Google, NCTA and a handful of Wi-Fi companies are urging the FCC to find a middle ground on LTE-unlicensed. The FCC could let the market take its course or impose command and control regulation, they said in a letter posted Thursday in docket 15-105. “Between these two extremes is a middle-ground path of establishing straightforward rules of device eligibility, encouraging industry to develop appropriate norms of conduct and mechanisms for managing the use of the commons, and then largely staying out of the way as self-regulation and innovation take hold.” This middle ground is “precisely the course the Commission took with respect to the unlicensed spectrum commons under Part 15 of its rules,” they said. Boingo Wireless, Broadcom, Hewlett-Packard and Ruckus Wireless also signed the filing.

FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai criticized Chairman Tom Wheeler Thursday for setting up meetings “on Wall Street” to clarify the FCC’s position toward transactions. Pai was referring to alleged business outreach efforts by the commission. The FCC has denied that the business outreach was ever planned or occurred (see 1510020049). The agency’s record toward business has created uncertainty, Pai said, but that uncertainty shouldn’t be addressed though private meetings, he said in a news conference following Wheeler's, which itself followed the commissioner meeting. Commission policy should be “made in public” he said. The FCC should establish a “clear regulatory framework” for deciding which transactions will be approved and "let the chips fall where they may,” Pai said.

The FCC adopted a video relay service (VRS) Further NPRM on circulation, a commission spokesman told us Thursday. A draft Further NPRM and interim order had been scheduled for action at the commission's Thursday meeting, but the item was removed from the agenda after being adopted, an FCC public notice said. The spokesman said the Further NPRM was adopted but not the draft order. The draft Further NPRM asked whether the commission should partially modify its four-year schedule of rate reductions and adopt possible enhancements to VRS "functional equivalence," while the draft order would have partially modified VRS rates, pending action in the further rulemaking, according to the meeting agenda released Oct. 15 (see 1510160026). The item “responds to a petition related to freezing VRS rates and seeks comment on policy changes to improve VRS features," another FCC spokesman told us last week.

Carriers are playing games on their level of interest in 600 MHz spectrum in the buildup to the TV incentive auction, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said at a news conference after Thursday’s meeting. After the commission’s Aug. 6 meeting, Wheeler said pointedly it was up to carriers whether they want to play in the auction (see 1508060028). Sprint since said it wouldn't bid and Verizon this week downplayed its need for additional low-band spectrum (see 1510200058). Wheeler was president of CTIA and has a long history in spectrum auctions. “I think we’ll have a very successful auction,” he said, chuckling, noting the auction starts in just 157 days. “I think what we’re seeing right now is the marketing has begun, everyone is positioning a little bit,” he said. “This is all pre-auction shenanigans that one can expect [to] happen in any kind of a marketplace.” Wheeler said the key goal of the auction is getting more spectrum in play for wireless broadband, not bringing in huge revenue. He was asked about broadcaster concerns that the voluntary incentive auction isn’t really voluntary. “There are no armed FCC agents holding guns to heads,” he said. “You are free to decide whether or not you want to participate.”

The FCC said it will provide weekly data on consumer complaints about unwanted calls from telemarketers. The agency said the promise of a weekly release builds on its declaratory ruling clarifying its interpretation of the Telephone Consumers Protection Act approved at the June 18 meeting (see 1506180046). In June, the FCC “gave the green light for do-not-disturb technology, clarifying that there are no legal barriers to service providers offering robocall-blocking technologies to consumers,” the agency said in a Wednesday news release. “While such services are available today as apps on some smartphones and on VoIP phone systems, work is still underway for many carriers and third-party providers to offer consumers these tools on traditional landline networks.” The initial data dump lists basic information on 9,803 complaints made to the FCC about unwanted calls. “This data will help improve do-not-disturb technologies” so providers can offer “the best service for consumers,” said Alison Kutler, chief of the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau.

Microsoft is concerned that LTE-U may hurt other unlicensed uses in the 5 GHz band, said President Brad Smith and another representative in a phone call with FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, the company said in filing posted Wednesday in docket 15-146. During Friday's conversation with Wheeler, Smith and Director-Government and Regulatory Affairs Paula Boyd sought to have at least three unlicensed channels designated nationwide in the TV bands after the incentive auction. Monday, Boyd and other cable and tech heavyweights like Comcast and Google shared with aides to FCC members their concerns about LTE-U hurting Wi-Fi (see 1510200048). LTE-U won't interfere with Wi-Fi, Qualcomm, a backer of the LTE technology, has said. Qualcomm declined further comment Wednesday.

