Digital Divide

Reps Mike Carey (R-OH) and Nikki Budzinski (D-IL) introduced bipartisan, bicameral legislation to renew the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP)—a federal program that helped low-income households afford access to high-speed internet.

We should not take our foot off the gas when it comes to the importance of better mapping, considering it’s at the heart of so much in the rural broadband space. Congress charged the Federal Communications Commission in early 2020 with creating a national broadband availability map. It is only fair to say that the national broadband map is better than any broadband availability dataset before it, and that it keeps getting better. But we are in no position to declare “mission accomplished” or even “good enough” when it comes to the national broadband map.

The death of the US government's Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) is starting to result in disconnection of Internet service for Americans with low incomes. Charter Communications reported a net loss of 154,000 Internet subscribers that it said was mostly driven by customers canceling after losing the federal discount.

One of the biggest challenges for the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) grant is for State Broadband Offices to make sure that every unserved location gets covered by the grants. My understanding of the process is that the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) will not approve the BEAD grants being made by a State until they can demonstrate that every unserved and underserved location will be covered by the grants.

Goal One for the District of Columbia State Broadband and Digital Equity Office is to make high-quality, affordable, high-speed internet accessible to all residents of D.C. in their homes and local Community Anchor Institutions (CAIs) and drive equitable adoption of broadband. Key to that goal is ensuring that no D.C. resident must pay more than two percent of their gross income per month for high-speed internet. But, as a percentage of the total population, D.C. has more people with income below 150 percent of the federal poverty line than the US does overall.

The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has approved New Mexico and Virginia’s Initial Proposals for the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program. This approval enables New Mexico and Virginia to request access to funding and begin implementation of the BEAD program—a major step towards closing the digital divide and meeting the President’s goal of connecting everyone in America with affordable, reliable, high-speed Internet service.  The action allows states to request:  

On July 24, the U.S.

For as long as the internet has existed, there’s been a gap between those who have access to it—and the means to afford it—and those who don’t. The vast majority of federal broadband spending over the past two decades has gone toward expanding internet access to rural areas. Only $14.2 billion went to making the internet more affordable through the Affordable Connectivity Program.

Although the urban–rural digital divide is a globally common phenomenon, less is known about the social determinants of the digital divide within rural and urban areas. Understanding this relationship is important for assessing the equity implications of telecommunication policy given the ongoing and significant public investment into high speed broadband infrastructure. This paper contributes to this discussion by connecting high speed broadband maps in Ireland to measures of social deprivation constructed from detailed population-wide Irish census data collected in 2022.

USTelecom and more than 30 other broadband industry groups sent a letter to Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo covering several ideas for how the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) can remedy the issues posed by the rates being approved for the low-cost service option requirement in the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD)Pprogram.