The Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration will submit to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for clearance a proposal for voluntary collection of broadband availability data. In the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2018, Congress directed NTIA to update the national broadband availability map in coordination with the Federal Communications Commission and the states. Congress directed NTIA to acquire and display available third-party data sets to the extent it is able to negotiate its inclusion to augment data from the FCC, other federal government agencies, state governments, and the private sector. NTIA has developed this voluntary collection of broadband availability data, at a more granular level than that available via current Federal programs (including the FCC Form 477 process). This data will be used to analyze and map broadband availability across the country, and particularly in rural areas, for the purposes of public policy-making and public investment analysis and decision-making. This information collection covers the 50 states, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Island Areas of American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, and the United States Virgin Islands.

The data to be collected includes geographic information on service availability—such as address, address range, road centerline, land-parcel identification, or latitude/longitude— and corresponding broadband availability data (such as technology service type, upload, and download speed, etc.) Data in a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) format that describe (a) wireless coverage areas based on a propagation model and (b) network infrastructure (such as fiber optic routes) is also responsive. The information collection will be administered through an online file transfer tool.

Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information collection should be sent within 30 days

Despite a host of concessions offered by Sprint and T-Mobile that won over Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai, the fate of the deal hinges on the competition questions that reportedly continue to dog the deal at the Department of Justice. At the DOJ, deals are approved if they won't hurt competition, which is usually determined by potential impact on consumer prices. Discord between the FCC and DOJ is unusual, as the agencies usually collaborate and share information during merger reviews. In past telecommunication deals involving reviews by both the FCC and DOJ, the agencies often announce their decisions in quick succession. If the DOJ sues to block the merger, it could go to court — or the two companies could give up on their plans. State attorneys general are also still reviewing the deal.

Sens Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) are criticizing Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai's decision to greenlight the merger of T-Mobile and Sprint -- the latest sign that antitrust issues are core to many of their 2020 platforms. Sens Sanders and Klobuchar say a merger of the telecommunications giants would leave consumers with fewer choices. Sen Klobuchar, who is expected to publish a book on antitrust issues later in 2019, said the deal could harm competition. “T-Mobile has long been a competitive disruptor in the market, bringing down prices and spurring innovation,” she said. “I don’t think going from four to three major carriers will be good for competition in the long term.”

Although Sens Sanders and Klobuchar were the only ones to weigh in on May 20, other 2020 contenders are on record criticizing the deal. Earlier in 2019, Sens Sanders, Kobuchar, Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and Cory Booker (D-NJ) were among the Democratic senators who sent a letter to Chairman Pai, calling on the FCC to reject the deal.

San Jose (CA) and AT&T announced a new project to outfit the city’s streetlights and public parks with public Wi-Fi routers and earthquake sensors. The city plans to outfit 550 streetlights with LED lights, and install 670 smart-lighting controllers, 15 digital infrastructure nodes and 100 Wi-Fi extenders from AT&T. San Jose already offers public Wi-Fi in some parts of its downtown, but the Wi-Fi extenders will improve public safety and expand access to internet in public parks. 

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about data privacy and competition policy, GOP senators signaled they are divided over whether to pursue antitrust enforcement against the country's largest tech companies. Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) expressed concern that Google and Facebook "own 70 percent of digital advertising in the world," asking witnesses for potential "antitrust remedies" to apply to advertising practices. But he stopped short of calling for any specific actions. Sen Ted Cruz (R-TX) focused his remarks on the "size, power [and] market cap" of Google, calling the company "larger than Standard Oil was when it was broken up and larger than AT&T was when it was broken up."  "There are many on this committee, including myself, concerned about potential anticompetitive conduct from Google," Sen Cruz said. Sen Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) echoed his sentiments, saying she is concerned "there are openings for market abuse and exploitation of consumer data and also for being able to use these platforms and then drive out competition."

Sen John Cornyn (R-TX) said he thinks "the discussion of breaking up a Google or breaking up a Facebook is not what we should be doing." He called for giving users "more information" about how the companies use their data rather than imposing stringent regulations on how they operate. "[Users] can vote with your feet," Sen Cornyn said. "You can either break them up by no longer interacting with them or you can build them up because you’re comfortable with their … standards." 