Six companies will pay a combined $30 million in FCC fines for what the agency said was deceptive marketing of prepaid calling cards, though dissenting Commissioners Michael O'Rielly and Ajit Pai said it's the agency that's stretching or breaking the law. The companies targeted immigrant consumers with advertising saying their calling cards cost just dollars but allowed hundreds or thousands of minutes in international calls, but then the companies all assessed numerous fees and surcharges that weren't clearly disclosed, the FCC said Wednesday. “Consumers should not have to comb through small print and contradictory disclosures to learn that the bold promises made in advertisements are false and misleading,” Enforcement Bureau Chief Travis LeBlanc said in a statement. Each paying $5 million in fines are Locus Telecommunications, Lycatel, NobelTel, Simple Network, STi Telecom and Touch-Tel USA. Pai said the six "used blatantly misleading and deceptive marketing," but that the agency's investigation didn't get all the information needed to justify a finding of multiple violations of Section 201(b) by each company -- those multiple violations instead of a single continuing violation being the difference between $5 million in fines versus a liability cap of $1.575 million. The forfeiture number also seemingly "was plucked out of thin air rather than determined through the use of a rational methodology," Pai said in his dissent, saying the notices of apparent liability and the forfeiture orders in some of the six cases lack any evidence the cards were sold within the one-year statute of limitations. O'Rielly, meanwhile, said the fines are part of a further expansion of the reach of Section 201(b) into marketing, and the agency never received any complaints about the six companies. "Some may be tempted to dismiss these actions as merely closing out the enforcement backlog on an industry that has been on the decline for years, with no effect on other types of companies," O'Rielly said his separate dissent. "Indeed, it is not clear that all of these companies remain in business today. Since this isn’t about getting the money, which may never happen, then it must be about setting the principle. Once this bad 'precedent' is set, it will undoubtedly be used against other types of providers in the future."

A U.S. District Court judge in Milwaukee granted Performant Technologies a stay Tuesday of a Telephone Consumer Protection Act-related lawsuit pending the outcome of various cases before federal courts of appeal. Judge Rudolph Randa commented on the FCC July declaratory ruling on the TCPA (see 1506180046). Randa said he agrees with Commissioners Ajit Pai and Mike O’Rielly, who raised concerns about how the FCC ruling interpreted the word capacity as spelled out in the TCPA. The FCC found that use of the term “capacity” in the definition of “automatic telephone dialing system,” doesn't exempt equipment that lacks the “present ability” to dial randomly or sequentially, Randa wrote. Pai said in dissenting from the ruling that the FCC “dramatically expands the TCPA’s reach,” Randa noted. According to Pai, the FCC found that the “TCPA prohibits a person from making ’any call’ to a mobile phone ’using any automatic telephone dialing system,’ except in certain defined circumstances,” Randa said. Randa said he granted Performant a stay because of the probability that finding won't survive legal challenge. “Thus, it seems to the Court, as it seemed to the dissenting Commissioners, that the majority’s interpretation of the term ‘capacity’ contradicts the plain language of the statute,” Randa wrote. The decision came in case no.13-C-1196.

Hillary Clinton backs enforcement of strong net neutrality rules, she said Tuesday in a commentary on business policy posted on the website Quartz. Clinton, campaigning for the Democratic nomination for president, criticized what she considered loopholes in the current system. “Closing these loopholes and protecting other standards of free and fair competition -- like enforcing strong net neutrality rules and preempting state laws that unfairly protect incumbent businesses -- will keep more money in consumers’ wallets, enable startups to challenge the status quo, and allow small businesses to thrive,” Clinton said in her column. Clinton indicated backing for the FCC’s direction on net neutrality, including reclassification of broadband as a Communications Act Title II service, earlier this year. Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla., has told us he doesn’t see the administration position shifting under a Clinton presidency (see 1504160034), and open Internet advocate Marvin Ammori has also expressed his confidence in Clinton on the issue (see 1507210050). No Republicans running for president back the FCC net neutrality order, and some have prioritized dismantling it. Clinton also intends to “prevent concentration in the first place by beefing up the antitrust enforcement arms of the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission,” she added. “I will direct more resources to hire aggressive regulators who will conduct in-depth industry research to better understand the link between market consolidation and stagnating incomes. Ultimately, this will foster a change in corporate culture that restores competition to the marketplace.”

Relaxed legal out-of-band emissions (OOBE) rules, higher power levels and unlimited antenna heights open the door to more fixed satellite service (FSS) earth station interference and should be rejected, the Satellite Industry Association said in filing posted Tuesday in opposition to a CTIA petition for reconsideration of FCC rules on the 3.5 GHz shared spectrum band. Instead, stricter citizens broadband radio service (CBRS) limits are needed to avoid "a significant increase" of more than 11 km in the protection distance needed between CBRS devices and FSS earth stations, SIA said in a filing in docket 12-354. While both CTIA and Nokia have pushed for greater emissions limits, "neither provides an adequate rationale," with CTIA itself arguing for more stringent OOBE limits "when its own members' operations could be the victims of unwanted emissions," SIA said. The satellite group also rejected the idea of changing the metric for OOBE limit compliance from average power measurements to a peak detector, because that would "undermine the prophylactic objectives of the OOBE limits." Similarly, a higher maximum effective isotropic radiated power (EIRP) and an eliminating of the antenna height limit for nonrural Category B citizens broadband radio service devices (CBSDs) will also "substantially increase the separation distances" needed to protect FSS from interference. Petitioners pushing for such higher EIRPs "fail to even acknowledge these trade offs," SIA said. But SIA said some areas of the FCC order should be reconsidered, such as the 60-second delay allowed for a CBSD to end transmission, lower its power or relocate to another channel, since even 60 seconds "could have significant adverse effects on FSS operations, including the potential to undermine safe satellite operations," SIA said. The FCC also should put in place a geolocation requirement to give reliable CBSD location information and "abandon the idea of relying on 'professional' installers to ensure the accuracy," the group said.