Russia export controls and sanctions

U.S. ISPs face a bigger cybersecurity threat today because nations representing that threat work together like never before, Wilkinson Barker’s Clete Johnson said Wednesday. Other experts said cybersecurity plans are rightly a requirement of receiving funding under the $42.5 billion broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program.

ATLANTA -- The U.S. is taking an increasingly hard line against all connected Chinese and Russian devices, not just those from particular manufacturers such as Huawei, cybersecurity expert Clete Johnson told attendees at SCTE's annual TechExpo Wednesday. Meanwhile, cable providers at TechExpo discussed why it's imperative that there is better convergence in wireline and mobile services.

The satellite industry faces an electric propulsion thruster supply bottleneck, with the largest producer -- Russia's EDB Fakel -- banned from Western supply chains and numerous other EP vendors unable to fill the gap, Quilty Space's Caleb Henry wrote Monday. "As it turns out, [EP] thrusters, especially the Hall-Effect thrusters [proliferated low earth orbit] operators fancy, are extremely hard to manufacture at scale," he said. While several U.S. companies have developed Hall-Effect thrusters of their own or licensed the technology, almost all are still struggling to scale production after years of effort, he said.

The growing pace of launches in the U.S. is stressing launch site capabilities, particularly Florida's Cape Canaveral, launch operators said Wednesday at a U.S. Chamber of Commerce aerospace conference in Washington. Meanwhile, FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said SpaceX could pose a monopolistic threat in commercial space and that more competition is needed. In addition, the FAA was criticized for its launch regulatory regime.

Ukraine’s Military Institute of Telecommunications and Information Technology, which suffered a Russian missile attack Tuesday killing more than 50 people according to media reports, provides telecom education to military and nonmilitary students in the central Ukrainian city of Poltava. The institute offers education in information and cybersecurity, information systems and technologies and telecom and radio engineering, based on the institute’s website.

The FCC has determined that cybersecurity and anti-virus software that Russia’s Kaspersky Lab produced or provided poses “an unacceptable risk to the national security” of the U.S. and should be on the agency’s covered list of unsafe products, a Tuesday notice said. Any gear “that integrates cybersecurity or anti-virus software produced or provided by Kaspersky, or any of its successors or assignees, is prohibited from obtaining an equipment authorization from the Commission,” said the notice by the Office of Engineering and Technology and Public Safety Bureau. Kaspersky was initially added to the list in 2022 (see 2203270001).

Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Ted Cruz, R-Texas, criticized the Department of Transportation Thursday night for seeking to zero federal funding for the Maritime Administration’s Cable Security Fleet program in its FY 2025 appropriations request. Congress allocated $10 million for the program in FY 2024. “Congress created the CSF Program through the” FY 2020 National Defense Authorization Act “to ensure a domestic capability to maintain and repair undersea cables,” Cruz said in a letter to Maritime Administration head Rear Admiral Ann Phillips. He said the program requires the administration to contract with privately owned U.S.-flagged cable vessels in “times of national emergency. The security of undersea cables depends on having access to these ‘trusted’ ships for maintenance and repair of cables, rather than relying on foreign-flagged repair ships sometimes owned by foreign adversaries, which may be recalled to their home countries or otherwise pose risks and reliability concerns during conflict.” The “request to zero out the CSF program is puzzling considering the uptick in threats to undersea cables,” including from China and Russia, Cruz said: “U.S. officials have raised concerns that foreign cable repair ships -- on which we will further rely absent the CSF program -- pose a security threat because underwater cables are vulnerable to tampering. Specifically, other countries could tap undersea data streams, conduct reconnaissance on U.S. military communication links, or steal valuable intellectual property used in cable equipment.”

The mega constellation boom -- and satellites' maneuvering capabilities -- demonstrates the need for a global system of information sharing among satellite operators, according to Richard DalBello, director of Commerce's Office of Space Commerce. He spoke Tuesday during a Politico space commerce event. At the same event, Sens. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., and Jerry Moran, R-Kan., warned about increased space threats the U.S. faces, particularly from China and Russia.

House Democrats rang alarm bells Wednesday over the Appropriations Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies (CJS) Subcommittee’s proposal reducing FY 2025 allocations for NTIA and other Commerce Department agencies. The subpanel advanced its FY25 bill on a voice vote Wednesday after Republicans defended the proposed cuts, including a significant slashing of annual funding for the DOJ Antitrust Division. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo fielded repeated questions during a House Innovation Subcommittee hearing Wednesday about Republicans’ claims that NTIA’s requirement that broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program participants offer a low-cost connectivity option constitutes rate regulation.

Group of Seven members are focused on Chinese investment in Western telecommunications networks because they're concerned with Beijing’s access to company data, Anne Neuberger, White House deputy national security adviser-cyber and emerging technology, said Tuesday.