Fourteen companies and organizations of all sizes and specialties across the tech and telecom industry landscape joined the Telecommunications Industry Association, a TIA news release said Friday. The new members include: Asociar; Burns & McDonnell; Contra Costa Transportation Authority; Engineered Tower Solutions; iFast; Infinera; Network Technology Solutions; Power of Design Group; PTI Solutions; Schnabel DC Consultants India; Shenandoah Tower Service; Sioux Falls Tower & Communications; Texas A&M Transportation Institute; and Vertical Solutions. “As the industry faces rapidly developing technologies, new regulatory environments, and shifting business models,” becoming a member of TIA “gives companies a strong voice in charting the future of the network,” said TIA CEO Scott Belcher.

In an ending of the ill-fated Redbox Instant by Verizon streaming video service, which shut down Oct. 7, the venture’s attempt at closure with its customers hit a snag Wednesday when subscribers tried to follow an email invitation to switch their purchased content to M-GO. We were one of the Redbox Instant by Verizon pioneers who jumped on instructions in the “friendly reminder” it offered by email Wednesday to “provide access at NO COST to you for movies you purchased from us” through an agreement with M-GO. If movies we had purchased couldn’t be transferred to M-GO, we were to qualify for credit in the M-GO store for the price we originally paid for the movie, the venture said. As a bonus, we were to receive a $5 welcome credit from M-GO. We followed instructions to visit the M-GO page, where we were instructed to enter our email address. But a system glitch prevented subscribers from entering email addresses and completing the process, which included access to the names of movies that subscribers had purchased from Redbox Instant by Verizon. Wednesday and again Thursday, Redbox Instant by Verizon sent out an apology email: “You recently received an email from us reminding you to act by March 20, 2015 if you wished to establish an account with M-GO to access and watch your Redbox Instant by Verizon movies," it said. "Unfortunately, due to a technical error on our part, the consent page used an invalid email address instead of your Redbox Instant by Verizon email and did not allow you to properly enter your email address before completing the consent process." After apologizing, Redbox Instant by Verizon assured customers that their account information was "safe and secure.” Redbox Instant by Verizon will be “re-sending this reminder email to you soon, after we’ve corrected the migration function,” it said. We decided not to wait for an invitation and tried the link again, finding that the email address issue was corrected. A confirmation email thanked us for our consent to switch our purchased movies to M-GO and said we’d receive instructions within the next 24 hours on “how to complete the migration process.”

The State Department now requires U.S. companies and foreigner end users to sign and submit an addendum to the DSP-83 nontransfer and use certificate form at the time of application for a permanent export license for unmanned aerial systems (UAS), known commonly as drones. Temporary UAS exports, for marketing and other purposes, won't require the addendum, State said last week. State included the necessary addendum format with its statement. The department recently outlined a new policy for UAS trade, in a separate announcement (see 1502170065), shortly after the Federal Aviation Administration unveiled plans to propose rules for commercial drones and President Barack Obama asked agencies to look at drone privacy issues (see 1502160003).

The State Department is putting into force control guidelines for exports of unmanned aerial systems (UAS), known commonly as drones, the agency said Monday. State didn’t say when it would publish regulations on the guidelines, but said end users will have to meet the following criteria: Recipients are to use these systems in accordance with international law, including international humanitarian law and international human rights law, as applicable; armed and other advanced UAS are to be used in operations involving the use of force only when there is a lawful basis for use of force under international law, such as national self-defense; recipients are not to use military UAS to conduct unlawful surveillance or use unlawful force against their domestic populations. Also this week, the White House released a memo on drone privacy, and the Federal Aviation Administration released a draft of proposed rules for commercial drone operations (see 1502170038 and 1502160003).

