Internet/Broadband

By this Order, the Wireline Competition Bureau and Wireless Telecommunications Bureau extend the deadline for filing initial and reply comments in response to the Thirteenth Section 706 Report Notice of Inquiry until September 21, 2017 and October 6, 2017, respectively.

Facebook is using data it created to map the planet’s entire human population to help it determine what types of internet service it should use to reach the unconnected or not-so-well connected. Facebook now knows where 7.5 billion humans live, to within 15 feet, thanks to mapping data it created based on satellites in space and government census numbers, according to the report, which covered an event in San Francisco where Janna Lewis, Facebook's head of strategic innovation partnerships and sourcing, presented. "Satellites are exciting for us. Our data showed the best way to connect cities is an internet in the sky," Lewis said. "We're trying to connect people from the stratosphere and from space" using high-altitude drone aircraft and satellites to supplement earth-based networks, Lewis said.

The data are used "to know the population distribution" of earth to figure out "the best connectivity technologies" in different locales, Lewis said. "We see these as a viable option for serving these populations" that are "unconnected or under-connected.” Facebook is among a growing number of companies trying to connect the unconnected to the internet, including tapping the stratosphere. Facebook’s strategy involves Aquila, a new aircraft architecture it designed that allows the aircraft to stay in the air for months at a time.

A Q&A with Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai.

Asked about Congress' role in the network neutrality debate, Chairman Pai said, "Well a few years ago after one of the court rulings in 2014, I suggested that, you know, I think Congress would be well-positioned to take hold of this issue and just figure out what the rules of the road are going to be long-term. And I think in the past couple of months, we've seen increasingly a desire from all sides of the debate to involve members of Congress. And obviously if Congress sets the rules in statute, then the FCC, the American public, is duty-bound to follow it. And so we'll see what they do in the time to come."

Because whether and how to regulate various parts of the Internet supply chain (or, if you prefer, ecosystem), I will try to explain below why common carriage obligations, such as network neutrality, are different from public utility regulation (even though most utility providers are common carriers), which is different from natural monopoly regulated rate of return/tariffing/price regulation. I will briefly explore some of the arguments in favor of applying some sort of public forum doctrine or common carrier obligation to social media platforms, and — because this invariably comes up in telecom space — why platform or other infrastructure providers are not and should not be covered by Title II or the Federal Communications Commission, even if we agree they should have some sort of public forum or even public utility obligations.

Among its peers, Google is an unparalleled lobbyist. Between April and June 2017, Google spent $5.4 million lobbying the federal government, more than double the lobbying budget for Apple, a comparable global behemoth that also has to fend off regulatory scrutiny. The tech giant has also long funded a lengthy roster of think tanks, academics, and nonprofits that grapple with issues that could seriously impact Google’s bottom line, such as privacy, network neutrality, and tax reform.

So when the New York Times reported that the New America Foundation (a Google-funded think tank) severed ties with Open Markets (an antimonopoly group housed within New America) after complaints from a top Google executive (Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google’s parent company), it seemed like a rare glimpse at how Google wields its power behind the scenes. Emails between New America and Open Markets reviewed by WIRED and others also give greater insight into the way that funding from Google can influence a policy group's internal dynamics. The cornerstone of Open Markets’s advocacy work is the idea that consolidation of power erodes political liberties and democratic values. But the dustup shows how easy it would be for Google to manipulate public debate on national issues without leaving much of a fingerprint.

A Google spokesperson tells WIRED that its financial support does not interfere with any think tank’s “independence, personnel decisions, or policy perspective." But in emails, New America’s CEO and president Anne-Marie Slaughter comes across as more of a conduit than a firewall between New America’s donors and intellectual work of its scholars.

The Federal Communications Commission’s public commenting process on network neutrality was such a debacle that the legitimacy of the entire body of comments is now in question. Many of the comments were filed with obviously bogus names.

Among the more visible cases of name theft: journalist and net neutrality advocate Karl Bode's identity was used without his consent for a comment favoring a roll back of the rules. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai's name was used on hundreds of comments opposing his proposal, some threatening him with death or using racial slurs. John Oliver's name was used on more than 2,000 of comments as well. On a case by case basis, these forgeries are easy enough to spot. But in aggregate, they're making it harder to draw conclusions about the overall public sentiment of the proceeding. In May 2017, the FCC's site was also hit with what appeared to be a spambot submitting hundreds of thousands of anti-Title II comments with the exact same boilerplate language. The broadband industry is now using the chaos of the comments process to claim that the public actually supports repealing Title II.

Former FCC special counsel Gigi Sohn said, "I can’t imagine there is nothing they can do, and I’d love to see a citation to anything that says that they cannot remove a comment that has been proven to be fake." If anything, she says, the agency might have an obligation under the Administrative Procedure Act to remove fake comments from its consideration. "At a bare minimum, they should investigate these comments and if they can’t actually remove the comments, they can and should disregard them as part of their consideration of record."

Twelve senators sent a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Pai and Commissioners Clyburn, O’Rielly, Rosenworcel and Carr on August 31, 2017, expressing concern that the FCC appears ready to decide that mobile broadband could be a substitute, rather than a complement, to fixed broadband service, and that slower-speed mobile service substitutes as effectively. They noted the FCC’s current policy provides that Americans need access to both mobile and fixed broadband services, with speeds of at least 25 Mbps download/3 Mbps upload. They said such substantial shifts in policy require greater consideration and debate, and urged the Commission to grant an extension of 30 days for both the initial and reply comment periods for the Section 706 Advanced Telecommunications Capabilities Report Notice of Inquiry (NOI).

On August 4, 2017, the Commission released the Connect America Fund Phase II (CAF II) Auction Comment Public Notice, seeking comment on detailed proposals for conducting the Phase II reverse auction designated as Auction 903. While many of the pre-auction and bidding procedures and processes proposed for this auction are similar to those used in other Commission auctions, the proposals include some new procedures and processes. To facilitate public input on the proposals, the Rural Broadband Auctions Task Force announces that the Wireless Telecommunications and Wireline Competition Bureaus will host a webinar about the proposed auction process on September 11, 2017, from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. ET.

Leaving aside the discussion for a minute on whether tech platforms like Google and Amazon actually might meet the definition of a monopoly under our nation’s antitrust laws (a precise and economically rigorous definition usually left to the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, or the federal (and sometimes state) court system), we seem to have forgotten about an important part of the digital ecosystem and whether it has a monopoly problem. It’s the one that’s hiding in plain sight and the evidence is in your mailbox (or inbox) every month when you get your cable bill.

Why does is matter if cable internet service providers have market power? When companies monopolize they may hurt consumers because they no longer have the incentives to compete on price or service, with the unsurprising result that even while profits for companies increase consumer satisfaction plummets and prices continue to rise.

[Commentary] We have come to the end of the comments period set by the Trump Federal Communications Commission (FCC) during which the public could respond to the FCC’s efforts to deregulate high-speed Internet service and roll back network neutrality rules that designate the Internet a utility. There have been over 22 million comments to the FCC’s proposed rule making, or ‘rule unmaking’ — surely a testament to the Internet’s potential to encourage participation — and it appears the huge majority of those comments have spoken against the FCC’s proposal to deregulate.

The public now understands, just as the courts have always understood, the the Internet is an incredible information transmission utility that has fallen into the hands of monopolists and should be regulated in the public’s interest. But the Trump FCC has only free market solutions to problems we don’t have in 2017, so it is highly likely that this FCC will indeed do away with the Net Neutrality rules set forth by the FCC in 2015.

[Fred Johnson is a documentary maker and telecom policy analyst]