Internet/Broadband

Don’t miss your chance to nominate a Digital Equity Champion! The deadline to submit your nomination is March 18. Named for Charles Benton, the founder of Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, the National Digital Inclusion Alliance created the awards to recognize leadership and dedication in advancing digital equity: from promoting the ideal of accessible and affordable communications technology for all Americans to crafting programs and policies that make it a reality. Nominations (and self-nominations!) are being accepted for two awards:

Information sharing on cybersecurity and election threats may become a whole lot harder after the Department of Homeland Security ended some federal funding for two partnerships used by thousands of state and local governments. A spokesperson for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency confirmed it terminated a $10 million partnership with the Center for Internet Security for the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center, and the Election Infrastructure Information Sharing and Analysis Center.

Evan Feinman, a top Commerce Department official sent a blistering email to his former colleagues on his way out the door warning that the Trump administration is poised to unduly enrich Elon Musk’s satellite internet company with money for rural broadband. The technology offered by Starlink, Musk’s company, is inferior, Feinman warned.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) sent letters to Adobe, Alphabet, 

After three years of working with the federal government for more than $1 billion in broadband expansion funding, state officials are bracing for what will come next after a pause was announced. West Virginia Broadband Office Director Kelly Workman said they are expecting changes in the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program but aren’t quite sure what those might include.  Officials with the Trump administration announced a “rigorous review” of the $42.5 billion program. “There are some suggestions that have been raised concerning efficiencies that can be gained through the enviro

The Maine Connectivity Authority believes there are several ways to both accelerate and improve the BEAD program, reducing barriers and maximizing the Return On Investment (ROI):

The Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition commends the Federal Communications Commission for granting a 60-day extension of the Funding Year 2025 Rural Health Care Program application filing window, moving the deadline from April 1, 2025, to June 2, 2025.

The N.C. Department of Information Technology’s Division of Broadband and Digital Opportunity announced more than $10 million in Completing Access to Broadband program projects to connect 2,762 households and businesses in Cherokee, Clay and Macon counties to high-speed internet. These projects will be funded by more than $7.5 million from the federal American Rescue Plan awarded by NCDIT and nearly $2.6 million from selected broadband providers: 

Increasing broadband deployment has been a critical component of the United States’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic and a central aspect of the recent wave of funding aimed at modernizing the country’s infrastructure. However, achieving the goal of those federal commitments will require a new degree of public and private sector collaboration, and one issue in particular is causing a disproportionate amount of uncertainty: the attaching of lines for broadband to utility poles. To better understand pole attachment challenges and begin to identify possible policy solutions, The Pew Charitabl

The Federal Communications Commission's Office of Managing Director (OMD) announces that the proposed universal service contribution factor for the second quarter of 2025 will be 0.366 or 36.6 percent. Contributions to the federal universal service support mechanisms are determined using a quarterly contribution factor calculated by the FCC. The FCC calculates the quarterly contribution factor based on the ratio of total projected quarterly costs of the universal service support mechanisms to contributors’ total projected collected end-user interstate and international telecommunications re