FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s proposal to raise the benchmark for judging the availability of broadband to 25 Mbps downstream and 3 Mbps upstream is facing opposition from Verizon. The proposal will be added to the commission’s Jan. 29 meeting for a vote, an agency official told us Friday. Increasing the standard in determining the adequacy of broadband deployment, from 4/1 to 25/3, would be a “large” shift, Maggie McCready, Verizon vice president-federal regulatory affairs, and William Johnson, associate general counsel, told Wheeler aide Renee Gregory and an aide to Commissioner Mignon Clyburn in separate meetings Tuesday, said an ex parte filing. A draft FCC report on the progress of broadband deployment to be voted on at the meeting concludes that deployment, based on the higher standard, isn't occurring in a “just and reasonable fashion" (see 1501070046). Verizon officials disagreed. They said an assessment shouldn't discount the growth in mobile Internet access, “an important source of broadband connectivity that is being widely embraced by consumers, and, particularly with the widespread availability of 4G LTE,” the commission's report should reflect deployment of these services. The draft report calls the 4-year-old 4/1 standard “dated,” and said 53 percent of rural Americans, and 17 percent nationally, lack access to broadband at 25/3 Mbps speeds. A key consideration is the growth in streaming video and audio, which now comprises 63 percent of downstream traffic, an agency fact sheet about the proposal said. The commission also will vote on issuing a notice of inquiry on how to improve broadband deployment.
The FTC reached a proposed settlement with two payday lending services for $21 million, an agency news release said Friday. It’s the FTC’s largest recovery in a payday lending case, it said. The agency filed a complaint in 2012 against AMG Services, MNE Services and other co-defendants, alleging the services charged consumers “undisclosed and inflated fees,” the agency said. The settlement the FTC reached with AMG and MNE “requires these companies to turn over millions of dollars that they took from financially-distressed consumers, and waive hundreds of millions in other charges,” Jessica Rich, FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection director, said. “It should be self-evident that payday lenders may not describe their loans as having a certain cost and then turn around and charge consumers substantially more.” The attorney for AMG and MNE didn’t comment.
The FCC should make public draft texts of proposals to be taken up at commission meetings at the same time they're circulated to commissioners, Commissioner Mike O’Rielly said in a blog post Friday. O’Rielly called for the change in August (see 1408080031). He said now he understands the texts of items aren’t posted in advance of meetings because “it could be harder to comply with the Administrative Procedure Act,” and that “it could be more difficult to withhold documents under the Freedom of Information Act,” the post said. Neither argument is “persuasive or insurmountable,” O’Rielly wrote. His spokeswoman declined to detail who at the agency made those arguments. The agency didn't comment on O’Rielly’s blog. The concern about the APA, O’Rielly wrote, is that it requires the commission to review all comments and ex partes in a proceeding and respond to any substantive issues. “The concern is that, if we provide a copy of the draft item, we will get more specific comments and ex partes that staff will have to address when finalizing the item," said O'Rielly. "That is, we might actually get constructive feedback based on facts about what is in a draft that require us to roll up our sleeves and explain why we’ve made certain decisions and discarded alternatives.” Calling it a “logistical issue” and not a legal one, O’Rielly said the commission’s “capable and hardworking staff and managers” would be “up to the task” of dealing with it. O’Rielly also disputed a concern that releasing a draft of an agenda item “would make it harder to justify withholding other drafts or even internal emails about various drafts. … I am confident that our talented lawyers at the agency can handle it.” O’Rielly also said he has a sense that there are “some unspoken objections to the proposal” -- that “parties could be in a better position to figure out which edits have been requested by which offices.” He’s not troubled by that prospect, O’Rielly said. “Having worked on the Hill where members put their names on amendments, I am comfortable being associated with my requested edits,” the post said. The current process, O’Rielly said, can lead parties to have “limited or even incorrect knowledge of what is in a draft item, and therefore raise arguments that may be, through no fault of their own, untimely, unnecessary, or misdirected. That, in turn, requires staff to spend time sifting through red herrings rather than considering focused input that could strengthen the reasoning and ultimately the legal sufficiency of the item.”
The FTC is mailing 16,590 checks worth more than a combined $700,000 to consumers who lost money in automated phone or robocall schemes that “allegedly promised to reduce the interest rate on consumers’ credit cards for an up-front fee,” an agency news release said Friday. Each check will be for $42.95, it said. The funds are being made available through two related FTC settlements from 2013, it said. (See settlements here and here.)
Comments on the FCC rulemaking on classifying some online video distributors as multichannel video programming distributors are due Feb. 17, replies March 2, the Media Bureau said in a public notice Thursday.
