House Communications Subcommittee Ranking Member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., wants more FCC authority over retrans conflicts, and is already provoking opposition from broadcasters. She plans to introduce the Video Consumers Have Options in Choosing Entertainment Act (http://1.usa.gov/17QKhDH), her office said Monday. “Recurring TV blackouts, including the 91 U.S. markets impacted in 2012, have made it abundantly clear that the FCC needs explicit statutory authority to intervene when retransmission disputes break down,” Eshoo said in a statement. “This discussion draft is intended to spur constructive, actionable debate on ways to improve the video marketplace for video content creators, pay-TV providers and, most importantly, consumers."

Federal agencies are still working on how to approach mobile payments, said Kate Kingberger, U.S. Treasury mobile payments specialist, at an event Monday. The Financial and Banking Information Infrastructure Committee (FBIIC) at Treasury is working to maintain security and consumer protection and to define federal regulations, said Kingberger. Adoption rates have been increasing for mobile banking because of growing smartphone adoption, but security remains an issue for some, said Federal Reserve Board economist Max Schmeiser at the event on mobile payments.

The mobile payment regulatory realm is shaped by concerns about the potential for money laundering, privacy concerns and inherent limitations of mobile devices, officials from federal agencies said during a Monday panel on mobile payments hosted by Law Seminars International.

NAB is pursuing a relocation to the Capitol Riverfront area to be closer to Congress and the FCC, said a spokesman. “For NAB lobbyists to be stuck in a cab for an hour a day trying to get to and from Capitol Hill is not an effective use of our time.” The current location was ideal when the FCC was at 1919 M St. NW, he said. The FCC moved to its current location on 12th St. SW in 1999. Some media industry executives said it’s very common for trade associations to move closer to government locations.

Wednesday’s 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision in Time Warner Cable, NCTA v. FCC (CD Sept 5 p4) vacating the standstill rule on procedural grounds indicated the agency would be within its rights to resurrect it, experts said. But the FCC might face a steep court battle in doing so, said foes of the rule including the then-commissioner who voted against it, in interviews last week. The standstill rule, created in a 2011 order, let commission staff authorize continued carriage of a channel involved in a program carriage complaint while a decision is pending (CD Oct 4 p3).

FCC acting Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn did not place an order mandating interoperability in the lower 700 MHz band on the agenda for a vote at the commission’s Sept. 26 meeting. The agenda for the meeting circulated Thursday. Proponents of an order had hoped she would take that step to force an agreement as negotiations continue between them, AT&T and Verizon Wireless. The meeting could be Clyburn’s last as acting chair, with the nomination of Tom Wheeler as chairman pending before the Senate and the next FCC meeting slated for Oct. 22.

The National Security Agency took heat from critics for reported counterencryption efforts. The NSA should never again be involved in encryption standards-setting, despite its wealth of talented cryptographers, Joseph Lorenzo Hall, senior staff technologist at the Center for Democracy and Technology, told us. Critics said Friday the NSA’s efforts to introduce vulnerabilities into secure communications would expose Americans to hacking and foreign surveillance from others able to crack the codes.

American Tower said Friday it will buy MIP Tower Holdings, the parent company of Global Tower Partners (GTP); the $4.8 billion purchase price includes $3.3 billion in cash and an agreement to assume $1.5 billion in debt. Macquarie Infrastructure Partners owns a majority of MIP Tower Holdings and GTP; Dutch pension fund manager PGGM has a minority ownership. Although the deal will allow American Tower to expand its position among the top U.S. tower companies, industry analysts told us they don’t believe it will fundamentally affect the U.S. tower market or encounter major regulatory issues. American Tower said it expects the deal to close in Q4 (http://bit.ly/15AKyL2).

The deregulation of Frontier Communications by the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission was the right move for consumers who should be able to make their own choices, said Phil Jones, WUTC commissioner and NARUC president. The decision to deregulate the wholesale and retail rates came from 1986 policy actions, so companies could seek “minor touch of regulation,” said Jones. Through the alternative form of regulation (AFOR) and competitive classification, telcos have the ability to file a petition, find the relevant markets and determine competition, he said. They have the ability walk away if conditions imposed by the WUTC aren’t acceptable to them, said Jones at a FCBA event Friday.

UltraViolet’s continued growth is encouraging for the home video industry, said executives at the Entertainment Merchants Association and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. SPHE is “extremely pleased on the progress” that UltraViolet has made, Rich Marty, SPHE vice president-worldwide emerging platform development and marketing, told us. There are more than 13 million accounts across the industry, and UltraViolet is available in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, he said.