Jimm Phillips

The FCC should “let the market, rather than government fiat,” guide how the upcoming 600 MHz incentive auction is structured, said Commissioner Ajit Pai said Wednesday at a Mobile Future event. A market-based approach includes “letting all companies participate” in the auction by not adopting overly restrictive rules that limit participation by top wireless carriers Verizon Wireless and AT&T, he said. Pai has long advocated for the agency to follow industry’s advice in developing the rules for the incentive auction. The auction rules must also be fair to all stakeholders, Pai said, saying broadcasters and carriers have collaborated well during the process. “That’s something we should embrace,” he said. The FCC must also stay within statutory bounds allowing the agency to hold the auction and complete the rulemaking process within a reasonable time frame, Pai said. Uncertainty about the timeline doesn’t serve anyone well, he said. If the ultimate goal of the auction is to provide funding for programs like FirstNet, the FCC must “impose little or no restrictions” on the auction to make it successful, said Recon Analytics analyst Roger Entner in a related panel discussion. “The more you're imposing restrictions, the less money you'll get."

The federal government needs to do a “bona fide audit” of its spectrum holdings, said former FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell, a Hudson Institute visiting fellow, Monday at a Hudson event. The White House and Congress need to “make it a priority to have there be a transparent -- as transparent as possible -- but meaningful audit of federal spectrum, and then move on to implement policies that would promote the auction of exclusive-use licenses,” McDowell said. The federal government’s use of its spectrum holdings in the 1755-1780 MHz band has been an ongoing debate as federal agencies seek to clear government users from swaths of the band to allow commercial use. Federal users need to be given an incentive to move off the band, but the process remains “opaque,” McDowell said. “I know a lot of federal spectrum is used for very important purposes, but I think we can all assume that not all of that spectrum is being used efficiently -- or sometimes not at all -- and that there would be a greater societal and economic benefit were it auctioned.” Troubles also lie ahead for the desired pairing of the 1755 band with the 2155-2180 MHz band in an AWS-3 spectrum auction, he said.

Efforts on Capitol Hill to pass legislation aimed at combating abusive patent litigation brought by patent assertion entities are being promoted through widespread misinformation, said CEO Nathan Myhrvold of PAE Intellectual Ventures. Patent reform advocates have been pushing for legislation to combat PAEs -- an issue they feel the America Invents Act (AIA) did not adequately address. There are already multiple bills in the House and Senate that address abusive patent litigation, with additional bills in both chambers’ Judiciary committees expected to drop this fall (CD Sept 5 p8).

Mobile payment services have the potential to become more widespread in a few years, but industry standards may be needed to assuage consumers’ concerns about data security and other issues, said Jamie Barnett, co-chair of Venable’s telecom law practice, at a Law Seminars International event Tuesday. Barnett previously was the FCC’s Public Safety Bureau chief. A recent Federal Reserve study found that 42 percent of surveyed consumers said concerns about data security were the main reason they didn’t use mobile payment services -- the top reason given in the survey, Barnett said. Other barriers to adoption include network security, consumer privacy, liability, dispute resolution and a lack of uniform standards, he said. There’s no single legal framework that deals with mobile payment services, though 19 federal agencies have some regulatory interest in the sector (CD Sept 10 p9).

Capitol Hill is divided on possible regulations on data privacy -- one camp believes the U.S. needs a new legal regime on data privacy and another believes regulation could injure the current data environment, said Senate Commerce Committee Senior Counsel Christian Fjeld. The pro-regulation camp, including committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., believes any regulations need to include baseline privacy protections based on giving users notice and choice on the collection of their data -- and secure retention of data where necessary, Fjeld said. Rockefeller and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., introduced the Do-Not-Track Online Act (S-418) in March (CD March 4 p6) to create a “legal obligation” for companies to honor consumers’ Do Not Track requests, Fjeld said. Companies have no legal obligation to honor such requests, and the “balance needs to change” so such requests are honored, he said Tuesday during a Future of Privacy Forum and Stanford Center for Internet and Society event.

American Tower said Friday it will buy MIP Tower Holdings, the parent company of Global Tower Partners (GTP); the $4.8 billion purchase price includes $3.3 billion in cash and an agreement to assume $1.5 billion in debt. Macquarie Infrastructure Partners owns a majority of MIP Tower Holdings and GTP; Dutch pension fund manager PGGM has a minority ownership. Although the deal will allow American Tower to expand its position among the top U.S. tower companies, industry analysts told us they don’t believe it will fundamentally affect the U.S. tower market or encounter major regulatory issues. American Tower said it expects the deal to close in Q4 (http://bit.ly/15AKyL2).

It’s unclear whether FirstNet is going to insist on having a strong security interest in the towers included in its nationwide public safety network, said PCIA President Jonathan Adelstein Friday during a BroadbandUS.TV webcast. After the NTIA entity ended negotiations with Broadband Technology Opportunities Program recipients in Charlotte, N.C., and Adams County, Colo., to bring their LTE public safety networks into the FirstNet network (CD Aug 14 p2), some media reports said it was because FirstNet was unwilling to waive its security interest in the projects’ infrastructure.

The FCC Wireless Bureau’s decision to temporarily halt its unofficial 180-day clock for review of AT&T’s bid to buy former Alltel spectrum licenses from Atlantic Tele-Network was criticized by AT&T, but is consistent with past practices, other industry observers said. The delay was criticized by pro-free market interest groups. The FCC paused its review in order to seek further information from AT&T on its plans to migrate ATN’s prepaid customers onto its network (CD Aug 28 p11).

The forthcoming Cybersecurity Framework being developed by critical infrastructure industries and the National Institute of Standards and Technology “complements, and does not replace, an organization’s existing business or cybersecurity risk management process and cybersecurity program,” said a discussion draft of the framework NIST released Wednesday night. The framework is instead meant to help an organization leverage its existing cybersecurity processes and identify areas to improve risk management, although organizations that lack a cybersecurity program can use the framework as a “reference when establishing one,” NIST said in the draft (http://1.usa.gov/154Zjp9).

Outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano said Tuesday that her successor will need to continue tackling cybersecurity issues, because the U.S. “will, at some point, face a major cyber event that will have a serious effect on our lives, our economy, and the everyday functioning of our society.” Although the Department of Homeland Security has “built systems, protections and a framework to identify attacks and intrusions, share information with the private sector and across government, and develop plans and capabilities to mitigate the damage, more must be done, and quickly,” Napolitano said in a speech at the National Press Club. Napolitano is resigning in late September to become president of the University of California system (CD July 15 p4). President Barack Obama has not yet named his nominee to take over permanently for Napolitano. Experts told us that whoever replaces Napolitano will set the course for the agency’s involvement in cybersecurity issues.