An anonymous telecom company and an Internet company backed Twitter in the social networking site’s legal fight for the right to release information related to national security letters (NSLs) it receives. The anonymous companies filed an amicus brief Tuesday arguing that gag orders are an “unconstitutional prior restraint on free speech and a serious infringement of their First Amendment Rights.” The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which is representing the anonymous companies, provided the brief. Twitter filed a lawsuit in October arguing that “users deserved to know certain basic facts about NSLs that the government did or did not serve on the social media company,” EFF said. NSLs issued by the federal government almost always contain a gag order, prohibiting the companies from notifying customers or the public that a demand has been made, the group said. The anonymous telecom and Internet companies involved in this case “want to go public with some details of their fights against NSLs,” such as their corporate identities and “what they have done to protect customers from unreasonable collection of information,” EFF said. The government argues that identifying the companies that received an NSL “might endanger national security,” EFF said. Several courts, including the Supreme Court, recognize that “a prior restraint -- preventing speech in the first instance instead of imposing a penalty after the speech -- is a serious and dangerous step," EFF Legal Fellow Andrew Crocker said. "Yet with NSLs, we have prior restraints imposed at the government's whim, without any judicial oversight or review. Our clients want to talk about their experience with these NSLs, but the government is unconstitutionally shielding itself from any criticism or critique of their procedures." A San Francisco-based federal district court judge agreed with EFF in 2013 that the NSL provisions were unconstitutional and prohibited any future NSLs and accompanying gag orders, EFF said. That ruling was stayed pending appeal, allowing additional NSLs to be distributed while the case makes its way through the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

CEA hails the Federal Aviation Administration for finally releasing its proposed rules on small drones, President Gary Shapiro said Monday in a statement. But the rulemaking notice is “only the liftoff stage toward needed final rules,” Shapiro said. “It will be important to strike the appropriate regulatory balance between innovation and safety, and we urge the FAA to expedite this rulemaking action to fully realize commercial drones’ potential as a truly disruptive technology.” CEA thinks drones “will revolutionize a broad array of consumer and commercial sectors, bringing with them innovative new businesses and thousands of jobs,” Shapiro said. Amazon had asked the FAA for an exemption to test-fly small commercial drones on its Seattle property (see 1407150075). The FAA’s proposed rules wouldn't prohibit industries from using drones to transport cargo, “so long as it is not done for compensation and the total weight of the aircraft, including the property, is less than 55 pounds,” the notice said. The agency seeks comment on whether drones should be permitted to transport property for payment “within the other proposed constraints of the rule,” such as the requirements for line of sight operations. It also seeks comment on whether a special class of “air carrier certification” should be developed for commercial operations of small drones. Release of the rulemaking notice came roughly 11 months after CEA and the Aerospace Industries Association joined in urging the FAA to speed the rulemaking process along (see 1403280033). The rulemaking notice also came nearly five years after an FAA-“chartered” aviation rulemaking committee completed work on a 74-page report of comprehensive recommendations on small drones use (see 1403310035). Comments on the proposed rules are due 60 days after they’re published in the Federal Register. Although privacy issues as they pertain to drones "are beyond the scope" of its rulemaking, the FAA and the Department of Transportation will participate in NTIA's "multi-stakeholder engagement process" on the "privacy, accountability, and transparency issues" of commercial drone operations, the notice said (see 1502170038).

Amazon, with a score of 83.72, finished behind first-place Wegmans Food Markets in the 2015 Harris Poll Reputation Quotient study. Consumers rated companies on key "reputational dimensions" of products and services, emotional appeal, financial performance and vision and leadership, Harris said Wednesday. The reputations of the 100 most visible companies range from excellent (scores of 80+) to poor (scores of 50 to 64). Apple (80.69), at ninth, has fallen five spots since 2012. Among consumer tech companies, Google came in at 10 (80.44), Sony at 13 (79.93), Microsoft at 15 (79.94), Intel at 20 (78.54), LG at 23 (78.20), Hewlett-Packard at 42 (75.26) and Dell at 60 (72.13). Verizon led wireless carriers in 66th place with a “fair” rating of 69.74, followed by Sprint at 72 (67.66), T-Mobile at 75 (67.54), and AT&T at 76 (67.26). Video operators hovered in the fair to poor range on the list. DirecTV posted at 83 (65.27), Charter at 92 (60.30) and Comcast at 93 (60.64). Dish Network came in 98th out of the 100, with a rating of 58.07, according to rankings. Goldman Sachs bottomed out the list. “Reputation is far from static and is a business asset that is earned every day as people evaluate companies through the lens of what matters most to them,” Harris spokeswoman Carol Gstalder said. The study was done online among 27,278 U.S. respondents Oct. 20 to Dec. 18, with preliminary nominating research done with 4,034 respondents, Aug. 26-28 and Sept. 24-26.

