Verizon and AT&T are backing the C-band Relocation Payment Clearinghouse's request that it be allowed to shut down June 30 (see 2505140034). Substantive functions related to the C-band transition are complete, Verizon said in a filing posted Friday (docket 18-122). Pointing to Anuvu's pending appeal of a denied claim, Verizon said the 3.7 GHz service overlay licensees will guarantee payment to Anuvu in the event of a favorable FCC or final court ruling. AT&T filed similarly last week.
NextNav's proposed reconfiguration of the lower 900 MHz band would cost the tolling industry an estimated $6.8 billion, far outweighing supposed economic benefits, according to industry representatives. A docket 25-110 filing posted Friday recapped a meeting with FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington and the offices of Chairman Brendan Carr and Commissioner Anna Gomez. During that meeting, International Bridge, Tunnel & Turnpike Association and E-ZPass Group representatives discussed the industry's economic impact study indicating that the direct and indirect costs of the NextNav proposal would be "many tens of billions of dollars across many industries" (see 2504300022).
Five years after the launch of its 5G Home Internet fixed wireless service, T-Mobile is the fastest-growing ISP and the fifth-largest in the U.S., the company told the FCC Friday (docket 22-211). In its latest annual status report on its 5G deployment requirements as part of its 2019 Sprint acquisition, T-Mobile said it has more than 6.5 million customers and is available to more than 70 million homes. As of March 31, its low-band 5G covers 98.45% of the U.S. population, while its midband 5G covers 94.75%; its six-year milestone requirement is for 99% and 88% coverage, respectively. It has already met all its rural 5G network coverage requirements, though it continues to extend its low-band and midband rural coverage, T-Mobile said, and it has also already met all its in-home broadband service milestones.
The FCC Enforcement Bureau issued a $25,000 penalty against the owner of a citizens band radio service station in Rockford, Illinois, for malicious interference and unauthorized operation, said a forfeiture order in Friday’s Daily Digest. Jayme John Leon violated FCC rules by using his station to make one-way transmissions and send nonverbal, indecipherable sound effects over long periods, the order said. His transmissions included recorded comedy routines, air raid siren sounds and “unintelligible, data-like” noises, said the 2023 notice of apparent liability that preceded Friday’s forfeiture order. The NAL said Leon has a history of noncompliance with FCC orders, previously being fined $14,000 for transmitting obscene and profane language. According to the NAL, Leon has said the broadcasts were caused by “a milk crate containing a battery-operated CB radio placed by an unidentified third-party at a corner near his house,” but he hasn’t provided evidence of the device. The Enforcement Bureau gathered evidence that showed the transmissions coming from an antenna on Leon’s home, the NAL said.
Representatives of the ioXt Alliance, an IoT security group, met with Public Safety Bureau staff about the FCC’s nascent voluntary cyber trust mark program. They “provided a general overview of how ioXt’s own certified products registry operates and offered insights on challenges and opportunities associated with the design and development of the registry for the Commission’s IoT Cybersecurity Labeling Program,” said a filing posted Thursday in docket 23-239.
The FCC defended its 50% upward adjustment of a fine it imposed on Verizon for data violations, bringing the total penalty to $46.9 million, in a brief filed Wednesday at the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. The court heard Verizon’s challenge of the fine in April (docket 24-1733), with judges appearing skeptical of the carrier’s arguments (see 2504290060). This week, they asked both sides about the adjustment as they near a decision. The FCC defended the fine even though now-Chairman Brendan Carr and Commissioner Nathan Simington had opposed it (see 2504250062).
The Enterprise Wireless Alliance asked the FCC to clarify the regulatory status of 800/900 MHz specialized mobile radio service systems not interconnected with the public switched telephone network. They should be considered private mobile systems that “may not be classified or regulated as common carriers for any purpose under the Communications Act,” the group said in an undocketed filing posted Wednesday.
Geophysical Survey Systems Inc. (GSSI) asked the FCC to act on its 2019 request for a waiver of commission rules for ultra-wideband ground-penetrating radar devices to allow the certification and marketing of a new device it's developing. The device would help autonomous vehicles in stay in a lane.
NAB fired back at the Wi-Fi Alliance and various tech companies for opposing its petition for reconsideration of an order expanding the parts of the 6 GHz band where new very-low-power devices can operate without coordination (see 2505150017). “Both oppositions misstate the nature of NAB’s request in alleging procedural defects,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 18-295.
Motorola Solutions Inc. (MSI) announced a deal after markets closed Tuesday to buy Silvus Communications for up to $5 billion. Silvus “designs and develops software-defined high-speed mobile ad-hoc network (MANET) technologies that enable highly secure data, video and voice communications without the need for fixed infrastructure,” MSI said: The solution Silvus offers “consists of industry-leading algorithms running on a software-defined communications platform to provide high bandwidth network connectivity to mobile frontline teams and unmanned assets that operate in challenging environments.”