CTIA made the case against treating mobile the same as fixed broadband under net neutrality rules, in its report on a meeting with aides to FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai. Consumers have more choices for mobile broadband and it's technically more difficult to provide, CTIA said in a filing in docket 14-28. “Wireless is different and the Commission was correct in 2010 in its decision not to subject mobile broadband to the same requirements as wireline broadband,” CTIA said. “Any additional rules that apply to wireless must take into account the unique competitive and technical attributes of wireless service and avoid impeding the differentiated offerings and choices mobile consumers enjoy today.”

Wireless carriers are likely to move away from aggressive pricing aimed at adding subscribers, especially in light of the high prices seen in the AWS-3 auction, said Mark Lowenstein, managing director of Mobile Ecosystem, Friday in a Fierce Wireless blog post. “AT&T and Verizon are going to have to figure out how to somehow fund the twin ambitions of additional spectrum to meet the data needs of customers, while finding additional market opportunities now that organic revenue growth in wireless is maturing.” Sprint and T-Mobile are also becoming more conservative, he said. “With all their financial obligations, I believe the wireless operators are going to be far less reckless, pricing-wise, than they have been over the past 18 months.” This has been a "pretty unique period" for wireless, with 10-20 percent reductions in price, more generous data allocations and aggressive iPhone and device buyout deals aimed at winning customers, he said.

Mobile video -- followed by music streaming and apps -- will be the key driver of global mobile data traffic in 2015, said a Gartner analysis released Thursday. Citing data from mobile providers, Gartner Research Director Jessica Ekholm said mobile video is generating half of all mobile data and will grow to more than 60 percent of mobile data consumption by 2018. Two variables in projected data usage are video-calling services and music streaming, Ekholm said. Five minutes of FaceTime video chat on a 3G network uses just 15 MB of data but as the number of video callers grows, “the collective total amount can be large,” she said. If users shift to higher bit rate music services, that could also affect data usage significantly, she said. “Mobile music streaming can easily generate hundreds of megabytes of data,” depending on the service; a user listening to Spotify can consume more than twice as much data as a Pandora user, she said. Overall, mobile data traffic is forecast to grow 59 percent this year to 52 terabytes, up from 33 terabytes last year due to newer, faster networks and growing numbers of consumers using more affordable 3G and 4G handsets. Mobile data growth is expected to continue into 2016 at a 53 percent clip to 80 million terabytes, she said. By 2018, half of North American mobile connections will use 4G networks, Ekholm said, and 4G users will generate 46 percent of all mobile data traffic, consuming nearly 5.5 GB of data monthly -- three times that of a 3G smartphone. Cisco this week projected a surge of mobile data usage in the coming years (see 1502030041).

Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., and FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai jointly questioned how FCC rules could let Dish Network buy $13.3 billion worth of AWS-3 licenses for $10 billion using bidding credits (see 1502020039). “While most bidders put their own money on the line, some of the largest companies in the auction were using billions of taxpayer dollars. How is that possible?” they asked in an op-ed piece in Thursday's Wall Street Journal. They warned that despite Dish’s alleged manipulation of the designated entity program, the FCC may further loosen DE rules. “What is astonishing about the manipulation of the bidding process is how cavalier the parties are,” they wrote. "The two Dish-related companies -- Northstar Wireless and SNR Wireless -- didn’t exist until a few months before the auction, and each reported to the FCC that it was a ‘very small business’ as neither had any gross revenues. Yet together the two companies magically managed to place bids more than seven times those of spectrum-hungry T-Mobile.” The FCC had no comment.

The Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) Text-to-911 Readiness and Certification Registry is now available, the FCC Public Safety Bureau said in a public notice Wednesday. The Text-to-911 Registry "lists each PSAP by FCC PSAP ID and name, the county of operation, the primary point of contact for coordinating text-to-911 service, the method by which the PSAP will accept texts, and the state or local governing entity authorizing the PSAP to accept texts,” the bureau said.

Security vulnerabilities in hotel Wi-Fi networks are being exploited by hackers to steal people’s passwords and other sensitive information, Carol Kando-Pineda, counsel for the FTC's Consumer & Business Education Division, wrote in a blog post Wednesday. If using a public network is necessary, Kando-Pineda recommended taking precautions such as ensuring personal information or login information is used only on websites that are fully encrypted, using a different password on different websites, logging out once leaving a website, paying attention to Web browser alerts and keeping browser and security software up to date. “If you regularly need to access online accounts through public Wi-Fi networks, you may want to use a virtual private network,” she wrote.

The FCC gave “significant weight” to the road map by APCO, the National Emergency Number Association and four major carriers in approving rules for wireless indoor location accuracy, the FCC said in the order, posted on its website. “No single technological approach will solve the challenge of indoor location, and no solution can be implemented overnight,” the order said. “The requirements we adopt are technically feasible and technologically neutral, so that providers can choose the most effective solutions from a range of options.” The commissioners approved the order at their monthly meeting last week (see 1501290066).

Sprint has wrapped up the 800 MHz rebanding in 40 of 55 National Public Safety Planning Advisory Committee (NPSPAC) regions, the carrier said in an FCC filing in docket 02-55. The NPSPAC regions that remain incomplete are mostly along the Canadian or Mexican border, Sprint said. Only three individual licensees remain to complete 800 MHz band reconfiguration in the non-border U.S., it said. “Progress on the nationwide 800 MHz band reconfiguration continues to make strong progress.”

The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association asked the FCC to delay a vote on net neutrality rules, citing the negative economic impact on small ISPs, in a filing in docket 14-28. The FCC is expected to vote on the order at its Feb. 26 meeting, and Wednesday Chairman Tom Wheeler revealed some details (see 1502040055). “WISPA remains concerned that the significant economic impact of any new open Internet regulations has not been given full, fair and appropriate consideration by the Commission,” the group said. “In the absence of any assessment of the impact new rules would have on small businesses, WISPA respectfully asks the Commission to defer action on the Open Internet item.” WISPA said the light touch rules in the FCC’s 2010 order “have stimulated tremendous innovation and growth of broadband adoption and edge services.”

The FCC “left a staggering $22.5 billion on the table” in its recently concluded AWS-3 auction, the Phoenix Center said Wednesday in a report. The FCC raised almost $45 billion for the 65 MHz of AWS-3 spectrum, setting a new record for a U.S. spectrum auction (see 1501290059). FCC adoption of a hybrid block-sized approach likely reduced auction revenue by $1.5 billion, while the commission’s decision not to pair the 1695-1710 MHz band with complementary spectrum likely reduced auction revenue by up to $21 billion, the center said. “The AWS-3 auction signals the industry's low confidence with the government's willingness and ability to increase the supply of spectrum for commercial purposes,” said center Chief Economist George Ford in a news release.