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Federal Shutdown Does Not Delay Implementation

By BBK Jan 15, 2019 | Original alert here

A pair of orders by the Tenth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in the litigation over the FCC’s controversial small cell order were issued Thursday.

• First, the court denied local government requests to stay the FCC’s small cell order pending resolution of the litigation. That means most of the FCC’s small cell order went into effect on Jan 14, 2019.

• Second, the Tenth Circuit granted local government requests to transfer the small cell order appeal back to the Ninth Circuit.

This means that both the small cell order and the FCC’s earlier moratoria order will be heard together in the Ninth Circuit. The FCC orders do not preempt state laws that may limit control over wireless facilities — both state and federal requirements apply, and if there is a conflict, the rule that most limits local authority will control.

Continue reading “New FCC Rules Take Effect, Preempting Local Authority Over Wireless Siting”

It’s the two bodies’ first conflict of the new Democrat-controlled congress.

By Makena Kelly, Jan 14, 2019 | Original Verge article here.

A recent report on wireless carrier location-tracking has sparked a growing feud between FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and the Congressional committee charged with overseeing him. Last Friday, Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) sent a letter to Pai requesting an “emergency briefing,” following reports that the nation’s largest cellphone carriers were disclosing consumers’ real-time location data. But according to Pallone, Pai has refused to hold the briefing.

Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) said:

“Today, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai refused to brief Energy and Commerce Committee staff on the real-time tracking of cell phone location . . . [We] will continue to press the FCC to prioritize public safety, national security, and protecting consumers.”

Continue reading “Ajit Pai Locks Horns with Congress Over Location-Tracking”

For the Deployment of Densified 4G and 5G Antennas in Public Rights-of-Way

H.R.530 – To provide that certain actions by the Federal Communications Commission shall have no force or effect

• https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/530/text
• https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/530/all-actions
• 1/14/2019 — Introduced in House
• 1/14/2019 — Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce
• Sponsor — Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA-18)
• Co-Sponsor — Rep. Jackie Speier, (D-CA-14)

Press Release January 15th, 2019 | Original here.

Update: We received the bill text for HR.530 text directly from Eshoo’s office: 2019-0114-HR-530.pdf

"Actions by the Federal Communications Commission in ‘Accelerating Wireless and Wireline Broadband Deployment by Removing Barriers to Infrastructure Investment’ (FCC 18–133 and 83 Fed. Reg. 51867) and the Federal Communications Commission’s Declaratory Ruling in ‘Third Report and Order and Declaratory Ruling’’ (FCC 18–111) shall have no force or effect.’

WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Jan 14, 2019, Congresswoman Anna G. Eshoo (CA-18) introduced H.R. 530, the Accelerating Wireless Broadband Development by Empowering Local Communities Act of 2019, legislation to overturn Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations limiting the ability of local governments to regulate the deployment of 5G wireless infrastructure.

Continue reading “Rep. Anna Eshoo Introduces Legislation To Restore Local Control”

By Jon Brodkin, Jan 14, 2018 | Original ARS Technica article here.

Remind — the company that offers the classroom communication service — says it must end free texts for Verizon users because of new fee.

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A free texting service used by teachers, students, and parents may stop working on the Verizon Wireless network because of a dispute over texting fees that Verizon demanded from the company that operates the service. As a result, teachers that use the service have been expressing their displeasure with Verizon.

Remind — the company that offers the classroom communication service — criticized Verizon for charging the new fee. Remind said its service’s text message notifications will stop working on the Verizon network on January 28 unless Verizon changes course. (Notifications sent via email or via Remind’s mobile apps will continue to work.)

The controversy cropped up shortly after a Federal Communications Commission decision that allowed US carriers’ text-messaging services to remain largely unregulated.

