NTIA Joins Push Against Shorter Subsea Cable Licensing Terms
NTIA joined the submarine cable industry in voicing concerns about parts of the FCC's proposed rewrite of its subsea cable rules. In docket 24-523 reply comments this week, NTIA, the subsea cable industry and allies called instead for using the proceeding to streamline existing rules. FCC Commissioners adopted the subsea cable NPRM unanimously in November (see 2411210006). Initial comments on the NPRM saw pushback from industry (see 2504150002).
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Shortening the cable licensing term from 25 years could harm cable investment, NTIA said. It backed the Committee for the Assessment of Foreign Participation in the U.S. Telecommunications Services Sector -- aka Team Telecom -- in its push for rules that allow easier sharing of confidential information between the FCC and Team Telecom. NTIA said the FCC should ensure it prevents Chinese control of U.S. submarine cables "in the least burdensome and most efficient way possible," working with Team Telecom toward that end.
NTIA also recommended that the FCC look into national security risks stemming from undersea installation and maintenance and repair services provided by foreign companies, such as Sino-British Submarine Systems, which is majority-owned by China Telecom. In addition, the FCC should consider requiring licensees to submit installation and maintenance and repair plans as part of their license application and in periodic reports.
Team Telecom, in comments submitted by NTIA, said there are national security risks from submarine line terminal equipment (SLTE) entities being controlled by foreign adversaries. The FCC should require licensees to report some information to the commission and Team Telecom about non-licensee entities that own or operate their own SLTE on the cable, it said. Team Telecom also backed the FCC proposal to adopt a presumption that entities that were denied or lost licenses on national security or law enforcement grounds would be ineligible for future cable landing licenses.
The International Connectivity Coalition said some of the NPRM's "over-regulatory proposals ... would impede deployment of subsea cables and impose significant costs and burden on licensees, users, and others in the sector without any countervailing national security benefits." The group called the current licensing regime "opaque" and said it involves duplicative reviews across multiple agencies, which can take years. The Team Telecom review often results in materially different compliance burdens on different operators, it said, calling instead for a comprehensive review, monitoring and enforcement process across agencies, a single interagency risk assessment, and standardized Team Telecom mitigation conditions.
The Submarine Cable Association said there's widespread agreement in the docket against requiring parties lacking operational control of a cable -- such as data center operators and SLTE owners -- to be licensed. That would only put more burdens on the industry and wouldn't benefit national security, it said.
Incompas said the FCC's authority to extend its licensing requirements beyond the owners or operators of a cable is hazy, adding that agency authority doesn't extend into international waters either. It also advised against requiring disclosure of the precise locations of subsea cable landings.
CTIA said harmonizing and simplifying proposals in the NPRM, such as streamlining Team Telecom review, would be in line with the FCC's "Delete, Delete, Delete" efforts. It criticized the NPRM's proposed cybersecurity risk management requirement, which is notably different from the approach in the 5G Fund Order, and pushed for more consistency. The Alaska Telecom Association said that while it disagrees with a licensing requirement for purely domestic submarine cables, any such process should use a streamlined, blanket licensing model.
In a separate filing, the International Connectivity Coalition also said it met with Tom Sullivan, acting chief of the FCC Office of International Affairs, to discuss keeping the 25-year license term and bright line rules for restricting or prohibiting transactions that have links to a foreign adversary. In addition, the meeting participants -- including coalition members Meta, Microsoft and Amazon Web Services, as well as the Telecommunications Industry Association -- discussed a fast-track review for parties whose licenses were approved previously. Numerous parties in the NRPM's reply comments backed a similar fast-track review process.