If the FCC takes a Communications Act Title II net neutrality approach and opts not to forbear from Sections 201 and 202, it should, at most, rely on the sections only to provide additional authority for transparency, no-blocking, and antidiscrimination rules, CEO Michael Powell and other NCTA officials told agency General Counsel Jonathan Sallet, Philip Verveer, senior counselor to Chairman Tom Wheeler, and other officials Monday, said an ex parte filing posted Wednesday in docket 14-28. Applying Sections 201 and 202 beyond what’s needed to enforce net neutrality rules “would expose broadband providers to the investment-reducing and innovation-chilling risks that have sparked vehement opposition to reclassification,” NCTA said. It’s “particularly important to forbear from enforcing Section 201(b),” the filing said, because “the directive to ensure that all ‘charges’ and ‘practices’ are ‘just and reasonable’ would subject every aspect of a broadband provider’s business to regulatory second guessing and micromanagement.” President Barack Obama’s call, while endorsing reclassification, to forbear from rate regulation “cannot be accomplished without forbearing from Section 201(b) -- as that provision is the primary source of statutory authority for the FCC to engage in rate regulation,” NCTA said. The association stressed it continues to oppose reclassification, and wants forbearance from all requirements if the commission adopts the Title II approach. Forbearance also should be done concurrent with any approval of reclassification, NCTA said. Calls by some to suspend sections of Title II, while the commission decides whether to forbear from them, “would deprive industry participants of much-needed regulatory certainty,” NCTA said. Also attending the meetings were James Assey, executive vice president; Rick Chessen, senior vice president-law and regulatory policy; Steven Morris, associate general counsel; Latham Watkins’ Matthew Murchison and Matthew Brill; and members of the commission’s general counsel’s office and the Wireline and Wireless bureaus. NTCA CEO Shirley Bloomfield urged Sallet Monday not to forbear from Section 254 because it could block the agency’s ability to require broadband customers to begin contributing to the USF (see 1501120039), said an ex parte filing. Brendan Kasper, Vonage senior regulatory counsel, and Morgan Lewis’ Joshua Bobeck and William Wilhelm urged an aide to Commissioner Mignon Clyburn Monday not to forbear from Sections 201, 202 and 208, the company’s ex parte filing said. Vonage backed Google’s position to not forbear from Section 224, which gives broadband providers access to utility poles and other infrastructure needed for deployment (see 1412310041).
Comments on how the proposals in the incentive auction comment public notice could affect the FCC’s Regulatory Flexibility Act analyses of the auction’s effects on small business are due Feb. 13, the same day as other comments on the PN, the Wireless Bureau said in a notice Thursday. Replies, like replies on the auction PN, are due March 13. Paperwork Reduction Act comments on the information collection procedures connected with the auction will be due 60 days after Thursday’s notice is published in the Federal Register, the bureau said.
The BroadbandUSA initiative under the NTIA’s auspices uses the agency’s experience with the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) “and brings that skill set to share with communities around the country to help them with the issues they’re facing to ensure” they can improve their broadband access, Douglas Kinkoph, acting associate administrator of the Office of Telecommunications and Information Applications, said in an interview. The White House announced the BroadbandUSA initiative Wednesday as part of its package of plans to improve access to affordable high-speed broadband. President Barack Obama also declared his support for ending state laws that restrict municipal broadband deployments as part of that plan (see 1501140048). BroadbandUSA is “a continuation in some ways of NTIA’s mission of always pushing and helping in the broadband space, but we’re not funding this time,” Kinkoph said Thursday. “We’re providing expertise and sharing it on a no-cost basis.” New NTIA grants would have required legislation from Congress, and the White House emphasized that its new broadband plan would focus on initiatives that didn’t require Congress. NTIA’s BTOP experience means it has “expertise that cuts across infrastructure, broadband mapping, broadband adoption, digital inclusion and public access,” which can all be integrated into advice the agency can provide to local communities, said Laura Breeden, program director-public computing and broadband adoption.
AT&T's planned acquisition of DirecTV will close in Q2, Canaccord Genuity analysts emailed investors Wednesday. The acquisition is expected to close in 2015's first half, an AT&T spokeswoman emailed us. The ongoing net neutrality debate and the FCC upcoming vote on a net neutrality order in February won’t affect the acquisition, Canaccord Genuity said. DirecTV didn't have an immediate comment. The news release announcing AT&T/DirecTV May 18 said it was expected to close within about 12 months, a DirecTV spokesman said.
The FCC needs to step up its shift toward electronic communications, Commissioner Michael O'Rielly said in a blog post Wednesday. Pointing to recommendations in a February report on FCC process reform that all bureaus with licensing responsibility move to electronic means of communication, O'Rielly put the onus on the Office of the Managing Director to implement the shift: “What is the hold-up on completing this very reasonable review of our licensing and notification processes, and why haven’t other actions been taken to move towards electronic recordkeeping and communications?” O'Rielly praised the shifts to paperless licensing that already have happened, as in the Wireless Bureau seeking input on the Universal Licensing System and the Antenna Structure Registration System having a paperless option. “Considering that the Commission issues almost half a million wireless licenses and authorizations per year at a cost of over $300,000, this could result in substantial savings,” O'Rielly said. He pointed to recent enforcement actions related to conventional mail -- such as an applicant not receiving notices of delinquency sent to the wrong address -- as evidence of the advantage of electronic communications. “Chairman Wheeler set the Commission on the right path on this particular item, but now we need to follow through at a much swifter pace," O'Rielly said. "The process reform initiative and the Chief Information Officer completely agree this is a priority area, and are working hard on it," said an FCC spokesman in an email.