Remind said in a notice to users:

"To offer our text-messaging service free of charge, Remind has always paid for each text that users receive or send. Now, Verizon is charging Remind an additional fee intended for companies that send spam over its network. Your Remind messages aren’t spam, but that hasn’t helped resolve the issue with Verizon. The fee will increase our cost of supporting text messaging to at least 11 times our current cost — forcing us to end free Remind text messaging for the more than 7 million students, parents, and educators who have Verizon Wireless as their carrier."

Continue reading “Verizon Charges New Fee for Texts Sent from Teachers to Students”

Posted Jan. 11, 2019 | Adapated from the original Bloomberg Law article here

A challenge by dozens of cities and counties to a Federal Communications Commission order aimed at speeding up the deployment of densified 4G and 5G network infrastructure is back in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit on Jan. 10 granted a bid by San Jose, Calif. and other local governments to transfer the case to where they had originally sued. The court also denied their bid to stay the FCC’s order pending the litigation, though that issue could be taken up by the Ninth Circuit. Portions of the order is set to take effect in part on Jan. 14, but the FCC has been shutdown since Jan 2, 2019, so the Jan 14 effective date is not crystal clear,

The transfer is “huge news,” Robert (Tripp) May, counsel for the League of California Cities and several other local government petitioners, told Bloomberg Law Jan. 11.

May, a telecom partner at Telecom Law Firm PC in San Diego, said:

“Between the two, I would take the transfer over the stay seven days a week. Petitioners now can ask the Ninth Circuit to halt the order, even after it takes effect."

Continue reading “Challenge to FCC Order to Streamline 4G and 5G Infrastructure Moves to Ninth Circuit”

Jan 11, 2018 — by Charles T. Harry, Associate Research Professor of Public Policy; Director of Operations, Maryland Global Initiative in Cybersecurity; Senior Research Associate, Center for International and Security Studies, University of Maryland | Original article here.

As Americans increasingly buy and install smart devices in their homes, all those cheap interconnected devices create new security problems for individuals and society as a whole. The problem is compounded by businesses radically expanding the number of sensors and remote monitors it uses to manage overhead lights in corporate offices and detailed manufacturing processes in factories. Governments, too, are getting into the act – cities, especially, want to use new technologies to improve energy efficiency, reduce traffic congestion and improve water quality.

The number of these “internet of things” devices is climbing into the tens of billions. They’re creating an interconnected world with the potential to make people’s lives more enjoyable, productive, secure and efficient. But those very same devices, many of which have no real security protections, are also becoming part of what are called “botnets,” vast networks of tiny computers vulnerable to hijacking by hackers.

Continue reading “The Quiet Threat Inside Internet of Things Devices”

Limited oversight, no competition, and state corruption aren’t a recipe for broadband success.

by Karl Bode Jan 10, 2018 | Original Motherboard article here.

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Once as important as the American railroad and electrical grid, American phone companies aren’t quite what they used to be. With the use of copper-based landlines having plummeted the last few years, many of the nation’s phone companies have attempted to shift their business models toward new, more profitable sectors like video advertising.

The problem: many of their aging fixed-line networks were not only built on the backs of billions in taxpayer subsidies, they’re very much still in use — and for many, slow, expensive DSL is the only broadband available. But with no local competition and local and federal oversight eroded by lobbying — many of these companies have simply stopped caring.

Case in point: Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson last week released a scathing 133-page report highlighting how the state’s incumbent phone company, Frontier Communications, has increasingly refused to upgrade its aging network, often taking months to make repairs, putting those with medical conditions at risk.

The state Attorney General said:

“The findings of this investigation detail an extraordinary situation, where customers have suffered with outages of months, or more, when the law requires telephone utilities to make all reasonable efforts to prevent interruptions of service. Frontier customers with these outages include those with family members with urgent medical needs, such as pacemakers monitored by their medical teams via the customer’s landline.”

Continue reading “American Telecom Companies Are Letting Their Phone Networks Fall Apart”

— and Why America Might Miss It.

