Industry experts said some questions remain after last week’s announcement that “key stakeholders in the aviation and wireless industries” agreed to a revised rollout of C-band spectrum around some airports by Verizon and AT&T (see 2206170070). Airlines for America (A4A), which represents major airlines, already questioned the pact in a letter to the FAA.
Two top litigators in the FCC Office of General Counsel think the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit’s December decision upholding the FCC’s 6 GHz order (see 2112280047) and a decision by the same court remanding the FCC’s 2019 RF rules to the agency for further work (see 2108130073) were the two most important recent court decisions affecting the FCC. The two spoke during an FCBA webinar Friday. A top administrative law expert said the Chevron doctrine is in doubt, but still not dead.
The FAA said Friday “key stakeholders in the aviation and wireless industries” have identified steps that will protect commercial air travel while allowing Verizon and AT&T to turn up the power on 5G C-band radios around protected airports on a case-by-case basis. The carriers agreed to keep mitigation measures in place around some airports for another year or longer. Airlines for America (A4A), which represents major airlines, raised concerns in a Friday letter to the FAA.
Implementing zero-trust architecture (ZTA) in the federal government, per executive order 14028 by President Joe Biden last year (see 2204080039), won’t be easy and will require a different approach in different agencies, said a Center for Strategic and International Studies report released Thursday. “Shifting from perimeter defense to ZTA is not as easy as flipping a switch; it is a complex undertaking,” the paper argues: “It involves more than procuring new hardware and software. Making such a shift requires adopting new policies, processes, and structures.” CSIS said a top barrier is what it calls “tech debt.” The federal government spends about $90 billion each year on IT, with most of the money dedicated to maintaining “legacy, often antiquated systems,” the report said: “Departments and agencies often find it challenging to secure funding and authorization for new large-scale IT modernization efforts and relatively easier to obtain funding for existing systems. This dynamic often motivates agencies to focus on operating and maintaining existing systems rather than pursuing new capital investments.” Another concern is a lack of urgency by government leaders, CSIS said. “The federal government, as a whole, really needs to understand the why and commit to the how,” said Emily Harding, CSIS deputy director, during a webcast. “ZTA can create friction for the user, but that’s OK,” she said. “U.S. government employees need to understand why they should make the effort, why the friction is worth it,” she said. The federal government needs to become “as efficient as a Google or an Amazon” but “we’re a ways from there,” said James Lewis, CSIS senior vice president. New infrastructure relies more on AI, the cloud and other new technologies, he said. “The old approach to cybersecurity isn’t going to work,” he said. Getting the federal government to change won’t be easy, Lewis said. “It’s a huge entity,” he said: “It has thousands, sometimes millions of parts. The parts don’t always want to cooperate.” The attitude can be “I can just wait 18 months and these political appointees will go away, and I can go back to what I've been doing,” he said. Legislative mandates, budget directions and standards can help move the government, he said.
The FCC got a mixed response to a Competitive Carriers Association petition seeking FCC clarification that broadband data collection (BDC) filings can be certified by a qualified engineer who isn't a licensed professional engineer (PE) accredited by a state licensure board (see 2205170073). Replies were posted Thursday in docket 19-195. Many commenters support CCA but “they fail to show that a declaratory ruling is warranted or provide support for the argument that the public interest is served by relaxing the certification requirement,” the Rural Wireless Association said. CCA asked the FCC “to adopt a brand new definition” and “such a request must be made via a petition for rulemaking, which is subject to its own requirements and governed by the Administrative Procedure Act,” RWA said. Leave the requirement in place, said the Nebraska National Society of Professional Engineers. Similar government programs have similar requirements, the group said: “This is done to ensure that … projects are constructed in a manner that meets all local, state, federal and in some cases international, regulations and requirements. It also ensures that the networks are designed in such a way as to meet the speed and data rate performance requirements that the service provide[r]s are advertising.” NCTA supported CCA. NCTA said it “appreciates the need to ensure the accuracy of the mapping data submitted to the Commission [but] the individual most familiar with the preparation and development of that data and thus in the best position to certify to its accuracy may not have the requisite professional designation.” Most groups representing providers support CCA, the Wireless ISP Association said. Opponents “ignore the realities of the marketplace and conflate the requirements of building infrastructure with the more routine task of certifying network coverage based on parameters established by the Commission,” WISPA said. The current PE shortage “will result in many providers being unable to get the required engineering certification, and, consequently, being unable to make their BDC filings timely, if at all; or, incurring unduly burdensome costs to enlist a PE,” ACA Connects said. “The response to CCA’s petition by trade associations, broadband service providers, and individual commenters reflects widespread support for the Commission’s policy objectives, and a shared commitment to accurate and granular data collection as a crucial component of broadband deployment,” CCA said.
