Press Release

The House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, chaired by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), advanced bills to the full committee that improve the nation’s broadband infrastructure and strengthen public safety communications.

Rep Kevin Cramer (R-ND) introduced the Reprioritizing Unserved Rural Areas and Locations (RURAL) for Broadband Act. The RURAL Broadband Act ensures government resources are being used as efficiently as possible while developing broadband networks in rural areas. The bill prioritizes the Rural Utility Service (RUS) funds to unserved areas over underserved areas which are already receiving some Universal Service Fund (USF) resources. Senator Steve Daines (R-MT) introduced identical language as a bill in the Senate, S. 2970.  

Recognizing the importance of innovative communications technology designed for people with disabilities, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced the winners of the seventh annual Chairman’s Awards for Advancement in Accessibility (Chairman's AAA). Winners of 2018 Chairman’s AAA:
Orbit Reader 20: This refreshable braille display and notetaker significantly reduces the price point for this type of accessible technology, which has been prohibitively expensive for many blind and low vision persons. 

Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) released the following statement after Facebook provided responses to questions posed by Sen Markey in the wake of the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica privacy breach. In his questions, Sen Markey asked Facebook to commit to not include advertising in children’s offerings and to commit to not share children’s information for targeted advertisements, once young users turn 13.

Senators Brian Schatz (D-HI) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) called on the Federal Communications Commission to share more information about the reported distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack on the FCC’s website while it was open for comments on net neutrality in 2017.

[June 11], the Federal Communications Commission’s misguided repeal of network neutrality goes into effect. This is bad news for all of us who rely on an open internet for so many facets of civic and commercial life. Internet service providers now have the power to block websites, throttle services, and censor online content. They will have the right to discriminate and favor the internet traffic of those companies with whom they have pay-for-play arrangements and the right to consign all others to a slow and bumpy road.

[Commentary] Requiring the targeting data label on ads is just a simple way of bringing the shadowy business of data collection and ad targeting into the light of day. If Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg are sure that there is nothing wrong with harvesting users’ personal data to place ads, they should have no problem with being completely open with consumers about the real costs of the “free” service their company provides. Internet advertisers may complain that ad targeting is a complicated business and that the targeting of one ad may rely on many pieces of user data. Well, so be it.

Internet service providers spent millions of dollars lobbying the Federal Communications Commission to end network neutrality, and they are certainly going to expect a healthy return on that investment. While the ISPs are clearly focused on increasing their profits, here the ISPs are likely to be patient. Their wisest course of action will be to eliminate net neutrality like a slow drip over time in the hope that consumers won’t notice and will stop caring.

The Federal Communications Commission’s Restoring Internet Freedom Order, which goes into effect on June 11, 2018, will protect the open Internet that consumers cherish while paving the way for better, faster, cheaper Internet access. The order replaces unnecessary, heavy-handed regulations
dating back to 1934 with strong consumer protections, increased transparency, and common-sense regulations that will promote investment and broadband deployment. The FCC’s framework for protecting Internet freedom has three key parts:

It’s been four months since my colleague, Federal Communications Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, and I penned an op-ed reaffirming the need and accompanying reasons to stop states from diverting critical 9-1-1 fees collected from consumers to non-9-1-1 functions.  After such time, it seems appropriate to ask: have things improved?  In reality, the effort to end 9-1-1 fee diversion has had mixed results.