No new laws or regulations are needed to prevent voicemail hacking in the U.S., said telecom and cable industry associations in letters released Tuesday. Reacting last month to the News Corp. phone hacking scandal in the U.K., House Commerce Subcommittee on Manufacturing Chair Mary Bono Mack, R-Calif., sent letters to the heads of USTelecom, CEA, CTIA, NCTA and the Information Technology Industry Council (CD July 19 p6) asking if it’s necessary to adopt new practices, laws or regulations to prevent phone hacks and other privacy breaches. Bono Mack “is reviewing all of the information provided in the letters and is satisfied, at this point in time, that the phone hacking scandal appears to be limited to Great Britain,” her spokesman said Tuesday.

More judges on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals should hear challenges to the FCC’s ownership rules remanded in its Prometheus Radio Project v. FCC decision, said a group of broadcasters and newspaper owners in a petition for an en banc rehearing filed with the court late Monday. In a 2-1 decision in July, a three-judge panel sent back to the FCC several rules that would have relaxed restrictions on the cross-ownership of local broadcast and daily newspaper assets in the same market (CD July 8 p3). The group includes Fox, Tribune, CBS, NAB, Newspaper Association of America, Belo, Morris Communications and Clear Channel. It said the panel’s decision goes against the court’s Administrative Procedure Act precedents and also undermines the 1996 Telecom Act by stymieing Congress’ intent to have the FCC regularly update its ownership rules. Critics of media consolidation said the petition will probably fail.

CTIA is no longer saying flatly that it will revive a legal challenge in response to a new version of a San Francisco ordinance requiring disclosures about cellphone radiation. The association is continuing to study the legal arguments, and a decision may not be made for several weeks, said John Walls, the vice president of public affairs.

The FCC will formally and finally delete mention of the Fairness Doctrine from its code of federal regulations, under an order by the Media Bureau, the FCC said Monday. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski had told House Republicans such a rule change was imminent. The change, which has no practical effect because the rule had not been enforced in 20 years, is part of a broader effort at the agency to clean up its rule books by eliminating redundant and obsolete rules. References to the FCC’s “Broadcast Flag” copy protection rules, already overturned by a court, are also set to be removed.

The FCC stopped accepting and processing applications involving TV service on channel 51, a public notice released Monday said. Those with pending Channel 51 applications for TV, low-power TV, TV Translator and Class A service will have 60 days to amend their applications and request a different channel assignment, the notice said. The FCC also said it will begin accepting petitions for rulemaking filed by full-power TV stations that want to move from Channel 51 to another frequency.

The Rural Utilities Service continues to hand out grants and loans even after the Broadband Initiatives Program (BIP) has run its course, Administrator Jonathan Adelstein said Monday during a call with reporters. Adelstein spoke as the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced $103 million in funding for 23 projects to provide broadband service to unserved and underserved rural communities.

Dish Network asked the FCC to waive integrated service rules in its purchase of S-band mobile satellite service/ancillary terrestrial component licensees TerreStar and DBSD. The request made Monday was part of Dish’s application to transfer TerreStar’s FCC licenses to Dish. Dish asked the FCC to combine its Monday filing with a previously filed application for DBSD’s licenses (CD April 12 p7). Dish is in the process of buying the MSS companies out of bankruptcy, which would give Dish 40 MHz of spectrum currently allocated for MSS/ATC use. The spectrum is also part of the 300 MHz identified in the National Broadband Plan as spectrum that could be available for broadband use within the next five years.

LightSquared presents a key early test of the Obama administration’s proposal to reallocate 500 MHz of spectrum to wireless broadband in 10 years. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski stressed in a recent briefing for reporters that any decision will be based on engineering analysis and won’t be political (CD Aug 10 p2). LightSquared demonstrates the kinds of difficulties presented by many of the bands regulators hope to convert to broadband use, said industry officials in interviews last week.

The FCC should take “swift and decisive” action to “promote universal broadband connectivity and advanced Internet protocol (IP) networks” as it moves forward on Universal Service Fund and Intercarrier compensation reform, Google, Skype, Vonage, the Ad Hoc Telecommunications Users Committee and Sprint Nextel said in a filing to the commission (http://xrl.us/bmasxm). The filing proposes its own principles for reform, starting with an argument that the legacy USF should eventually be eliminated, in favor of a new fund that pays for broadband.

Building a national wireless broadband network for public safety is the top telecom priority this fall for the Senate Commerce Committee, committee aides said. House Democratic and Republican staff, meanwhile, have continued discussions on spectrum legislation through the August recess, House officials said. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., also is closely watching the FCC as it attempts to overhaul the Universal Service Fund and the committee may have a hearing on the AT&T/T-Mobile deal, his spokeswoman said. Senate Republicans, meanwhile, are poised to move their Congressional Review Act rebuke of the FCC’s net neutrality order.