Federal Communications Commission

While America’s digital divide has been improving, large chunks of the country, especially rural and tribal lands, are still lagging behind in connection, according to research and experts, and that significantly hampers their access to vital, potentially lifesaving information. Without cell towers, urgent emergency alerts can’t get to phones and it is more difficult for residents to warn one another of danger or contact authorities. It’s a tough sell to get private companies to spend the time and money to build towers in rural areas, according to reports and experts.

Billions of dollars are up for grabs to expand broadband availability across the country. But the Federal Communication Commission maps that will determine where the money goes are inaccurate, according to the Texas comptroller, because internet service providers inflated their coverage areas. The Texas office charged with challenging and improving those maps at the state level says it can’t.

Congress is again kicking the can down the road on several issues important to the US telecommunications industry. A 4,155-page omnibus spending package bill that Congress unveiled is expected to pass in order to keep the government operating. But Congress punted on a long-term extension of the Federal Communications Commission’s auction authority, covering the shortfall for rip and replace funding, and consideration of more mid-band spectrum for wireless use. One tiny blurb of the bill was devoted to the FCC’s

The Federal Communications Commission approved a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) for a new three-year plan for compensation rates for Internet Protocol Captioned Telephone Service (IP CTS).

The Federal Communications Commission launched a proceeding to streamline its review processes for satellite applications.

The Federal Communications Commission proposed rules to more precisely route wireless 911 calls and texts to 911 call centers, which can result in faster response times during emergencies. Wireless 911 calls have historically been routed to 911 call centers based on the location of the cell tower that handles the call. But in some cases—for example, if a 911 call is made near a county or a city border—the nearest cell tower may be in a neighboring jurisdiction.

I suspect that there are already a lot of communities and other folks who are in violation of the license agreement to view and use the new Federal Communications Commission mapping fabric and associated data. CostQuest, the firm that created the mapping fabric, has provided communities and others with a basic license to view and utilize the mapping data strictly for the purpose of the Broadband Data Collection (BDC) process – for reviewing and challenging the FCC maps. Anybody that wants to use the mapping data for any other purpose must sign a different agreement and pay to utilize the da

People with low incomes can get free Internet service through Comcast and the Federal Communications Commission's Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), but signing up is sometimes harder than it should be because of confusion within Comcast's customer service department. The confusion is related to a Comcast rule that makes customers ineligible for Internet Essentials low-income service if they have been a Comcast subscriber in the previous 90 days. That rule and another one related to unpaid bills are not supposed to apply to people who also qualify for the ACP.

In November 2022, the Federal Communications Commission released our pre-production draft of its new broadband maps. For the first time ever, the maps reflect broadband availability at the physical location level. In fact, prior FCC maps only provided this information at the census-block level. That means these new maps provide the best picture available to date of where broadband is and is not available across the country, and the maps will only get better over time as the FCC gets input from stakeholders across the country.

The Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced that New Hampshire received its first “Internet for All” grants for deploying high-speed Internet networks and developing digital skills training programs under the Biden-Harris Administration’s Internet for All initiative. New Hampshire is receiving $5,525,033.51 in funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, signed by President Biden, to plan for the deployment and adoption of affordable, equitable, and reliable high-speed Internet service throughout the state.