Carriers almost universally opposed in comments late Tuesday a Telcordia petition criticizing the ability of North American Portability Management and Neustar to administer the Number Portability Administration Center database. The FCC asked whether it should adopt competitive bidding for local number portability administration and end the North American Portability Management’s role in handling contracts for number portability administration. Only Comcast voiced concerns about NAPM, urging the commission to open a rulemaking to make LNP administration “more competitive, transparent, and representative of the current industry landscape.”
Adam Bender
Adam Bender, Deputy Managing Editor for Privacy Daily. Bender leads a team of journalists and reports on state privacy legislation, rulemaking and litigation. In previous roles at Communications Daily, he covered telecom and internet policy in the states, Congress and at the FCC. He has won awards for his reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), Specialized Information Publishers Association (SIPA) and the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing (SABEW). Bender studied print journalism at American University and is the author of multiple dystopian sci-fi novels. Keep up to date with Bender by reading his blog and following him on social media including Bluesky, Mastodon and LinkedIn.
Broadband is “clearly not” available to all Americans, said state members of the Federal-State Joint Conference on Advanced Services in comments last week on the FCC’s latest inquiry into whether advanced telecom capabilities like broadband are being deployed to all Americans in “a reasonable and timely fashion.” Others provided mixed reviews of U.S. broadband deployment (CD Sept 8 p5). The FCC must deliver the report to Congress by Feb. 3.
Some small rural phone companies are asking if Google and other content providers should contribute to the Universal Service Fund. In filings and meetings this summer at the FCC, the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association has urged the FCC to open a rulemaking on the subject (CD Aug 31 p9). Content providers impose significant costs on companies’ networks, and charging them for USF would further the FCC’s broadband deployment goals, said NTCA Vice President Dan Mitchell in an interview. But a Google spokesman disputed the credibility of NTCA’s evidence. And some phone companies aren’t sure the proposal can be implemented.
“Significant questions exist about the extent to which broadband access markets are competitive,” the Federal Trade Commission said in comments Friday to the FCC. The FCC’s pending national broadband plan provides an opportunity to do “a competitive market analysis that can be used as the foundation for the development of ongoing regulatory policies governing broadband Internet access.” The FTC also urged the FCC to collect more data on network management practices.
It’s not bad to be worried about the FCC’s national broadband plan, because that response probably will increase creative thinking as the commission develops its recommendations, plan coordinator Blair Levin said Wednesday at an event held by the Udwin Breakfast Group. “To a certain extent, I want you to be worried. I want everyone in this room to be worried. I'm worried.” The country’s broadband problems aren’t easy to solve, he said. “What should worry you is if we have a knee-jerk reaction.”
Cooperation among federal, state and private bodies is pivotal to the success of the national broadband plan, government officials said Tuesday at an FCC workshop. “If we win, it will be because we figure out that balance,” said Jane Patterson, executive director of the e-NC Authority in North Carolina. Eric Garr, the general manager of the FCC’s broadband plan, agreed. “This is a team sport,” he said. “It certainly requires federal action. It requires great partnerships with industry. It requires very dedicated officials from state and local government to make all this work.”
Prisons and their phone companies urged the FCC to ban call routing services that reduce the cost of prisoner phone calls. In comments Monday supporting a petition by inmate telco Securus Technologies, the groups said security and public safety is threatened by ConsCallHome and similar services that give families of inmates local numbers in a specified prison’s exchange. The local number reroutes calls to the family member’s actual number. Securus, which owns several companies providing phone service for inmates, wants the commission to declare the service is a form of dial-around calling that inmate telcos may block.
Many factors affect what actual impact broadband availability has on economic growth, economists cautioned the FCC in a broadband workshop Wednesday. Historically, broadband deployment has spurred economic growth in some -- but not all -- areas, they said. “If all we did is provide broadband to underserved communities, it would probably not provide any benefits at all,” said University of Maryland Prof. Brent Goldfarb.
Network connectivity is crucial to building a smart grid that enables more efficient electric power use in the U.S., government and electric industry officials said at an FCC broadband workshop Tuesday afternoon. However, panelists disagreed about whether the public wireless network is robust enough to support applications that go beyond basic metering.
FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski circulated three Universal Service Fund items Friday. They concerned the E- rate program, a petition by the Coalition for Equity in Switching Support about the high-cost program, and a petition by U.S. Cellular regarding Lifeline verification rules. The chairman also circulated an order Thursday closing a 1995 investigation into GTE tariffs. The E-rate item is a notice of proposed rulemaking on updating the program to comply with last year’s Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act, an FCC official told us. The item on switching support includes an order and a notice of proposed rulemaking that would deny the coalition’s petition but open a new proceeding to look into the matter, the official said. The switching support coalition protested an FCC rule that reduces a small incumbent carrier’s LSS support when its number of access lines climbs above a specified threshold but doesn’t increase support if its access-line count falls below the threshold (April 22 p9).