Cingular, Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel asked the FCC to turn down a plea by the Rural Telecom Group and 7 small and midsized wireless carriers that the agency undertake a formal inquiry into whether the FCC should require carriers to provide “automatic,” seamless roaming on their networks. But attorneys representing the 8 told us Mon. the issue appears to be gaining momentum at the FCC.
Howard Buskirk
Howard Buskirk, Executive Senior Editor, joined Warren Communications News in 2004, after covering Capitol Hill for Telecommunications Reports. He has covered Washington since 1993 and was formerly executive editor at Energy Business Watch, editor at Gas Daily and managing editor at Natural Gas Week. Previous to that, he was a staff reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Greenville News. Follow Buskirk on Twitter: @hbuskirk
Chmn. Martin still hasn’t started to circulate an order addressing Sprint Nextel’s failure to meet a Jan. 2005, deadline for 95% of subscribers to have location-capable handsets. Martin has circulated orders addressing failures by the other large carriers. But Sprint’s failure is tied to problems converting subscribers on Nextel’s legacy iDEN network to GPS handsets as a result of a software glitch affecting millions of Motorola iDEN phones. The FCC is still reportedly looking more closely at that. “I'm not surprised,” said a public safety source. “Sprint Nextel certainly raised more issues than some of the others.” Among the major carriers, Verizon Wireless, Sprint, Alltel and U.S. Cellular offer handset-based E-911 solutions. Cingular and T-Mobile provide a network-based E-911 solution.
The FCC could lose big when the Court of Appeals, D.C., hands down a ruling later this year in a court case filed by the American Council on Education, CompTel and various Internet and education groups, to judge from oral arguments heard Fri. They're challenging how the FCC has applied CALEA to VoIP and other Internet communications.
The FCC should dump an April 25 order setting designated entity (DE) bidding rules for an advanced wireless services (AWS) auction starting June 29, urged Council Tree Communications, the Minority Media & Telecom Council (MMTC) and Bethel Native Corp. in a Fri. petition. The DEs asked the FCC to hold the auction, but using previous auction rules.
The FCC has put on a fast-track for approval testing criteria for devices in the 5 GHz band, a proceeding that ultimately will open an additional 255 MHz of spectrum to unlicensed use including Wi-Fi. The Commission set up a lightning-fast comment period, in which all comments and replies must be completed in a total of 15 days. Rather than issue a notice of proposed rulemaking, the FCC sought comment on objections to a 2003 order that were themselves more than 2 years old.
The FTC Wed. filed federal court complaints against 5 web-based data brokers that sell confidential telephone records to 3rd parties, charging them with violating federal law. FTC sought a permanent halt to the sale of the records and asked the courts to order the data brokers to give up the money they made through the illegal operations. The FTC voted 5-0 to lodge the complaints.
Alltel likely will sit out the June FCC advanced wireless services auction, CEO Scott Ford said Wed. in a conference call with analysts on Alltel quarterly results. Ford said he questions how useful the 90 MHz of spectrum being sold would be to Alltel as it builds out its network. One byproduct of the auction is that acquisition activity in the wireless world has ground to a halt, with FCC rules limiting contact between wireless carriers going into the AWS auction.
President Bush nominated John Kneuer to become permanent NTIA dir. He has been acting dir. since Feb. Kneuer, deputy dir. under Michael Gallagher, was expected to be nominated to the post and no other strong candidate emerged (CD Feb 17 p1). He was named deputy dir. in July 2004, after having joined NTIA in Oct. 2003. Previously, Kneuer was an attorney at Piper Rudnick, exec. dir.-govt. relations at the Industrial Telecom Assn. and an attorney-adviser in the FCC Wireless Bureau. When the Senate will act on the nomination remains an open question. “Industry thinks very highly of John,” said one regulatory attorney. The source compared Kneuer with FCC nominee Robert McDowell, whose nomination has been stuck in the Senate: “Everybody likes him, too, and it doesn’t make any difference. Getting any nomination through the Senate requires a good deal of luck and having all the stars lined up.”
DoJ and the Dept. of Homeland Security asked the FCC not to require that carriers dispose of customer calling and other records after a specified date, arguing that customer proprietary network information (CPNI) is used in “virtually every federal, state, and local investigation of consequence.” Meanwhile, an industry source said, the FTC is poised to announce enforcement actions against 5 companies for selling phone records.
Ultra-wideband (UWB) chipmaker Alereon, which predicts UWB could have a breakthrough year in 2006, plans to ask the FCC for permission to transmit at higher power levels at the upper ends of the radio spectrum. Alereon, perhaps in tandem with other UWB firms, plans to ask the FCC to revisit parts of its UWB rules, Alereon CEO Eric Broockman told us. But any proposal for higher power levels for UWB is likely to be controversial.