Jimm Phillips

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., said Tuesday he was considering a bill that would stop an FCC NPRM that would propose to give airlines leeway to allow in-flight use of cellphones for text, data and voice. (See separate report below in this issue.) The backlash from Congress, some in the airline industry and members of the public began last week when the FCC said it would vote on the NPRM at its Dec. 12 meeting. Chairman Tom Wheeler has since said the NPRM would allow further in-flight cellphone use but wouldn’t mandate it, leaving the decision with the airlines (CD Nov 25 p1). Former FCC officials and communications industry groups tell us they believe the agency is justified in pursuing a possible rule change given recent technological advances -- and that Wheeler and the FCC shouldn’t remove the NPRM from its agenda because of recent public criticism. They also say Wheeler won’t likely back down.

NTIA said in a letter to the FCC Monday it “fully supports” the Department of Defense’s sharing proposal to partially vacate the 1755-1780 MHz band, and it laid out a specific plan to change allocations in the 2025-2110 MHz band to make the plan work. NTIA’s plan reflects an agreement between DOD and NAB in which DOD agreed to work around broadcaster needs, an NTIA official said during a background briefing with reporters. DOD agreed in July to move some of its operations to the 2025 MHz band in order to free up the 1755 MHz band for commercial use, but discussions between the department and NAB broke down because CTIA wanted to reallocate 15 MHz of the 2025 MHz band to its members. Talks later resumed after CTIA said it would not push for reallocation on the 2025 MHz band (CD Oct 30 p2). The agreement is an outgrowth of those renewed negotiations, the NTIA official said.

The Department of Defense believes coordination of spectrum sharing in the 3.5 GHz band presents an opportunity to improve spectrum sharing efforts “across the board,” said Fred Moorefield, director-spectrum, policy and programs for DOD’s Office of the Chief Information Officer, at an FCBA event Thursday night. Sharing on the 3.5 GHz band will be one of the first indications of how spectrum sharing “is going to work on this type of scale,” Moorefield said. DOD is “really trying to help” the FCC and NTIA coordinate sharing on the band, which DOD has said it will need to use for radar services for the foreseeable future, he said. DOD will reflect its willingness to cooperate when it releases its spectrum strategy Dec. 11, Moorefield said. The spectrum strategy will focus on “adaptability, flexibility, resiliency, maneuverability, technology and more spectrum sharing both ways,” he said.

The House Judiciary Committee cleared an amended version of the Innovation Act (HR-3309) Wednesday night, passing it on to the full House on a 33-5 vote. HR-3309, which would curb so-called patent litigation abuse, received unanimous Republican support, with most committee Democrats ultimately voting for it after last-minute negotiations yielded an amendment that moderated the bill’s fee-shifting provision.

The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) approved and released Thursday a report that said cybersecurity is better served by “a set of processes that continuously couple information about an evolving threat to defensive reactions and responses” rather than by instituting “a collection of static precautions.” PCAST had expected to present the report in October, but it was delayed because of the government shutdown. PCAST has previously examined cybersecurity issues through classified reports, but “there are many aspects of cybersecurity that we felt are very important to present to a larger community and are in no way classified,” said PCAST Vice Chair William Press, who co-wrote the report with Craig Mundie, a senior adviser to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. A full version of the report was not available Thursday.

The House Judiciary Committee marked up the Innovation Act Wednesday, with votes on many amendments falling largely on party lines. Ranking member John Conyers, D-Mich., and Intellectual Property Subcommittee ranking member Melvin Watt, D-N.C., as expected (CD Nov 20 p16), led opposition to HR-3309, which continued to be marked up Wednesday night. Conyers said the bill “overreacts” to real problems caused by abusive patent litigation and “would severely undermine the role of our federal judiciary in general and innovation in particular.”

There are “no easy answers” concerning an agenda item planned for the 2015 World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC-15) that seeks ways to allocate additional spectrum for mobile broadband services, said FCC International Bureau Chief Mindel De La Torre Tuesday at an FCBA event. The conference Nov. 2-27, 2015, in Geneva will in part consider additional mobile service allocations and identify additional bands for International Mobile Telecommunications, the ITU standard for wireless communications, to facilitate development of terrestrial mobile broadband. “Every single band has a constituency,” De La Torre said. “There are incumbents in every single one."

Prospects for approval of the Innovation Act (HR-3309) appeared to have improved significantly ahead of a planned House Judiciary Committee markup Wednesday. Industry stakeholders told us they believe the committee was far more likely to clear the bill after committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., released a new version Monday in the form of a manager’s amendment. If Carl Horton, chairman of the Coalition for 21st Century Patent Reform’s Steering Committee, “were a betting man, absolutely I think it passes out of committee,” he said. “The only question I think is going to be how strongly."

The House Judiciary Committee will mark up the Innovation Act (HR-3309) Wednesday, continuing committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte’s “ambitious” timeline for bringing the bill to the House floor. The markup is occurring despite a request from committee ranking member John Conyers, D-Mich., and seven other members of the committee asking for an additional hearing on the bill before a markup (CD Nov 12 p9). The markup is set to begin at 11:15 a.m. in 2141 Rayburn. An amended version of HR-3309 posted Monday effectively removed a controversial provision that would have expanded and made permanent a U.S. Patent and Trademark Office covered business method (CBM) patent review program (http://1.usa.gov/19AsEZM). Multiple software industry stakeholders had declared opposition to an expansion of the amendment, with Christopher Padilla, IBM vice president-governmental programs, saying in a letter to Goodlatte R-Va., Friday that IBM would oppose HR-3309 if it included the CBM provision. Reps. Doug Collins, R-Ga., and Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., spearheaded an amendment, originally set for consideration at Wednesday’s markup, which would have removed the CBM provision from HR-3309. Collins said in a statement that the new version of HR-3309 leaves the program “intact,” which is “great news for patent reform.” Collins said he appreciates Goodlatte’s “leadership in facilitating an open dialogue with the committee and allowing this change, which reflects the position of a growing, bipartisan group.” In the run-up to HR-3309’s markup, Goodlatte’s staff met Monday with industry stakeholders to discuss the bill. CEA President Gary Shapiro confirmed at a news conference Monday that the meeting’s participants included Michael Petricone, CEA senior vice president-government and regulatory affairs.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology on Thursday continued its push for public input on the Cybersecurity Framework, convening a workshop at North Carolina State University’s (NCSU) Centennial campus in Raleigh. The workshop -- set to run through Friday -- and a comment period running through Dec. 13 will help the agency revise the framework in advance of the expected release of a final version in February. Although NIST is examining all aspects of the framework, one of the main areas of interest since a preliminary version dropped in late October has been Appendix B, the framework’s privacy and civil liberties section.