The FirstNet Authority asked for a 10-year extension of the nationwide 700 MHz Band 14 license it received in 2012, which otherwise expires Nov. 15, said a Tuesday notice by the FCC Public Safety Bureau. The application window opened last week (see 2208190057). The bureau accepted the application for filing. “To the extent that the Bureau may need further information as part of the application, the Bureau may ask FirstNet to supplement the renewal application,” the bureau said: “Interested parties may file any views regarding the renewal application as an informal request for Commission action.” Those filings are due Sept. 22 and must “reference DA 22-882.” Oppositions to filings are due Oct. 3, replies Oct. 11, the bureau said.

Amazon underscored safety in a Friday blog post outlining plans for its drone delivery service that's to launch this year in Lockeford, California, and College Station, Texas (see 2206130024). The electric drones are designed to deliver sub-five-pound packages to customers in under an hour. To ensure safe delivery, the company used aerospace standards for a robust drone design and employed a “sense-and-avoid system” that detects and avoids obstacles in the air and on the ground, such as other aircraft and people and pets in backyards, it said. “Our drone can encounter new, unexpected situations and still make safe decisions -- autonomously and safely,” Amazon said. If the environment changes, and the drone’s mission commands it to come into contact with an object that wasn’t there previously, “it will refuse.” Amazon is creating an automated drone-management system to plan flight paths and ensure safe distances between aircraft and other aircraft in the area “and that we’re complying with all aviation regulations,” it said. The company has been working on the drone delivery technology for over a decade with a team of safety, aerospace, science, robotics, software, hardware, testing and manufacturing experts “to ensure our system meets the rigors required for an aerospace product,” it said. The company tests its drones in private and controlled facilities and has logged thousands of flight hours, putting them through “rigorous testing” and evaluation in accordance with regulatory requirements, it said. In the past two years of testing, Amazon has made over 188 updates to its system, including for noise and equipment ergonomics, it said. Amazon got an FAA part 135 air carrier certificate, giving it authorization to operate as an airline and deliver small packages via drone, it noted. As part of the process, it submitted over 500 safety and efficiency processes that it will use to conduct deliveries later this year in California and Texas, it said.

The combination of connected devices, ubiquitous cloud-based payment systems and audiences accustomed to interactive TV content means technology to allow viewers to shop with their televisions could finally take hold, said panelists at a Stream TV virtual summit Wednesday. Recent changes to privacy rules and Google’s stance against website cookies could mean digital advertisers will be looking for innovative ways to spend their budgets, and “shoppable TV” could be that opportunity, said Evan Moore, NBCUniversal Advertising & Partnerships senior vice president-commerce partnerships. Existing TV shopping offerings primarily use onscreen QR codes for viewers to scan with their phones, but companies are looking to go further, said Carl Fremont, CEO of ad agency Quigley. Viewers of NBCU’s Love Island USA are offered on screen the chance to buy items worn on the show after each episode, said Moore. The ad industry is also looking at AI-based technology that can “ingest” a video and find items comparable to the furniture or the cast’s clothing in a retailer’s inventory and offer it to viewers, Kerv Interactive’s Gary Mittman said. For shoppable TV to work, the actual transaction has to be as frictionless as possible, Mittman said. That can mean using a phone to make the purchase, clicking a button on the remote, or eventually voice commands, he said. “It could be a one-click transaction; the opportunities are broad,” he said.

The North American Numbering Council's number portability industry forum is "working on an issue brought in by Somos" about requested changes to the interface between the number portability administration center and pooling administrator function of the North American numbering plan administrator, said numbering administration oversight working group Co-Chair Philip Linse of Lumen during the group's virtual meeting Monday. It's "not the first delay" on Somos' contract, said iconnectiv Senior Vice President-Corporate and Business Development Chris Drake. "We're universally astounded at the lack of transparency," Drake said, and industry concerns have been "dismissed with a pat on the head." Drake noted iconnectiv also bid for the NANPA that was "more than 50% under" the awarded $80 million Somos received: "I’m confused how our proposal was too risky to select but three years of ongoing delay are of no concern at all." Somos didn't comment.

