Jon Brodkin

The Federal Communications Commission currently regulates broadband internet access service (BIAS, if you will) as an "information service" under Title I of the Communications Act. As the FCC contemplates reclassifying BIAS as a telecommunications service under Title II's common-carrier framework, the question is whether the FCC has authority to do so. Federal appeals courts have upheld previous FCC decisions on whether to apply common carrier rules to broadband.

Sports leagues are urging the US to require "instantaneous" takedowns of pirated livestreams and new requirements for Internet service providers to block pirated websites. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 requires websites to "expeditiously" remove infringing material upon being notified of its existence.

A group of Internet service providers that won government grants are asking the Federal Communication Commission for more money or an "amnesty window" in which they could give up grants without penalty. The ISPs were awarded grants to build broadband networks from the FCC's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF), which selected funding recipients in December 2020.

Starlink has abandoned plans to charge data overage fees to standard residential users who exceed 1TB of monthly usage. When SpaceX's Starlink division first announced the data cap in November 2022, it said that residential customers would get 1TB of "priority access data" each month.

SpaceX has offered a public explanation for why Starlink's actual service availability falls far short of what it claimed on the Federal Communications Commission's national broadband map. SpaceX's FCC filings indicate it offers fixed broadband at virtually every address in the US even though the Starlink website's service map shows it has a waitlist in huge portions of the country.  SpaceX removed some homes from the FCC database when residents filed challenges because they were unable to order Starlink at addresses listed as served on the FCC map. SpaceX tried to clear up the confusion in

Comcast has fessed up to another mistake on the national broadband map after previously insisting that false data it gave the Federal Communications Commission was actually correct.

Matthew Hillier can't get Comcast service at his home in Arvada, CO. But that didn't stop Comcast from claiming it serves his house when it submitted data for the Federal Communications Commission's new broadband map. Comcast eventually admitted to the FCC that it doesn't serve the address—but only after Ars got involved.

Ryan Grewell, who runs a small wireless Internet service provider called Smart Way Communications in Ohio, filed challenges to the Federal Communications Commission's new broadband map after his customers noticed that the FCC map falsely reported fiber Internet service was available at their homes. The FCC data was provided by Jefferson County Cable. In a reply to Grewell's challenges,  Jefferson County Cable Executive Bob Loveridge wrote, "You challenged that we do not have service at your residence and indeed we don't today.

People with low incomes can get free Internet service through Comcast and the Federal Communications Commission's Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), but signing up is sometimes harder than it should be because of confusion within Comcast's customer service department. The confusion is related to a Comcast rule that makes customers ineligible for Internet Essentials low-income service if they have been a Comcast subscriber in the previous 90 days. That rule and another one related to unpaid bills are not supposed to apply to people who also qualify for the ACP.

The Comcast "Broadcast TV" fee that isn't included in the company's advertised prices is rising again, tacking as much as $27 onto the monthly bills of cable TV users. Comcast's Broadcast TV and Regional Sports Network fees combined could add nearly $40 to a customer's monthly TV bill after next month's price hikes, all while Comcast advertises much lower prices than people actually pay.