If the FCC increases from 4 Mbps to 10 Mbps the minimum broadband speeds for recipients of high-cost USF funds, 4.7 million locations would be eligible for support, said the Wireline Bureau in a public notice Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1sogvXp). That’s an increase from the 4.25 million locations eligible under the lower speed threshold, the bureau said. Some 3.6 million locations would count as “unserved” by 10 Mbps/768 kbps, compared with 2.7 million unserved by 3 Mbps/768 kbps, it said. The results were produced using version 4.1.1 of the Connect America Cost Model. Detailed results and a list of eligible census blocks are at http://fcc.us/18RrTfQ. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has circulated a notice of inquiry asking about increasing the minimum download speeds to 10 Mbps, for purposes of determining whether ISP services are broadband (CD June 4 p1).

Inmate calling services (ICS) data will be due July 17, the FCC said Tuesday in a public notice in docket 12-375 (http://bit.ly/1r33IFr). A template form and related instructions for ICS providers are available at http://fcc.us/1r33SMZ, the notice said. The Office of Management and Budget approved the FCC’s one-time mandatory data collection of inmate calling rates June 2 (CD June 13 p11).

Level 3 Communications could face competition in its bid to buy tw telecom, but it is tw telecom’s “natural merger partner” because the two have “similar and yet complementary” assets, said Canaccord Genuity analyst Greg Miller in an emailed report. Level 3 said Monday it plans to buy tw telecom for $7.3 billion, including debt (CD June 17 p7). CenturyLink had been seen as close to buying tw telecom in 2012, Miller said. CenturyLink did not comment.

Comporium said it “lit up” its Zipstream 1 Gbps fiber network in downtown Rock Hill, South Carolina. Comporium affiliate Home Telecom previously began providing Zipstream service to MeadWestvaco’s Nexton community in Summerville, South Carolina, in mid May. Comporium announced development of the Zipstream network in February, saying it would cost $99 per month for consumers and $299 monthly for companies (CD Feb 13 p15).

The Office of Management and Budget approved the FCC’s one-time mandatory data collection of inmate calling rates (CD Aug 12 p1), said a notice in Thursday’s Federal Register (http://1.usa.gov/1hMVOzG). OMB approved the collection June 2, and so the information collection requirement is effective immediately, the notice said. All inmate calling service (ICS) providers must submit data on the costs of providing interstate, intrastate toll and local ICS. Submitted data should provide the costs of telecom service, interconnection fees, equipment investment, installation and maintenance, security, ancillary service and other costs, the notice said. Providers will also be required to provide certain related rate, demand and forecast data, the notice said. Confidential treatment for proprietary information is available through a protective order in dockets 12-375 and 13-113. The FCC estimated the time per response at 90 hours, the notice said. Major ICS providers had challenged the data collection, calling the FCC’s response time estimate “laughably” low (CD March 28 p3).

An FCC switched access decision in favor of AT&T will stand, the agency said Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1n47k7m). AT&T filed a complaint in 2010 against various telcos for charging for services they did not provide. The agency found the telcos to be “sham” CLECs created to “capture access revenues that could not otherwise be obtained by lawful tariffs.” All American Telephone, e-Pinnacle Communications and ChaseCom violated Communications Act sections 201(b) and 203 by engaging in “unjust and unreasonable” practices and by billing for services they did not provide, said the original order. Tuesday, the agency denied a petition for reconsideration by the defendants. Defendants’ petition and reply “repeat many arguments that the Commission has already fully considered and rejected,” said the denial.

Comments are due June 25 in docket 14-89 on an AT&T Communications Act Section 214 petition to discontinue business directory assistance service. The services have been offered to business with PBX phone systems as a means to provide phone listings through the businesses’ phone systems, said an FCC public notice (http://bit.ly/1n489x1). AT&T plans to discontinue these services around July 1, and notified its customers of the proposed discontinuances by U.S. mail on April 10, it told the FCC. “AT&T maintains that the public convenience and necessity will not be impaired by the proposed discontinuance because there are alternative services available and customers will be able to reprogram their PBX and continue to have access to directory assistance services by dialing 411,” the notice said.

AT&T plans several consumer outreach events in its proposed IP transition trial cities, it told FCC Wireline Bureau officials May 27, according to an ex parte notice posted June 10 (http://bit.ly/1n497cE). Over the next 60 days, AT&T plans three “senior tech training” sections in West Delray Beach, Florida, and three informational sessions and one city council briefing in Carbon Hill, Alabama. AT&T again said it would not seek approval to withdraw TDM services in the trial wire centers “any earlier than the second half of 2015” (CD May 29 p2).

Rural telcos should be OK despite a possible FCC re-definition of “broadband,” said Guggenheim Partners analyst Paul Gallant in a research note Monday. The FCC recently proposed to redefine “broadband” as 10 Mbps, up from 4 Mbps, in order to be eligible for Connect America Fund money (CD April 8 p1). “Given the tone of the Democratic majority in announcing the proposed increase, we suspect the FCC is likely to raise minimum deployment speeds from 4 to 10 Mbps,” Gallant said. That could lead to higher projected costs and a risk carriers wouldn’t accept CAF Phase II money, but “the FCC is sensitive to this risk and is likely to explore adjustments to other buildout factors” that might make it more “economically attractive” for telcos to accept CAF II payments for broadband buildout, Gallant said. Telcos like CenturyLink, Frontier Communications and Windstream are likely to accept the money, he said. They would start getting those payments in lieu of USF support around July 2015, he said. (See separate report on broadband speeds above in this issue.)

Paid prioritization as envisioned by Free Press and other net neutrality proponents doesn’t exist, said AT&T Senior Executive Vice President Jim Cicconi Friday in a blog post (http://bit.ly/1i8OitQ). The Internet “is totally safe from fast lanes and slow lanes,” and no ISP has any plans to introduce the kind of paid prioritization Free Press warns against, he said. All ISPs have posted policies that prohibit the kinds of discriminatory practices raised by net neutrality proponents, he said. Reclassifying broadband as a Title II common-carrier service would do little good, Cicconi warned. “Some groups have suggested the best path to prevent paid prioritization is Title II,” he said. “But there’s one gigantic problem with this. The plain language of Title II provides no basis to prohibit paid prioritization. Quite the contrary, Title II actually allows and could protect any such practice.” Cicconi is “just plain wrong,” responded Free Press Policy Director Matt Wood. “AT&T has a consistent record of blocking applications that compete with its own voice and messaging services.” Wood cited AT&T’s blocking of Skype, Apple’s FaceTime app and Google Voice “right up until the FCC and Free Press started asking questions and drawing up Net Neutrality complaints about these tactics.” AT&T also demands extra from content providers, Wood said. “Look no further than the new practice of charging video-streaming services like Netflix an extra fee just to get their traffic on to last-mile broadband networks."