LTD is "evaluating our next steps" after the FCC rejected its long-form application for the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I auction, CEO Corey Hauer told us (see 2208100050). "We are extremely disappointed in the FCC staff decision," Hauer said: "I don’t believe the FCC fully appreciated the benefits LTD Broadband would bring to hundreds of thousands of rural Americans." New Street’s Blair Levin told investors Thursday there are likely no negative implications for other telecom providers from the order. “For the most part, these funds affect highly rural areas where the major companies are not offering, nor have plans to offer service,” Levin said: “To some extent, it is a positive for the wireless companies, particularly those offering fixed wireless in rural areas, as it takes away a government subsidy for Starlink and others like LTD, though in the case of Starlink, it is likely to offer service in those areas anyway.” Litigation is possible but “this decision makes it easier for Governors awarding Infrastructure Bill funding to target funds to those areas that Starlink and LTD had provisionally won,” he said.

The FCC’s evaluation of future use of the 12 GHz band requires “a complex engineering process that involves analyzing competing technical analyses,” FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in a letter Wednesday to Rep. Neal Dunn, R-Fla. The agency is “evaluating two potential approaches to future use of the 12 GHz band: increasing terrestrial use of the shared band or continuing with the current framework,” she said: “This will require carefully examining the characteristics of this spectrum band -- including its propagation and capacity characteristics, the nature of in-band and adjacent band incumbent use, and the potential for international harmonization -- before deciding whether, and if so, how, to make it available for more intensive terrestrial or satellite use.” The agency is “considering the criteria that should be used for assessing interference between mobile and satellite services,” which is “important because one study in our record points to an interference-to-noise ratio based on an ITU-R specification that applies to terrestrial and satellite interference, while others advocate for a more stringent threshold that some satellite systems are required to use to coordinate among themselves under FCC rules,” she said. The FCC is looking at the “operational parameters and technical specifications of satellite user terminals in the band -- such as how many there will be, what will be the separation distances between satellite user terminals and 5G stations, what will be the elevation angle, antenna height, and antenna gain of the satellite user terminals -- and how best to structure a Monte Carlo simulation,” Rosenworcel said.

Schurz Communications and Long Lines Communications want Long Lines to be able to keep serving its customers under Schurz's direction while Schurz's application for approval of indirect transfer of control is pending, they said in a docket 22-249 special temporary authority (STA) request Monday. Schurz took control of Long Lines in 2015, and Long Lines has continued operating as a cable ISP and LEC holding company, but the two didn't get FCC approval for transfer of domestic Section 214 authorizations because they didn't know agency approval was needed, they said. Granting the STA will allow Long Lines rural Iowa customers to continue receiving communications services without interruption, Schurz and Long Lines said.

Though DOJ announced it plans to pursue creating regulations that would require state and local government websites be accessible to people with disabilities, it's "hard to be confident that new regulations will happen," disability rights lawyer Lainey Feingold blogged Monday. Noting a similar effort DOJ undertook in 2010 that never came to fruition, Feingold said her experience with delayed regulations "make[s] optimism a challenge." Justice announced last month it intends to publish an NPRM "to amend its Title II ADA regulation to provide technical standards to assist public entities in complying with their existing obligations to make their websites accessible to individuals with disabilities." It said it expects to issue an NPRM in April.

Tech occupations across all industry sectors increased by an estimated 239,000 positions in July, according to CompTIA's analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data. July’s unemployment rate for tech occupations was 1.7% in July, it said. Tech industry employment had a net gain of 12,700 workers in July, the 20th straight month of employment growth, said CompTIA Friday. Tech industry employment jumped by 143,700 jobs in 2022's first seven months, an increase of 55% from January-July a year earlier, it said.

Communications providers need to act to secure emergency alert system equipment against online attacks, warned the FCC Public Safety Bureau in a public notice Friday. The PN stems from an Aug. 1 Federal Emergency Management Agency advisory warning of a vulnerability in EAS encoders and decoders. If they aren't updated to the most recent software versions, the vulnerability "could allow an actor to issue EAS alerts over the host infrastructure (TV, radio, cable network).” The advisory warned the vulnerability may be presented as a proof of concept at the upcoming DEFCON 2022 conference in Las Vegas, Thursday to Aug. 14: “In short, the vulnerability is public knowledge and will be demonstrated to a large audience in the coming weeks.” The Public Safety Bureau warned broadcasters about the vulnerability in April and “again urges all EAS Participants, regardless of the make and model of their EAS equipment, to upgrade their equipment software and firmware to the most recent versions,” the PN said. Providers should keep their equipment updated and change default passwords, the PN said. FEMA “is working with the FCC to provide any assistance necessary, and share information with our broadcast partners to help correct this issue,” said a FEMA spokesperson. “This vulnerability does not directly impact any of FEMA’s systems.”