Some 32 million federal employees with security clearances may have had personally identifiable information (PII) compromised in a recent breach of Standard Form 86 (SF86) background checks stored on servers operated by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), said House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, Wednesday during part two of a hearing on the breach. OPM Director Katherine Archuleta declined to confirm whether that number was accurate, saying the background checks contain PII for family, friends, neighbors and associates of the subject of the background check.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler told the agency’s newly rechartered Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council Wednesday emergency communications must be among the group’s top priorities as it starts its two-year run. The new CSRIC, CSRIC V, held its first meeting at the FCC Wednesday.

The FCC will ask the Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council (CSRIC) to work on additional cybersecurity issues when the rechartered CSRIC V convenes June 24 for its first public meeting, Homeland Security Bureau Chief David Simpson said in a Monday blog post. CSRIC voted in March to adopt recommendations on adapting the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Cybersecurity Framework for communications sector use (see 1503180056). The CSRIC report drew wide praise from industry stakeholders, including in comments published earlier this month (see 1506010055). That report was one of CSRIC IV’s “biggest achievements” and “I expect the new CSRIC to build on these efforts by developing recommendations on how communications companies can improve information sharing about cyber risks within the private sector,” Simpson said. The FCC also expects CSRIC V to develop recommendations on reducing the frequency and impact of “misrouted” 911 calls, improving Next-Generation 911 and emergency alert systems, and enhancing communications infrastructure reliability, Simpson said. “I also expect that members will examine the challenges associated with prioritizing emergency communications during disaster-related infrastructure outages,” he said. The CSRIC meeting is set to begin at 1 p.m. at FCC headquarters.

The FCC 's Emergency Alert System (EAS) Sixth Report and Order puts improvements in the EAS system based on the 2011 nationwide EAS test into effect, said the order released Wednesday. “Our rules governing these alerts must continue to evolve as legacy networks and services transition to next generation technologies,” the order said. The order adopts “six zeroes” (000000) as the national location code “pertaining to every state and county in the United States,” and the order requires EAS participants to use equipment capable of processing the code. Participants must also use equipment “capable of processing a National Periodic Test (NPT) event code for future nationwide EAS tests” so future national, regional, state and local activations are consistent, the order said. Test data must now be filed in an Electronic Test Report System that was constructed to be “a practical, accessible, and minimally burdensome tool for recording EAS dissemination data,” the order said. The data will be used for developing an FCC Mapbook for illustrating how EAS alerts are propagated throughout the country. EAS participants are also required to ensure that EAS visual messages are “readable and accessible to all members of the public,” the order said.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s proposal for changing the $1.7 billion USF Lifeline program to cover Internet access could face some resistance from FCC Republicans, industry officials told us Monday. An order and further rulemaking on Lifeline are teed up for a vote at the FCC’s June 18 meeting (see 1505280037). Wheeler proposed an examination of a cap on the program as part of the proposal circulated last week to commissioners. The Senate Communications Subcommittee plans a hearing on Lifeline Tuesday (see 1506010050) The Lifeline item is lengthy and various commissioner offices were still taking a closer look as of Monday, FCC officials said.

A significant uptick in false emergency system alerts in the past five years has resulted in a growing number of FCC EAS penalties in amounts that previously appeared only in indecency cases, said broadcast lawyer Scott Flick in a post Tuesday on Pillsbury Winthrop's blog. That day’s $1 million settlement by iHeartCommunications (see 1505190039) means the FCC has “taken five enforcement actions totaling nearly $2.5 million for misuse of EAS tones by broadcasters and cable networks” in the past six months, Flick said. While the financial penalty is noteworthy, the FCC also is attempting to eradicate copies of EAS tones before they can be used by future production staffs, he said. "Given the easy access to numerous recordings of EAS tones on the Internet, the FCC might be a bit optimistic that deleting the tone from a station’s production library will prevent a recurrence," Flick said. "It is perhaps an acknowledgement that most false EAS tone violations are the result of employees unaware of the FCC’s prohibition rather than a producer bent on violating the rule."

The House Homeland Security Committee cleared the State Wide Interoperable Communications Enhancement Act (HR-2206) and the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS) Modernization Act (HR-1738) during a markup Wednesday. The bills now move to the House floor. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., won approval for an amendment to HR-2206 that “maintains the flexibility that states need” to implement this within each state’s organization “while maintaining the intent of the bill.” Emergency Preparedness Subcommittee Chairwoman Martha McSally, R-Ariz., successfully offered an amendment in the nature of a substitute for HR-1738, which the committee posted. The amendment includes language that would ensure that under all conditions the president can alert people of hazards and adds a sunset clause for the IPAWS advisory committee, which would include the FCC chairman, McSally said during the markup. The sunset date is six years after the committee's establishment. The bill is “nearly identical” to legislation approved last Congress, which did not advance into law, McSally added. She cited support from CTIA and NAB.

IHeartCommunications agreed to pay $1 million after admitting to misusing emergency alert system tones, and will follow a compliance and reporting plan, said an FCC news release Tuesday. IHeartCommunications must remove or delete all simulated or actual EAS tones from the company’s audio production libraries, the FCC said. Oct. 24, iHeart’s WSIX(FM) Nashville aired a false emergency alert during the broadcast of the nationally syndicated The Bobby Bones Show, the agency said. While commenting on an EAS test that aired during the 2014 World Series, Bobby Bones, the show’s host, broadcast an EAS tone from a recording of an earlier nationwide EAS test, the commission said. This false tone was sent to more than 70 affiliated stations airing the show and resulted in some of these stations retransmitting the tones, setting off a cascade of false EAS alerts on radio and TV stations in multiple states, it said. IHeartMedia did not immediately return a request for comment.

An FCC order on the agenda for next Thursday’s meeting is expected to require multichannel video programming distributors to pass through a secondary audio stream of emergency alerts which appear as an on-screen crawl on TV sets to tablets and smartphones streaming MVPD content through the companies' apps, said agency officials. It's "my hope and expectation that these new rules will enable individuals who are blind or visually impaired to more quickly respond to time-sensitive emergency situations,” FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said in an April 30 blog post on the items.

Roughly a week before ATSC 3.0's framers unleash a full progress report on the next-gen DTV standard at their “Boot Camp” conference on Wednesday in Washington, ATSC Thursday said the “first ingredient” of ATSC 3.0's physical layer has reached the status of “candidate standard” following a month of balloting. The so-called “bootstrap signal” portion of the physical layer is designated “A/321 Part 1" and will be “important to the future evolution of ATSC 3.0,” ATSC said in an announcement. Other “core elements” of the physical layer, including its modulation and error correction systems, will be balloted for candidate status this summer, ATSC said. Balloting on each of ATSC 3.0's components typically will be a four-week process, ATSC has said. The bootstrap signal for ATSC 3.0 transmission will remain a candidate standard for nine months while prototype equipment is built and tested “in advance of balloting for the entire system,” ATSC said. “The bootstrap is a low-level signal that tells a receiver to decode and process wireless services multiplexed in a broadcast channel,” said ATSC President Mark Richer. “It’s designed to be a very robust signal and detectable even at low signal levels.” The bootstrap signal provides “a universal entry point into a broadcast waveform,” ATSC said. It uses a “fixed configuration” known to all receivers “and carries information to enable processing and decoding the wireless service associated with a detected bootstrap signal,” as well as a “flag” that indicates when an emergency alert is in effect, it said.