The FCC certainly is keeping busy this fall. After six months of mulling it over, commission chairman Tom Wheeler announced today that the final version of a privacy rule that would limit what your broadband carrier can do with your personal data is in fact real and on the agenda for the FCC’s October meeting later this month. [More]
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FCC Delays Vote On Set-Top Box Proposal
By 9.29.16 — Updated: 10.3.16
After much hullaballoo and a number of eleventh-hour political plays, the FCC has scrapped its plan to vote today on a proposal that would upend the cable set-top box marketplace. [More]
Ahead Of Tomorrow’s Vote, Several Senators Urge FCC To Approve Set-Top Box Plan
By 9.28.16
Tomorrow, at its monthly open meeting, the FCC will be voting on the most controversial rule it’s undertaken this year: whether, and how, to let consumers get out of paying their cable company a fee every month for mandatory set-top boxes. [More]
Listen To This Creepy Robocall & See Why 750K People Want Free Robo-Blocking Tools
By 9.27.16
As if auto-dialed, pre-recorded robocalls weren’t bad enough, scammers are now blasting out robocalls that use poorly synthesized text-to-talk programs in an effort to try to frighten people into thinking they are being sued. [More]
Advocates, Lawmakers, Even Best Buy Call On FCC To Approve Cable Box Plan
By 9.27.16
The Federal Communications Commission has been stewing over a proposal that would shake up the cable set-top box market for months. They’ve got a vote on the final proposal coming up this week, but in the face of partisan bickering and opposition from the cable industry, the matter has become controversial. So today, a whole passel of folks called on the FCC to approve the measure ASAP, for consumers’ sake. [More]
How Much Control Do You Actually Have Over Your Private Data?
By 9.20.16
“Privacy” is the buzz of our era, but… what even is privacy? Different consumers, businesses, and regulators each have their own definitions and perspectives on the issue, while the law, too, is always evolving. [More]
FCC Explains Cable Set-Top Box Proposal, Everything Else It Does To Senate (Again)
By 9.15.16
Election years beget a compressed Congressional schedule. The House and Senate just got back to work in D.C. after a six-week break, and will be taking another six-week break as soon as we hit October 1 (picking up again after the election), so everything the committees want to do has to get done now. Like bringing in all five FCC commissioners for another episode of everyone’s favorite series, The FCC Explains And Defends Literally Everything It’s Doing. [More]
Do You Have A Cable Box Horror Story? Tell Us All About It
September 14, 2016
Between the FCC’s efforts to reform the set-top box market and the cable industry’s thinly veiled threats of litigation — not to mention divided opinions on the issue on Capitol Hill — the old cable box is a big topic of conversation these days. And while much of the focus has been on the billions of dollars the cable and satellite companies make from monthly lease fees on these devices, we’d like to hear from people who have had to go toe-to-toe with their pay-TV provider over their set-top boxes. [More]
Comcast Already Crying That FCC Set-Top Box Proposal Violates Federal Law
By 9.8.16
Within minutes of FCC Chair Tom Wheeler unveiling his final proposal for reforming the multibillion-dollar set-top box market, Comcast was already firing back, accusing the Commission of violating the law and hinting at a legal challenge to come. [More]
Final FCC Set-Top Box Proposal: Free Apps And Integrated Search For All
By 9.8.16
Remember how earlier this week the rumor mill had it that the FCC’s long-awaited final set-top box proposal was due out this week? The gossips were right; chairman Tom Wheeler’s office circulated it today. [More]
FCC Chair On 5G Future: “You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet.”
By 9.7.16
If you’re the wireless industry, you have to pay attention to the FCC. Everything it does determines everything you can do. So it’s not surprising that at the industry’s big annual event today, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler would take the stage for a keynote. And in that speech, he brought together a whole bunch of different FCC actions into one whole picture of what he hopes the communications future can be. [More]
Revised FCC Set-Top Box Proposal Inches Closer To Reality
By 9.6.16
Early this year, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler put forth a proposal: how about doing away with those set-top boxes you’re required to rent, for lots of money, in order to watch pay-TV? After all, it’s 2016, surely we can do better? Naturally, the suggestion became an instant political football. But after seven months of working it out, the rumor mill says a compromise is on its way. [More]
Court Throws Out Federal Government’s Lawsuit Over AT&T “Unlimited” Data Plans
By 8.30.16
Nearly two years ago, the Federal Trade Commission sued AT&T for allegedly misleading wireless customers by charging them for “unlimited” data plans while simultaneously throttling their cellular connection speeds when they passed certain monthly thresholds. AT&T failed in 2015 to get the case dismissed in District Court, but yesterday succeeded in convincing a federal appeals court to throw out the government’s complaint. [More]
AT&T: FCC Has “No Legal Or Factual Basis” To Issue Us Fine For Overcharging Schools
By 8.29.16
Back in July, the FCC accused AT&T of badly overcharging some Florida schools for their telecom service. AT&T fired back that the FCC’s claims were meritless and that it looked forward to fighting. AT&T is in this at least as good as its word, and has filed its reply. [More]
FCC’s Robocall Strike Force Kicks Into Action Today
By 8.19.16
Last month, after FCC Chair Tom Wheeler called on the telecom industry to finally do something about the nuisance of pre-recorded, auto-dialed robocalls, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson agreed to head up a joint private-public Robocall Strike Force tasked with actually doing something about these calls. Today, this elite squad of telephonic titans is meeting for the first time. [More]
What You Need To Know About New Rules Allowing Debt Collection Robocalls From Feds
By 8.11.16
If you ask any American to name the things they love the most, they are sure to reply, “debt collectors, intrusive pre-recorded phone calls, and the federal government!” So today — under orders to do so from a piece of rushed, tacked-on legislation — the Federal Communications Commission released its final rules allowing the federal government and some of its contractors to make debt-collection robocalls to wireless lines. [More]
Appeals Court: Municipal Internet Is Great, But States Can Still Restrict Access
By 8.10.16 — Updated: 1.25.17
More than a dozen states have laws that either prohibit counties and cities from operating their own broadband internet networks, selling service directly to consumers, or expanding their service behind a prescribed footprint. In 2015, the FCC voted to preempt two of these laws — in Tennessee and North Carolina — but this morning a federal appeals court says the FCC lacks the legal authority to do so. [More]
FCC, Historic Preservation Groups Agree To Speed Up This Whole 5G Deployment Thing
By 8.9.16
For an agency that telecom companies like to lambaste as old-fashioned, out-of-touch, and wedded to the past, the FCC sure is speeding up full-tilt into the future. To wit: the Commission is streamlining a bunch of regulations to make it as easy as possible to build 5G networks as fast as possible. [More]
