Craig Brittain, creator of an alleged “revenge porn” website, isanybodydown.com, is banned from publicly sharing nude videos or photographs of people without obtaining consent, as part of a settlement announced Thursday with the FTC. Brittain also agreed to destroy the images and personal contact information he collected for more than 1,000 individuals while he ran the site. “The illegally collected images and information will be deleted, and this individual can never return to the so-called ‘revenge porn’ business,” FTC Consumer Protection Bureau Director Jessica Rich said. Brittain obtained many of the images by posing as a woman on Craigslist and offering nude photos to women in exchange for nude photos of the women, the agency said. He asked viewers of his site to “anonymously submit nude photos of people,” the FTC complaint said. Photos posted included personal information about the people in the photos such as their full name, town and state, phone number and Facebook profile. Women who discovered their photos and information were posted on the site and contacted Brittain to remove the information were ignored or asked to pay between $200 and $500 for the removal of the images and content, the complaint said. The commission voted unanimously in favor of the proposed consent order. A description of the agreement will be available for comment until March 2.
TracFone, the nation’s largest prepaid mobile provider, agreed to pay $40 million to settle FTC allegations that it didn’t deliver on promises to customers who bought “unlimited” data service. The complaint alleged TracFone has advertised since 2009 prepaid monthly mobile plans for about $45 per month offering “unlimited” data under various brands -- including Straight Talk, Net10, Simple Mobile and Telcel America, said an FTC Wednesday news release. “Despite emphasizing unlimited data in its advertisements, TracFone drastically slowed or cut off consumers’ mobile data after they used more than certain fixed limits in a 30-day period,” the FTC said. “The issue here is simple: when you promise consumers ‘unlimited,’ that means unlimited,” said Jessica Rich, director of the FTC Consumer Protection Bureau. The agency's proposed order was filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. TracFone didn’t comment.
The National Hispanic Media Coalition will promote universal and affordable broadband, telecom networks and inclusive media for the Latino community as part of its 2015 policy priorities, NHMC said in an email Tuesday. NHMC will expand public and private broadband adoption programs for Latinos who lack broadband connections and promote telecom policies that treat Latino consumers fairly, it said. The coalition will continue to urge the FCC to reclassify Internet access as a common-carrier service under Communications Act Title II, it said. It will also focus on privacy protections for Latinos in the digital age, it said.
The Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau granted a one-year extension Wednesday of the FCC waiver for advanced communications services (ACS) accessibility rules to a basic class of e-readers, in an order in docket 10-213. E-reader makers had sought a waiver extension for an ongoing period of time, while groups representing the blind and vision impaired had opposed any extension of the initial one-year waiver (see 1411120048). The e-readers in the narrow class are primarily designed for reading text-based digital works, even though they're capable of accessing ACS, the bureau said. It won’t require e-reader manufacturers covered by the waiver to comply with section 14.20, 14.21 or 14.31 of the commission’s rules until Jan. 28, 2016. The bureau urged manufacturers to consider accessible design early on in development stages in future generations of e-readers "to provide ACS as one of their primary functions." "We're disappointed to hear that, but we're glad they haven't granted a permanent waiver," said a spokesman for the National Federation of the Blind. "We don't feel that e-readers should be exempt at all [from ACS rules]. The content of e-readers is 1s and 0s, so it's not inherently visual and can be rendered as pure Braille or other formats." The federation will submit further comments to the FCC, he said. A lawyer for the Coalition of e-Reader Manufacturers that had sought the waiver extension for Amazon, Kobo and Sony declined to comment.
The FCC was right to issue a strong warning against blocking Wi-Fi (see 1501270037), said the Wireless Innovation Alliance Wednesday in a news release. “As the FCC has said before, and was forced to say again: blocking legal communications from wireless users is unequivocally wrong,” the group said. “Unlicensed spectrum is our best bet for wireless innovation; it supports billions of dollars of economic activity every year and serves as an essential on-ramp for communications through services like Wi-Fi.”
Comptel, ITTA and NTCA are uniting in opposition to the Comcast/Time Warner Cable transaction, a wireline industry official told us Wednesday. The groups had been set to announce their new organization Wednesday, but the Washington, D.C., event was rescheduled to Monday, Feb. 2, due to inclement weather. The new organization will be wireline-centric, and the event will include briefings on how the merger would harm competition, the industry official told us. Comptel, ITTA and NTCA didn't comment.
The FCC issued a strong warning to hotels and businesses that they will face fines if they block Wi-Fi hot spots. The FCC said in October that Marriott International and its subsidiary, Marriott Hotel Services, had agreed to pay $600,000 to resolve an FCC investigation into whether Marriott intentionally interfered with and disabled Wi-Fi networks at a Tennessee convention center (see 1410060053). “Wi-Fi blocking violates Section 333 of the Communications Act, as amended,” said the public notice Tuesday. “The Enforcement Bureau has seen a disturbing trend in which hotels and other commercial establishments block wireless consumers from using their own personal Wi-Fi hot spots on the commercial establishment’s premises. As a result, the Bureau is protecting consumers by aggressively investigating and acting against such unlawful intentional interference.”
The FCC should adopt a “mobile-specific, Title I approach” to net neutrality rules, CTIA officials said in a meeting with Wireless Bureau Chief Roger Sherman. CTIA emphasized the level of competition in the wireless industry and the challenges of providing mobile versus fixed broadband, said an ex parte filing posted Tuesday 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.”
The FCC should secure public interest benefits and improvements to the Comcast Internet Essentials program if it approves Comcast's planned buy of Time Warner Cable, the California Emerging Technology Fund told FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler aides Gigi Sohn, Maria Kirby and Phil Verveer in a meeting Tuesday, according to an ex parte filing in docket 14-57. CETF “does not support or oppose" the deal, but said the FCC should secure an improved sign-up process and fewer eligibility restrictions for Internet Essentials in the transaction. CETF also wants specific performance goals for the program, an independent advisory committee and a requirement for Comcast to offer a stand-alone Internet program. “Comcast should capitalize a fund to be administered by an independent third party to fund outreach and actual sign-ups of eligible low income subscribers by community-based organizations (CBO’s) to the target population,” CETF said. It said CBOs have had difficulty working with Comcast.
The 2015 annual adjustment to the thresholds that trigger automatic FTC and Justice Department review of a merger or acquisition is the smallest in years, said Fletcher Heald wireless attorney Raymond Quianzon on the law firm's blog. The increase from the previous threshold is just half of 1 percent, he said. Under the latest adjustment, federal agencies will review deals where the total value exceeds $305.1 million or where the total value exceeds $76.3 million and one party has total assets of at least $15.3 million and the other party has assets of $152.5 million, he said. This monetary threshold trigger of FTC and Justice review is separate from the FCC review process, which applies to most communications-related deals, Quianzon said. “Once those lines are crossed, the prospect of additional (and considerable) time, expense and hassle to navigate the federal review process is a virtual certainty.” The new thresholds take effect Feb. 20.