Our Networks Are More Vital Than Ever. The FCC Owes Us Updates.

As so many Americans work from home, as our schoolchildren and university students shift to online learning, as virtually all of our social interactions occur online, a fundamental question looms: Will the internet break? The answer is probably not a simple yes or no, and it’s probably not the same answer everywhere in the United States. That’s why the Federal Communications Commission, the agency where I previously served as general counsel, should issue a weekly broadband status report, updating America on what is working about our broadband networks and what, if anything, is not. America’s network infrastructure is a patchwork quilt of technologies reaching across a vast geographic area with widely varying usage patterns even in normal times. But we are not in normal times, and the need for an entity that can provide school administrators, emergency planners, and the general public with a bird’s eye view of the health of our variegated communications systems and technologies has never been greater. It’s not enough to receive (if we do) individual network reports. The FCC, with its view across networks, should step up.

[Jonathan Sallet is a former general counsel for the Federal Communications Commission and currently a senior fellow at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, a nonprofit organization working to bring affordable, high-capacity broadband to all people in the U.S. to ensure a thriving democracy.]