR: Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke]
It may have felt like the presidential election completely dominated all the news coverage last year, but in retrospect, that seems almost like a golden age of media compared to what has happened since Donald Trump became President. Over the past few weeks, it has felt as if Trump is the only story that matters, taking over every section of the media world, from style to sports. “Every journalist, no matter the beat, covers politics now,” Bloomberg tech reporter Sarah Frier tweeted. Her tweet resonated: So far, it has garnered more than 1,600 retweets and 5,000 likes. Coverage of the media industry has, for many outlets, turned into coverage of the president’s antagonistic relationship with the press. At magazine conferences and during drinks with sources, the talk inevitably turns to Trump. Considering that the new Republican administration has cast the majority of the press in a starring role as “the opposition party,” and Trump has decided that the term “fake news” can be (falsely) used to describe any story he doesn’t like (while “alternative facts” can be used to create any story he wants), it’s perhaps no wonder that the relationship between the White House and the media has become a big story in its own right. Not since Watergate has public awareness of journalism seemed so high.
benton.org/headlines/has-donald-trump-taken-over-media-reporting | Women’s Wear Daily
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REGULATION

DO THE RIGHT THING
[SOURCE: New America, AUTHOR: Kevin Bankston]
[Commentary] New America’s Open Technology Institute has been working on answering this question: how do you get companies to do the right thing? We’ve studied three positive privacy and security practices that have been adopted by internet companies over the years—first by a few companies as an innovative new practice, then as a best practice by more companies, and finally as an established standard practice by most of the industry—so that we could chart the different events and influences that helped make that widespread adoption possible. Our hope was that by looking across several cases, we could identify what types of political, technical, and social interventions were most likely to help spur widespread change at the industry level, and could maybe even provide a roadmap for future advocates to follow. Specifically, OTI’s new “Do The Right Thing” project has mapped the key milestones along the road to adoption for three major privacy and security practices that have now become standard in the internet industry: (1) publishing transparency reports that detail government demands for user data, (2) encrypting web traffic by default (as of the end of last year, over half of all web traffic is now encrypted!) and (3) offering two-factor authentication (2FA) to better guard your online accounts against unauthorized intruders.
benton.org/headlines/getting-internet-companies-do-right-thing | New America
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AGENDA
Trump Takes on Tech Industry in Early Policy Moves

TRUMP VS TECH
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: John McKinnon]
President Donald Trump has shown a readiness to take on the tech industry, clashing with Silicon Valley in ways that his tech-friendly predecessor hardly ever did. The president’s executive order on immigration, which generated an outcry from the industry, was only the beginning. Trump-appointed regulators have begun scaling back network neutrality regulations that marked one of the tech industry’s most significant victories during the Obama era. That rule requires that internet service providers don't give priority to some traffic—a policy that companies like Facebook and Netflix like, because it assures them the same basic treatment that rivals would get. Regulators also are likely to undo customer-privacy restrictions imposed under the Obama administration that critics say disadvantaged cable and wireless firms such as Charter Communications and AT&T in their competition with internet firms. The new Attorney General Jeff Sessions, like President Trump, has been a critic of the tech industry’s ability to keep customers’ communications and data from the government. Many tech and privacy policy experts believe the new administration will be aggressive in its efforts to broaden the government’s authority, particularly where national security is involved. Moreover, given some past comments by President Trump and his aides, many companies worry that the administration plans new restrictions on visas for high-skilled workers from abroad, among other potential changes to the immigration system that could be unwelcome to Silicon Valley.
benton.org/headlines/trump-takes-tech-industry-early-policy-moves | Wall Street Journal
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February 2017

February 13, 2017 (Pai's FCC Talks the Talk, Then Walks in the Other Direction)

New chairman quickly shakes up FCC

The FCC talks the talk on the digital divide — and then walks in the other direction

Trump Takes on Tech Industry in Early Policy Moves

Consumers Are Going to Love the End of Net Neutrality—at First

Bronwyn Howell -- Reforming the FCC: From engineering outcomes to overseeing ecosystems

When a Pillar of the Fourth Estate Rests on a Trump-Murdoch Axis

Spyware’s Odd Targets: Backers of Mexico’s Soda Tax

Silicon Valley employees are emerging as a potent group of anti-Trump activists. Can they make a difference?

Schools Study How To Avoid Fake News