The FCC defended its decision to reclassify broadband as a Title II telecom service under the Communications Act in a reply brief to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Wednesday (docket 24-7000). It argued the court's decision staying the order pending review was done "without showing adequate statutory support." Moreover, the motions panel lacked "the benefit of the full briefing presented here" (see 2408130001).
Verizon will purchase Frontier in a $20 billion all-cash valued transaction, the companies announced Thursday. The deal is expected to close in 18 months, subject to regulatory and Frontier shareholder approval. Verizon will gain 2.2 million fiber subscribers, extending the company's network reach to 25 million locations across 31 states and Washington, D.C., as a result. Frontier also renewed a commitment to build out an additional 2.8 million fiber locations by the end of 2026.
Some IP-captioned telephone service (IP CTS) providers welcomed an accessibility coalition's petition asking the FCC to require that all IP CTS providers using automated speech recognition (ASR) as the sole means of transcribing speech also provide users the option of requesting a communications assistant (CA) at the start or any point during an IP CTS call (see 2408010057). The coalition also sought quality metrics for the service and asked that the commission not certify new IP CTS providers until its petition is addressed.
The White House Office of the National Cyber Director released guidance Tuesday, dubbing it a "roadmap," addressing "key vulnerabilities" in border gateway protocol (BGP) security. ONCD urged "every network operator use a risk-based approach to address BGP vulnerabilities" through the adoption of resource public key infrastructure (RPKI), which includes route origin authorization and origination, calling it a "mature, ready-to-implement approach to mitigate BGP’s vulnerabilities."
State broadband officials and digital equity leaders are optimistic that NTIA will soon announce additional awards in its $1.44 billion state digital equity capacity grant program that the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act funds (see 2403290039). During a visit Wednesday to Michigan, which already received its award amount, NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson said the agency is "working with each state on their plans for how they're going to spend that money." He also noted NTIA is accepting applications for its $910 million digital equity competitive grant program.
NTIA sought comment Monday on proposed guidance about entities participating in the broadband, equity, access and deployment program using alternative technologies (see 2205130054). Comments are due by 11:59 p.m. ET on Sept. 10 and should be sent to BEAD@NTIA.gov. "Connecting everyone in America will require a variety of technologies," BEAD Program Director Evan Feinman wrote in a blog. Fiber is "the gold standard," but where it's not "economically feasible, states and territories have other options."
The FCC asked the 8th U.S. Circuit Appeals Court to schedule oral argument on an industry coalition's challenge of the commission's digital discrimination rules (see 2407080012). In a brief (docket 24-1179), the FCC said issues in the Minnesota Telecom Alliance's (MTA) challenge are "complex" and oral argument "may assist the court." However, in its reply brief, MTA and a coalition of industry groups urged the court should decide that the discrimination rules are unlawful and set aside the FCC's digital discrimination order.
ISP and banking groups urged that the FCC update letter of credit (LOC) rules for its high-cost universal service programs. In reply comments posted Tuesday in docket 24-144, the groups said the record reflected overwhelming support for changes to the rules. Weiss Ratings founder Martin Weiss defended the "independence, objectivity, and accuracy" of the company's ratings in a letter to the FCC.
It's "astonishing that the FCC is once again seeking to impose heavy-handed regulation on internet access," TechFreedom and the Washington Legal Foundation told the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Wednesday. The groups urged the court in an amicus brief Wednesday that it should reverse the commission's order restoring Title II classification of broadband (see 2408130001). Their brief said the "only question for this court" is whether the FCC has the statutory authority to act (docket 24-7000), arguing the order is a violation of the major questions doctrine.
The FCC "must point to clear congressional authorization" before claiming it can reclassify broadband as a Title II telecom service under the Communications Act, a coalition of industry groups told the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in its challenge of the commission's net neutrality rules. The court granted a temporary stay of the rules earlier this month (see 2408010066). The petitioners -- ACA Connects, CTIA, NCTA, USTelecom, the Wireless ISP Association and several state telecom associations -- said in their opening brief filed late Monday (docket 24-7000) that the "best reading of the federal communications laws forecloses the commission’s reclassification."