Federal

Big kudos to the Federal Communications Commission for the release of its Communications Marketplace Report at the end of 2022. This is the first Communications Marketplace Report released under FCC Chairwoman Rosenworcel’s leadership, so none of us should be surprised that there are vast improvements in the information covered.

The Utah Broadband Center (UBC), powered by the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity, announces two new broadband planning grants are available to help local governments, municipalities, nonprofits, and government agencies develop plans to expand high-speed internet access and adoption in Utah communities. These grants—funded by the federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program and the Digital Equity Act—empower local stakeholders to identify areas of the state that need increased investment in infrastructure, skills training, or access to devices to facilitate Utahns

Whether or not the US closes its digital divide may come down to the fate of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP): the $14.25 billion program currently subsidizing broadband by $30/month for over 15.7 million households (up to $75 on tribal lands). That's the view of the National Urban League (NUL).

Broadband operators, including those represented by ACA Connects and NCTA–The Internet & Television Association, have asked the Federal Communications Commission to either clarify or reconsider two requirements in rules implementing consumer broadband labels that they say may not pass legal muster otherwise. Congress mandated the labels so consumers can better gauge just what kind of broadband service they are getting, including price, speed, and quality. In a joint petition for clarification or reconsideration filed with the FCC, the associations said they generally support the adoptio

So often when we think about 5G in the United States we talk about our phones. But if we do this right, our phones will be the least interesting thing about our 5G future. This is not about the small icon that appears—and sometimes disappears—in the upper right-hand corner of a mobile device. It is a whole lot bigger than that. We are talking about using 5G technology to lay the foundation for digital transformation around the globe. Because we are fast heading to a world where next-generation wireless networks connect everyone and everything around us.

In this Notice of Apparent Liability (NAL), the Federal Communications Commission proposes a penalty of $62,000,000 against Q Link Wireless for apparently violating provisions of the 2021 Consolidated Appropriations Act and FCC rules and orders governing the reimbursements it claimed for providing Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB) Program customers with internet-connected devices between December 2021 and March 2022. Because of these apparent violations, which involved overclaiming support for hundreds of thousands of computer tablets, Q Link apparently obtained at least $20,792,800 in impr

January 13, 2023 was a major milestone in the process of moving $42.5 billion from the federal government to states to distribute mostly to rural areas to build new, modern internet access networks. January 13th marked the deadline for error corrections (called challenges) to the official national broadband map that will be used to determine how much each state will get.

The Federal Election Commission (FEC) has dismissed a complaint from Republicans that Google’s Gmail app aided Democratic candidates by sending GOP fundraising emails to spam at a far higher rate than Democratic solicitations. The Republican National Committee and others contended that the alleged benefit amounted to unreported campaign contributions to Democrats. The Republican National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and the National Republican Congressional Committee complained to the FEC in 2022, citing 

There are almost 15.6 million households using the broadband subsidy from the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). The program started with a little over 9 million households at the start of 2022 and added over 500,000 new enrollees per month. Several folks who track funding say that ACP is going to run out of money sometime in the summer of 2024. The obvious solution to keep ACP operating is for Congress to refill the ACP funding bucket.

Brandy Reitter, executive director of the Colorado Broadband Office (CBO), discussed what the state’s broadband coverage looks like, local challenges with deployment, and progress on the funding front. In terms of coverage gaps, Reitter estimates there are about 166,000 households and 360,000 locations across Colorado without access to high-speed broadband, with over half of those households (around 93,000) having cited a lack of physical infrastructure as the main obstacle to broadband access.