Five Obama-era tech policies on the chopping block

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai is just getting started. Here are five regulations or policies he's working to roll back.

1. Net neutrality: When the FCC adopted its landmark net neutrality rules in 2015, requiring internet providers to treat all web traffic equally, then-Commissioner Pai issued a 67-page statement blasting the order as regulatory overreach that would stifle the internet economy.
2. Business data service: On April 20, the FCC will vote on more deregulation of the market.
3. Lifeline: Chairman Pai was quick to take on the FCC's Lifeline program, which provides broadband subsidies to low-income households.
4. Media ownership limits: FCC commissioners will also be voting on a proposal to undo an Obama-era change to media ownership rules, which made it harder for major TV broadcasters to buy up local stations. Broadcasters are currently limited to serving 39 percent of the country’s households. In August of 2016, the FCC voted to do away with the "UHF discount "— which let broadcasting companies count just half of the audiences of certain channels they owned toward the 39 percent limit. Chairman Pai is now proposing to bring it back, and the proposal is expected to pass.
5. Set-top box reform: Former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler proposed reforming the set-top box market, allowing consumers to buy them from third parties and breaking what critics call a cable company monopoly. One of Pai’s first actions as chairman was to withdraw the proposal, prompting an angry response from his predecessor.