The FTC settled a lawsuit against two individuals for alleged involvement in a multi-million dollar international telemarketing fraud scheme that targeted U.S. senior citizens. Defendants Marc Ferry and Robert Barczai allegedly withdrew money from the accounts of seniors without authorization, while claiming to sell fraud protection, legal protection and pharmaceutical benefit services for $187 to $397, the complaint said. As part of the settlement, Ferry and Barczai are barred from using remotely created checks, are required to obtain consumers’ consent before debiting accounts and are prohibited from misrepresenting any goods or services. They also must turn over proceeds from the scheme, which the FTC estimates are around $11 million. “Scammers thought they could cover their tracks by operating across borders, but law enforcement caught up with them,” said Jessica Rich, Consumer Protection Bureau director. “We’ve shut down their scheme of lying to older people and stealing their money.” The settlement announced Tuesday is part of a complaint issued against Ari Tietolman and his associates who “established a network of U.S. and Canadian entities to carry out their scam,” the FTC said.

The FCC is further beefing up its Enforcement Bureau, adding Phillip Rosario, former head of the Consumer Protection Department at the Connecticut Attorney General’s Office, as deputy chief. Rosario established the department and collaborated with the FCC on recent cramming settlements with AT&T and T-Mobile, said a news release.

Hype about the launch of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus last fall took a toll on sales of iPads in Q4 for Apple, which shipped 4.6 million fewer tablets versus the previous-year quarter, an industry research firm said. Apple had a 17.8 percent shipment decline over Q4 2013, to 21.4 million units in 2014 Q4, a Monday report​ from IDC said. Apple CEO Tim Cook said last week when releasing quarterly results that the iPhone was the star of that quarter (see 1501280031). The company expanded its iPad lineup by keeping around older models and offering a lower entry price point of $249, but the strategy “wasn't enough to spur iPad sales given the excitement around the launch of the new iPhones,” Jitesh Ubrani, IDC senior research analyst, said. Apple’s efforts to maintain iPad momentum “have fallen flat” because the latest generation of iPads offer “very minimalistic upgrades over their previous versions,” IDC said. "Cannibalization at the bottom from the iPhone and at the top from the Mac appears to be a serious issue for the iPad.” Worldwide tablet shipments, meanwhile, had a year-over-year decline for the first time since the market's inception in 2010, IDC said. It said overall shipments for tablets and 2-in-1 devices slipped 3.2 percent, to 76.1 million in Q4, compared with 78.6 million for the 2013 period. "The tablet market is still very top heavy" because Apple and Samsung are largely carrying the market each year, Ubrani said. Fifth-place Amazon had the steepest annual volume decline of the top five tablet vendors, IDC said. Despite a product refresh at the end of September with the Kindle Fire HDX 8.9 and 7-inch Fire HD, holiday sales tumbled nearly 70 percent compared with 2013, IDC said. Of the top five, it said that only Lenovo, in a distant third place, had growth in Q4, boosting tablet shipments by 9 percent to 3.7 million units for 4.8 percent global market share. IDC forecasts growth for the tablet category in 2015, Jean Philippe Bouchard, research director-tablets, said. Potential growth contributors include Microsoft's new operating system, a shift toward larger screen sizes and “productivity focused solutions,” along with technology innovations such as gesture control, he said.