Forty-six organizations and individuals filed comments with NTIA on how to prevent botnets and other automated threats, with many backing more government-industry collaboration (see 1707280030). Google and Alphabet's Nest Labs said they use security practices for their connected devices such as security by design, strong authentication and password practices, encryption, network security, automatic software updates and bug bounty programs. Microsoft described the work its digital crimes unit does with public and private sector partners to disrupt botnet operations and what the company does to improve hardware and software security. The Information Technology Industry Council said new IoT device makers such as startups may not be using best practices for secure device development and other cybersecurity approaches. ITI said barriers to the movement of global data could impede cyberthreat information sharing, citing as problematic 2013 changes to the Wassenaar Arrangement export control rules (see 1702130031). ACT|The App Association said law enforcement plays a vital role in preventing and mitigating attacks, requiring "close coordination" between U.S. and foreign governments and upfront forensic analysis. It said DOJ's position on law enforcement access to data stored abroad isn't aligned with U.S. law and "guaranteed rights" and this undermines the international rule of law, calling for more streamlined processes. NCTA said NTIA should push for a more "holistic approach" to fighting such threats, including application of artificial intelligence and adoption of mutually agreed norms for routing security. USTelecom supports principles for cybersecurity policymaking: private sector leadership and market-driven innovation; a dynamic flexible approach to security; shared responsibility among internet and communications stakeholders, government and consumers; and "active partnership against bad actors, not top-down government requirements."

The repacking priority window for stations that need changes to their post-incentive auction channel assignments will be Aug. 9-Sept. 8, said the Incentive Auction Task Force and Media Bureau in a public notice Monday. The first priority window is also for stations that experienced a population loss of more than 1 percent due to the repacking and Class A stations that weren't protected in the incentive auction, the PN said. Twenty-five stations told the FCC they can’t construct facilities for the channel assignments they have received for the repacking, the IATF said (see 1707130060). After the priority window, the estimated cost of the repacking could decline, the IATF said, as the current figure includes price estimates for eight of the stations that have said their channel assignment needs to be changed. A move to a new channel could change the repacking costs for such stations, the IATF has said.

The FCC failed to reply to a pair of Freedom of Information Act requests on electronic comment filing system problems in May that the agency said was due to a directed denial of service attack (see 1705090063), investigative journalist Kevin Collier said in a complaint (in Pacer) filed Wednesday with U.S. District Court in Brooklyn. Collier in his suit said he filed FOIA requests in May for records on the DDoS attack and the agency's analysis of astroturf anti-net neutrality comments, but it never provided or formally denied the documents. The FCC didn't comment.

Correction: The venue of the Wireless Infrastructure Association’s "HetNet Expo" Oct. 10-11 is the Palm Beach County Convention Center, West Palm Beach: here.

Comcast and others opposed an Incompas motion to modify FCC protective orders for reviews of past transactions. Incompas, which represents "direct competitors to Comcast," filed a motion asking that “interested commenters” in the open internet rulemaking "be permitted to review and use vast amounts of confidential and highly confidential information and data from those concluded adjudicatory proceedings, which it contends will 'strengthen the debate' and lead to a 'better' general rulemaking here," said a Comcast filing Thursday in docket 17-108. The motion "lacks merit and is an obvious -- and improper -- procedural tactic designed to delay and muddy consideration of the legal and policy issues relevant to the Commission’s [NPRM]." The transactions were: Charter Communications buying Time Warner Cable and Advance-Newhouse; Comcast/Time Warner Cable (which wasn't consummated); AT&T/DirecTV; Comcast/General Electric's NBC Universal. The "frivolous" Incompas motion appears "to be an improper end run around the protective orders governing the confidential materials at issue here," said an AT&T opposition posted Friday: "Both in-house and outside counsel in the merger proceedings at issue -- including INCOMPAS -- signed protective orders providing that 'Reviewing Parties ... agree ... not to use Confidential or Highly Confidential Information to seek disclosure in any other proceeding.' INCOMPAS' 'limited' motion requesting very specific and targeted categories of previously submitted documents and data raises serious questions as to whether INCOMPAS and its counsel are in fact 'us[ing]' the confidential materials they obtained as the basis for 'seek[ing] disclosure' in this quite different rulemaking proceeding." Charter also filed opposition. Incompas didn't comment.

