A phone company may be held liable for illegal robocalls transmitted over its network, a federal court ruled Thursday. Partly granting Florida’s motion for summary judgment, the U.S. District Court of Southern Florida found that Smartbiz Telecom violated the Truth in Caller ID Act and the Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR). While the court will move to trial on Florida’s additional counts alleging Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) violations, Judge Jose Martinez disagreed with Smartbiz, which, as an intermediate provider that didn't initiate the calls, argued it can't be held liable under the TCPA. Smartbiz, Martinez wrote, "was involved in the placing of the telephone calls because it knowingly allowed fraudulent calls to transit its network.”
The FCC gave the green light to extended milestone deadlines for EchoStar's 5G network buildout Friday, three days after the company filed its request (see 2409190050). EchoStar called the approval "a significant step to promote competition in the wireless market."
The FCC shouldn’t “shift the long-standing understanding of localism” in its proceeding on prioritizing locally originated programming (see 2403120071), said America’s Public Television Stations and PBS in a teleconference meeting Tuesday with Media Bureau Chief Holly Saurer and an aide to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, according to an ex parte filing in docket 24-14. Public TV programming is local because it's issue-responsive, the filing said. “The definitions established in this rulemaking could have implications for what is considered ‘local’ broadcast programming in future regulations,” said the public TV groups. The FCC should adopt a “qualified” noncommercial educational broadcast station definition that would allow NCE applications to be prioritized without meeting the agency’s proposed requirements that programming be originated locally. The public TV groups also said the FCC shouldn’t expand rules governing TV translators. Rather than requiring translators to designate communities of license, the agency should “grandfather in existing COLs for public television translators until the station requests to change their community of license.” Doing otherwise could “create a burdensome engineering and administrative scramble for some public television stations,” the public TV groups said.
CostQuest will offer NTCA members its broadband fabric data location "at exclusive member pricing" for the FCC's broadband maps and NTIA's broadband, equity, access and deployment program, the group announced Thursday. NTCA members will receive a "10% discount off list pricing," it said. In addition, CostQuest will provide data on network cost, competition and demographics for each broadband serviceable location (see 2211180062). NTCA and CostQuest will host a webinar for the group's members Oct. 30 at 1 p.m. EDT.
Representatives of Somos and the Ad Hoc Telecom Users Committee met with aides to all five commissioners about tweaking a draft order on using the do not originate (DNO) list in blocking unwanted and illegal robocalls. The order is set for a vote at the FCC’s Sept. 26 open meeting (see 2409050045). “Somos applauds the Commission for applying a DNO mandate for all carriers in the draft Order” and agrees the commission shouldn’t designate a particular list, said a filing posted Thursday in docket 17-59. But “a reasonable list must (not may) include” all invalid numbers where the area code or central office code begins with a 0 or 1, “all numbers in an area code that is not yet, or can never be assigned” and “all 10,000 and 1,000 blocks of numbers in area codes that are in service, but the blocks are not yet assigned,” the filing said. Somos would also include on the list “numbers for which the subscriber has requested call origination blocking.”
SpaceX representatives met with FCC staff to discuss recent studies that found high-power terrestrial operations in the lower or upper 12 GHz band “would cause debilitating interference to Americans who rely on next generation satellite broadband in the 10.7-12.7 GHz band.” Representatives from SpaceX met with staff of the Wireless Bureau and Office of Engineering and Technology, according to a filing posted Thursday in docket 20-443. “SpaceX has once again unveiled [Dish Network’s] efforts to steal high-power spectrum rights to a terrestrial service in the lower 12 GHz band at the expense of millions of Americans who rely on the band for their broadband and broadcast service,” the filing said. An EchoStar executive slammed SpaceX’s earlier filing on lower 12 GHz (see 2409040035), calling it an “unserious and last-ditch effort” to block use of the frequencies for fixed wireless (see 2409050040). EchoStar is Dish’s parent company.
The Coalition for Emergency Response and Critical Infrastructure (CERCI) asked the FCC to complete a collection of “granular data on public safety operations in the 4.9 GHz band” promised in a January 2023 (see 2408130035) order before addressing rules for the band. CERCI is a leading opponent of a proposal that would give FirstNet and AT&T control of the frequencies. “The FCC cannot convert the 4.9 GHz band into an AT&T FirstNet/commercial shared band premised on vague promises of interference protection for all current public-safety licensees,” said a filing this week in docket 07-100. “Rather, it must first conduct the data collection it announced over a year-and-a-half ago,” CERCI said: “CERCI respectfully submits that if the Commission were to conduct the data collection … it would conclude that it is not in the public interest to deploy the 4.9 GHz band on AT&T’s network.”
CTIA representatives spoke with aides to FCC Commissioners Geoffrey Starks and Nathan Simington about the group’s 2019 petition seeking clarity on pole attachment rules under Section 224 of the Communications Act. “The record on the Petition is thorough and many commenters supported CTIA’s request,” said a filing posted Thursday in docket 17-84: “As the Commission considers further actions in this docket, now is an appropriate time for it to make clear which infrastructure is in fact subject to Section 224’s requirements.” Representatives of the group previously met with aides to FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Commissioner Brendan Carr (see 2409180013).
CTIA completed a series of meetings with staff from all five FCC commissioner's offices on proposed rules requiring blocking texts. A vote on the issue is scheduled for the commissioners' Sept. 26 open meeting (see 2409050045). A filing, posted Thursday in docket 21-402, largely repeats points the group made based on an earlier meeting with an aide to Commissioner Nathan Simington (see 2409170044). “CTIA estimates that in 2023 wireless providers prevented over 47.5 billion spam messages from reaching consumers, and those numbers no doubt have continued to grow,” it said.
The FCC Wireline Bureau wants comments by Oct. 21, replies by Nov. 5, in docket 05-337 on the National Exchange Carrier Association's proposed changes to the average schedule Universal Service Fund high cost loop support formula. The proposed formula would take effect Jan. 1, said a public notice Thursday.