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FCC Announces Tentative Agenda for February 2020 Open Meeting
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai announced that the items below are tentatively on the agenda for the February Open Commission Meeting scheduled for Friday, February 28, 2020:
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Here's the agenda for the Federal Communications Commission's February open meeting:
Advances in technology are transforming how people across the globe engage with democracy. Opportunities for engagement and participation are expanding, but recent events highlight new threats to the integrity of democratic elections in a networked era.
As we enter the 2020 primary season, join journalists, political scientists, technologists, voting rights advocates, election law scholars, and regulators to explore these pressing issues.
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The United States has a real opportunity to lead in the next generation of 5G wireless connectivity, but doing so will require adequate public airwaves be made available to carry all the data. The so-called “C-band”—from 3.7 to 4.2 GHz—is widely seen as an ideal swath of spectrum for the job, as it offers an attractive balance of geographic coverage and capacity for large amounts of data. The global device ecosystem using these frequencies also has real momentum, with 23 countries and counting having allocated them for 5G.
The Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission will hold two public workshops to solicit public dialogue on the draft vertical merger guidelines released on Jan. 10, 2020.
Policymakers have long struggled to close a digital divide that leaves millions without access to broadband internet service. In recent years, another digital divide has emerged that involves the unevenness of cyber capacity-building and retention between regions. For the United States to remain the most dynamic and innovative tech powerhouse in the world, it is imperative for all its regions, and not merely a few rarefied clusters such as Silicon Valley, to foster and sustain research and development of cyber technologies for a 21st-century knowledge economy.
Encryption is often discussed as an issue of law enforcement, cybersecurity, or free expression for specific groups of users. However, encryption is crucial to the privacy and security of everyone who browses the internet, communicates online, or uses websites for convenient activities like banking, shopping, or tax filing. Now there is a vibrant discussion occurring among stakeholders and the general public about whether there should be any regulations on encryption available to consumers, or special provisions for access by law enforcement.
A public workshop to discuss Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, its expansive interpretation by the courts, its impact on the American people and business community, and whether improvements to the law should be made.
The Federal Communication Commission's Consumer Affairs and Outreach Division is going on a Rural Tour through Arizona and New Mexico, Jan. 27-31, the sixth in a series of trips designed to build partnerships with local consumer groups and to hear directly from local consumers and community members about their telecommunications concerns.