In our latest Annual Report to Congress, the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet Authority) outlines the significant progress made in fiscal year (FY) 2018 to deliver on Congress’s vision of creating a truly nationwide, interoperable broadband public safety network.  It was a landmark year for public safety, as the FirstNet network deployment began ahead of schedule following the decisions of all US states and territories and the District of Columbia to participate in the deployment of the nationwide public safety broadband network. Today, public safety entities throughout the nation are benefitting from the power of the network as they respond to emergencies and in their daily operations.  This includes more than 7,250 agencies using more than 600,000 connections on the FirstNet network, and over 100 devices approved and certified for use on the FirstNet network. The FirstNet Authority worked with jurisdictions and organizations across the country to educate first responders about the benefits of broadband for public safety and the ways it is changing vital public safety communications.

In swaths of rural America, along roads where there are just a few farms or homes within a mile-long stretch, customers are so few that the likes of AT&T and T-Mobile don’t bother to build cell towers for coverage. The only operators providing wireless access are small carriers, many of which can’t afford equipment from suppliers such as Ericsson and Nokia and instead rely on cheaper network infrastructure from Huawei Technologies and other Chinese companies. Rural broadband carriers could be forced to rip out and replace entire networks because they wouldn’t be able to import spare parts or software updates to maintain infrastructure, said Roger Entner, a telecom analyst at Recon Analytics. “If something breaks, what are you going to tell your customer? ‘I’m sorry you have an outage. We don’t know when we are going to fix it because it’s Huawei equipment. Until then, sorry. No internet for you,’ ” Entner said. “You don’t want to tell that to a customer.”

“Small carriers face a constant uphill battle both in terms of limited vendors who will supply to us … compounded by the regulatory challenges we’re up against,” said John Nettles, president of Pine Belt Communications, a small telecommunications company in Alabama that relies on the Chinese company ZTE for its 4G network. “Sometimes it feels like the cards are really stacked against us.” Nettles estimates that replacing Pine Belt’s network would cost $5 million to $10 million. And downtime from installing new equipment would probably cause Pine Belt to forgo $1 million to $3 million in roaming fees.

Among the mega-corporations that surveil you, your cellphone carrier has always been one of the keenest monitors, in constant contact with the one small device you keep on you at almost every moment. A confidential Facebook document shows that the social network courts carriers, along with phone makers — some 100 different companies in 50 countries — by offering the use of even more surveillance data, pulled straight from your smartphone by Facebook itself.  Offered to select Facebook partners, the data includes not just technical information about Facebook members’ devices and use of Wi-Fi and cellular networks, but also their past locations, interests, and even their social groups. This data is sourced not just from the company’s main iOS and Android apps, but from Instagram and Messenger as well. The data has been used by Facebook partners to assess their standing against competitors, including customers lost to and won from them, but also for more controversial uses like racially targeted ads. Some experts are particularly alarmed that Facebook has marketed the use of the information — and appears to have helped directly facilitate its use, along with other Facebook data — for the purpose of screening customers on the basis of likely creditworthiness. Such use could potentially run afoul of federal law, which tightly governs credit assessments.

President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign has spent far more than any single Democratic presidential candidate on Facebook advertising, reprising a strategy that was central to his 2016 victory. Since entering the race late in April, former Vice President Joe Biden has pumped more than $1 million into Facebook ads, outspending President Trump’s campaign for three of the past four weeks. Much of President Trump’s spending on Facebook advertising in recent weeks has gone toward ads that have been seen by older Americans, particularly women 55 and older. Many of the Trump campaign’s ads on Facebook are designed to get users to provide their contact information and expand the size of the campaign’s already enormous list of supporters. Others solicit donations or peddle Trump merchandise. “Facebook ads are a really valuable source for building your email list, and the more emails you have on your list, the more money you’re going to raise online,” said Eric Wilson, a Republican digital strategist. “There’s a direct through line to resources for the campaign.”

President Donald Trump has a penchant for ganging up on the "mainstream media," but lately his attacks have spread to ganging up on any information gatekeeper — from Big Tech platforms to newscasters on his favorite network. His ire lately has turned toward Sunday political shows, specifically. Last weekend he tweeted multiple times about the "Fake News Sunday Political Shows," even calling out Fox's own Chris Wallace for interviewing Mayor Pete Buttigieg. And, the White House launched a new tool recently that will allow any US citizen to submit a complaint if they think they were unfairly censored on social media platforms. The administration has pushed to undermine key White House press traditions that are meant to bring more information to the public, such as not holding a press briefing in weeks and taking away press passes from journalists. CNN's Oliver Darcy says part of the strategy is to make Americans in the middle of the country think that they're under attack by elitist institutions. "They're out to censor your ideas, you're under attack, and they're using that, effectively, fear mongering."