The 4.9 GHz band appears to be one of the wireless items likely to get further FCC action relatively soon, industry and FCC officials told us. Comments have been in since January on rewriting the rules, and 4.9 has long been a focus of Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. There's also general agreement that the band has been underutilized for a long time.
Dish Network said Wednesday it’s now offering 5G broadband service to more than 20% of U.S. POPs. Dish faced a Tuesday deadline to satisfy an FCC requirement tied to the company’s AWS-4, PCS H-block and 700 MHz-E block licenses. Chairman Charlie Ergen said last month Dish would hit the target and wouldn’t need an extension from the FCC (see 2205060036). “This marks a major milestone in building the world's most advanced cloud-native 5G Open [radio access] network,” said a news release. Dish said the Samsung Galaxy S22 and NetGear 5G hot spots are being offered to early subscribers. The network launched in Las Vegas in May (see 2205040057). “DISH already offers the Motorola Edge+ for purchase in Las Vegas and will expand the sale of this device to more markets in the coming months,” the company said. “Additional compatible devices will become available throughout the year." New Street’s Jonathan Chaplin told investors Tuesday the only market where Dish has formally launched is Las Vegas. “They announced 26 other major metro markets and another 110 smaller cities and towns that they would cover ahead of the 20% deadline,” he said: “Assuming they cover the urban and suburban region of each [partial economic area], the 27 metro markets capture about 17% of national POPs and the remaining 110 markets should easily cover the 3% required to get to the 20% target.”
The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals weighed in on the use of automatic telephone dialing systems (ATDS), upholding the dismissal of a Telephone Consumer Protection Act lawsuit against debt collector Navient, though on different grounds than those cited by a lower court in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Elizabeth and Joshua Panzarella sued Navient, claiming the company called their cellphones without prior express consent using an ATDS, in an attempt to collect a student loan held by a family member. The district court granted summary judgment for Navient, concluding “Navient’s dialing technology did not qualify as an ATDS under section 227(a)(1) of the TCPA because it viewed a particular component of Navient’s dialing technology as separate from its dialing system,” said the Tuesday decision by Judge Marjorie Rendell. The lower court “erred by failing to consider whether Navient’s dialing ‘equipment’ as a whole qualified as an ATDS,” she wrote: “Even though we do not decide whether Navient’s dialing equipment qualified as an ATDS, we find that Navient did not use an ATDS in violation of the TCPA when it called the Panzarellas. Thus, we will affirm the District Court’s order on this alternative ground.” In Facebook v. Duguid decided last year the Supreme Court sided with Facebook (see 2104010063), favoring a narrow definition of what constitutes an ATDS.
The FCC Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council met for less than an hour Wednesday, getting brief updates from each of its working groups.. The council's next action will come in September when it's expected to vote on the first of a series of reports. The FCC headquarters has reopened for visitors, but groups like CSRIC continue to meet online. Suzon Cameron, FCC designated federal officer, said the next meeting is also expected to be virtual. “Our specific objectives are to identify the challenges facing ORAN for security and interoperability and so on and how do we deploy and secure the open RAN,” said Mike Barnes, Mavenir chief product security officer and co-chair of the Promoting Security, Reliability and Interoperability on Open Radio Access Network Equipment WG. The Managing Software & Cloud Services Supply Chain Security WG is on target to submit a report on best practices in September, said T-Mobile’s Todd Gibson, interim co-chair. “The goal here for us is to really present something novel,” he said: “We don’t want to regurgitate what’s already been produced from the various sources, but try to layer in and contribute to the community providing some novel recommendations.” Some are already using Wi-Fi to make an emergency call, said Mark Reddish, APCO government relations manager and co-chair of the 911 Service Over Wi-Fi WG. “Our group’s focus is really on how to expand current capabilities,” he said: “For example, there could be enhancements in the number of situations in which a 911 call could be completed over Wi-Fi, enhancements to the location information that’s used for routing the call and describing the location of the caller, call prioritization, security issues.”
The Supreme Court appeared to raise questions about the future of the Chevron doctrine Wednesday, under which agencies like the FCC and FTC are afforded deference by the courts in their decisions as expert agencies. The unanimous court ruled in American Hospital Assn. v. Becerra that the Department of Health and Human Service’s decision to reduce yearly Medicare payments to hospitals as part of the 340B program was unlawful. The government raised Chevron deference, but the decision by Justice Brett Kavanaugh never addresses the doctrine. The case had been decided by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.