CTIA urged the FCC to put the onus on covered service providers (CSPs) rather than originating service providers (OSPs) if the agency imposes 988 outage reporting obligations, the subject of a January NPRM (see 2301040056). “As 988 communications are routed centrally to a single, nationwide response point, unlike 911 communications, which are routed to local Public Safety Answering Points, it is unclear how OSPs could provide actionable information about local outages to the nationwide 988 Lifeline or other stakeholders,” CTIA said, in comments posted Tuesday in docket 23-5. AT&T agreed rules “must reflect the fundamental differences in service architecture between 911 and 988.” Competitive Carriers Association members don’t “oppose some level of 988 outage reporting and notification,” but also don’t “support duplicative or potentially confusing efforts,” CCA said: If the FCC imposes a 988 outage notification requirement on OSPs, “in many cases, a 30-minute timeframe would be unreasonable and unrealistic, particularly for OSPs utilizing vendors for 988 solutions. Any 988 outage reporting requirement should enable realistic compliance.” The National Emergency Number Association said the FCC rightly proposes rules based on 911 outage reporting requirements approved last year (see 2211170051). The FCC should also require that PSAPs be alerted of 988 outages, NENA said: “If 988 service is not available to a person having a mental health crisis, and they do not have knowledge of an alternative means such as dedicated online chat services, then they may decide to dial 9-1-1 instead.” The group said the 988 system should plan to eventually migrate to next-generation 911 technologies “as a matter of building a more reliable, equitable life-saving service for people with mental health crises.”
It’s getting more difficult for telecom companies to maintain cybersecurity insurance due to the constant barrage of ransomware attacks, NTCA General Counsel Jill Canfield said Tuesday. She highlighted some of the cyber hurdles telecoms face, during an FCBA webinar. If a company has more than one insurance claim a year, the insurance provider will start denying claims, and it’s not easy to find a new provider, she said. Itron Privacy Counsel Nicole Thomas agreed, saying threat actors are going to continue to attack due to the profitability of ransomware efforts.
FCC proposals for improving emergency alert system reliability “are not tailored to the size, resources, or capabilities of EAS Participants,” said NCTA, ACA Connects, National Public Radio and NAB in meetings this week with aides to Commissioners Brendan Carr, Geoffrey Starks and Nathan Simington, said an ex parte filing posted Thursday in docket 15-94. The FCC “relies on fairly scant evidence of cybersecurity incidents or EAS equipment failures to justify the far-reaching proposals,” the filing said. The agency also underestimated the resources required for entities to comply with the proposals, the filing said. “Most EAS Participants have no in-house cybersecurity expertise, and therefore would likely require extensive -- and expensive -- assistance from outside consultants to translate the FCC’s broad and vague requirements into an actionable plan,” the filing said. The recently enacted Cyber Incident Reporting for Critical Infrastructure Act of 2022 designated the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) as the lead federal agency on cybersecurity incident reporting, the filing said. “It would be premature, and potentially duplicative and counter-productive for the Commission to create a cyber-related incident reporting scheme before CISA completes its proceeding,” the groups said.
FCC commissioners made numerous tweaks to a wireless emergency alerts Further NPRM on the way to approval last week (see 2304200040), based on a side-by-side comparison with the draft. The FNPRM was published in Monday’s “Daily Digest.” Comment deadlines will be set in a Federal Register notice. Commissioner Brendan Carr warned last week that revised rules shouldn’t prompt providers to opt out of the WEA program.
Despite considerable lobbying from some satellite operators for a different time frame, the FCC stuck with a 10-year sunset for interference protections in its order and NPRM passed 4-0 Thursday regarding spectrum sharing procedures among non-geostationary orbit (NGSO) fixed satellite systems (FSS) approved in different processing rounds. The commissioners at their open meeting also unanimously adopted a framework for requiring companies to renew their Section 214 authorizations to provide international telecommunications services to and from the U.S. and an order expanding its access stimulation rules to traffic that terminates through IP enabled service providers, as well as receiver standard and wireless emergency alert items (see 2304200040).
The FCC approved 4-0 Thursday “high-level principles” for spectrum management, focused on receivers. Industry observers say the effects could be limited (see 2304050046). Commissioners at the open meeting also approved a Further NPRM looking at more requirements for wireless emergency alerts, as expected (see 2304190027), which has proven more controversial.
An FCC Further NPRM examining numerous enhancements for wireless emergency alerts is expected to be approved with limited tweaks at the commissioners' open meeting Thursday (see 2303300070), agency and industry officials said. Other wireless items, including receiver principles, are expected to be approved with minimal changes.
LAS VEGAS -- ATSC 3.0 could be used to create the only viable backup for GPS and address a major U.S. national security vulnerability, said broadcasters and experts at this week's 2023 NAB Show. The U.S. power grid, financial markets and telecom industries rely on precise timing based on GPS to function, and would grind to a halt within days if it were rendered inoperable, said Key2Mobile founder Patrick Diamond, a member of the National Space Based Position, Navigation and Timing Advisory Board.
Federal Emergency Management Agency Integrated Public Alert & Warning System (FEMA IPAWS) staff endorsed an NAB proposal to allow broadcasters to replace physical emergency alert system equipment with software, NAB and broadcasters New York Public Radio, iHeartMedia, Cox Media Group, Graham Media and Capitol Broadcasting told the FCC Public Safety Bureau in a meeting Tuesday, according to an ex parte filing in docket 15-94. The shift to software would reduce the time to repair equipment and install security patches, NAB said. The software "would still operate if Internet or cloud connectivity is interrupted,” the filing said: “NAB is not advocating a fully cloud-based approach.” The broadcasters also told the agency they're “agnostic” on the development of such software. “We anticipate, and would likely prefer, that the current vendors of EAS equipment take the lead in such an effort, because this would allow industry to reap the benefits of their experience and expertise in this somewhat niche area of technology,” the filing said.
The Democratic Party of Wisconsin filed a complaint at the FCC Saturday against the state Republican Party for allegedly distributing a video promoting Supreme Court candidate Daniel Kelly using a text message that looks like an emergency alert. The election has been hotly contested and has gotten national coverage. “The audio began with a series of tones substantially similar to the Common Audio Alert Signal as defined in 10 CFR § 10.520” and transmittal of such audio is a “violation of 10 CFR 10.520(d)(2), which not only prohibits unauthorized use of the Common Audio Alert Signal, but unauthorized use of a ‘simulation’ of such a signal,” the complaint said. False use of emergency alert system codes or wireless emergency alert attention signals “may be considered a ‘false distress signal,’ which is prohibited under 47 U.S. Code § 325,” the complaint said: “The FCC has broad jurisdiction to investigate and remediate offenses under both of the sections cited above, and has proposed or imposed substantial forfeitures for those violations.” The state Republican Party didn’t immediately comment Monday.