The vacant channel proposal supported by Microsoft is “an affront” to the FCC’s work on the incentive auction, said America’s Public Television Stations in a letter posted last week in docket 12-268. Reserving vacant channels for unlicensed spectrum “would be potentially devastating to public television and its viewers in this country,” APTS said. “Nothing about this proposal is in the public interest, and the Commission should reject it outright.” Awarding Microsoft free spectrum would “further congest the broadcast spectrum, where hundreds of existing public television translators are hoping to repack,” APTS said. Microsoft didn’t comment. NAB also sent a letter to the FCC on the vacant channel proposal, attaching a Wired column penned by Obama administration tech adviser Susan Crawford (see 1707270032) that criticizes Microsoft’s intentions. “The article suggests that Microsoft’s focus on rural broadband is solely a political strategy designed to curry favor among domestic policymakers,” NAB said.

The Wright Petitioners asked for en banc review of a panel ruling that reversed key FCC inmate calling service pricing decisions, including intrastate rate caps, in a 2015 order (see 1706130047). A divided three-judge's panel's opinion "is at odds with fundamental Chevron principles and conflicts with decisions of the Supreme Court and this Circuit," said the inmate family advocates' petition (in Pacer) for rehearing en banc by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in Global Tel*Link v. FCC, No. 15-1461. The panel "struck down FCC regulations designed to rein in monopoly-fueled overcharges for prison inmates’ telephone calls that often constitute the only contact between incarcerated individuals and their families," the petition said Friday. "The panel did so on the basis of its de novo interpretation of the governing statute, refusing, except on one issue, to defer to the FCC’s longstanding statutory interpretations in a notice-and-comment rulemaking. This was not because the interpretations were unreasonable, or because the Commission had rescinded its decision, but because the agency’s Deputy General Counsel represented in a letter to the Court that a majority of the Commission no longer supported all of the issues as briefed. ... Courts review decisions, not letters from counsel." The FCC didn't comment. "Given the history of stays in this proceedings, the FCC’s stance on the crucial issues, and the straight forward arguments presented, this seems a real long shot," NARUC General Counsel Brad Ramsay told us. The Wright Petitioners had said they planned to file the petition when they asked the D.C. Circuit to delay consideration of an industry challenge to a 2016 FCC reconsideration order that revised ICS rates (see 1707140044).

The FCC will mark the Sept. 11 anniversary of the 2001 attacks on New York and Washington with a workshop on best practices for improving situational awareness during 911 outages, said a Thursday notice. The workshop “will include how to strengthen Public Safety Answering Point 911 service outage notifications and how to best communicate with consumers about alternative methods of accessing emergency services,” it said. The Public Safety Bureau will host the event Sept. 11 in the Commission Meeting Room. More details, including the start time, will be revealed later.

The FCC is moving forward on issues important for the deaf and hard of hearing, but regulation often isn't the answer, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai told a Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Inc. (TDI) meeting in Bethesda, Maryland, Thursday: “Advancing the public interest doesn’t always require adopting new rules.” A key to disability access is encouraging the telecom industry to make “accessibility a priority, rather than an afterthought,” he said. One of the most “encouraging developments” is that devices like smartphones have begun incorporating accessibility principles “from the get-go,” Pai said. “Accessibility by design helps those with disabilities stay as current as everyone else when digital, Internet, mobile, and other technologies are developed. It’s also so much easier and cheaper than retrofitting products after the fact.” Pai reflected on how much things have changed since 1968, when TDI launched: “You were using 18-wheelers to schlep discarded teletypewriters that weighed hundreds of pounds to the homes of deaf and hard-of-hearing people. You were doing it so that your community could have telephone access, which everyone else had been enjoying for decades.” Today, people have “mini-computers that fit in our pockets,” he said. Two years ago, then-Chairman Tom Wheeler spoke to TDI (see 1508200044) at its last major meeting. Pai’s comments were later posted.

We had limited access to new substantive filings on the FCC Electronic Comment Filing System Thursday. The FCC didn't comment. The system has been slowed due to large numbers of open internet public comments the past couple of weeks, and had a major backlog last weekend (see 1707240070).