This is adapted from an article by Michael Hiltzik, Jan 9, 2019 | Original Los Angeles Times article here

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In late 2017, Susan Crawford was visiting Seoul, South Korea, about six months before it hosted the 2018 Winter Olympics. Although she is an expert in telecommunications policy, Crawford was stunned at what she witnessed in Korea, which she describes as “the most wired nation on the planet” — flawless cellphone coverage even in rural areas, real-time data transmission, driverless buses using the latest communications technology to smoothly avoid pedestrians and evade obstructions.

Crawford told me recently

“I’ve never been embarrassed to be American before, but when Korean people tell you that going to America is like taking a rural vacation, it really makes you stop and worry about what we’re up to.”

Crawford, who teaches at Harvard Law School, has assembled her observations of these problems, along with suggestions how to alleviate them, in a new book published this week entitled “Fiber: The Coming Tech Revolution — and Why America Might Miss It.” it’s a follow-up to her 2013 book “Captive Audience,” which warned that the nation’s global leadership in internet technology was being frittered away by placing tech policy in the hands of profit-seeking companies with no incentive to keep the U.S. on the leading edge.

It may sound paradoxical, but. . .

The future of advanced wired and wireless services depends completely on how much fiber is in place — it all depends on wires laid by our nearly-forgotten State Public Telecom Utilities.

The data-carrying capacity of the next generation of wireless, labeled as “5G” (as the fifth generation of wireless telecommunications technology), will give countries that invest in the fiber that powers these advanced networks a huge advantage over those that don’t. It’s 100 times faster than the existing 4G technology and far more capacious, allowing simultaneous connections of billions of devices.

Continue reading “Fiber is the Coming Tech Revolution”

Internal documents obtained by Motherboard show that the company is preparing for layoffs—megamergers, deregulation, and tax breaks aren’t providing the public benefits AT&T promised.

by Karl Bode, Jan 8, 2018 | Original Motherboard article here.

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AT&T is preparing for yet another significant round of layoffs, according to internal documents obtained by Motherboard. The staff reductions come despite billions in tax breaks and regulatory favors AT&T promised would dramatically boost both investment and job creation.

A source at AT&T who asked to remain anonymous because they were not authorized to speak publicly told Motherboard that company leadership is planning what it’s calling a “geographic rationalization” and employment “surplus” reduction that will consolidate some aspects of AT&T operations in 10 major operational hubs in New York, California, Texas, New Jersey, Washington State, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, and Washington, DC. A spokesperson for AT&T confirmed to Motherboard that it is planning to “adjust” its workforce.

Continue reading “AT&T Preps for New Layoffs Despite Billions in Tax Breaks and Regulatory Favors”

By Joseph Cox, Jan 8 2019 | Original Motherboard article here

T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T are selling access to their customers’ location data, and that data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters and others not authorized to possess it, letting them track most phones in the country.

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Nervously, I gave a bounty hunter a phone number. He had offered to geolocate a phone for me, using a shady, overlooked service intended not for the cops, but for private individuals and businesses. Armed with just the number and a few hundred dollars, he said he could find the current location of most phones in the United States.

The bounty hunter sent the number to his own contact, who would track the phone. The contact responded with a screenshot of Google Maps, containing a blue circle indicating the phone’s current location, approximate to a few hundred meters.

Queens, New York. More specifically, the screenshot showed a location in a particular neighborhood—just a couple of blocks from where the target was. The hunter had found the phone (the target gave their consent to Motherboard to be tracked via their T-Mobile phone.)

The bounty hunter did this all without deploying a hacking tool or having any previous knowledge of the phone’s whereabouts. Instead, the tracking tool relies on real-time location data sold to bounty hunters that ultimately originated from the telcos themselves, including T-Mobile, AT&T, and Sprint, a Motherboard investigation has found. These surveillance capabilities are sometimes sold through word-of-mouth networks.

Continue reading “I Gave a Bounty Hunter $300 and He Located Our Phone”