The Regulatory Mix, TMI’s daily blog of telecom related regulatory activities, is a snapshot of PUC, FCC, legislative, and occasionally court issues that our regulatory monitoring team uncovers each day. Depending on their significance, some items may be the subject of a TMI Briefing.

FCC

         SADC 

The FCC released another list of additional parties that have signed an acknowledgement of confidentiality (AOC) and that seek to review the data gathered through the FCC’s special access data collection (SADC).  The list includes persons that signed an AOC since the FCC’s last Public Notice.  Companies that submitted confidential or highly confidential information in response to the SADC have until August 1, 2016, to object to the disclosure of their data and information to any of the parties on the list.

         Robocalls

In a recent blog post, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler discussed the FCC’s actions to help consumers “cut off” robocalls.  He noted that he had recently sent letters to the CEOs of major wireless and wireline phone companies calling on them to offer no cost call-blocking services to their customers.  He also sent letters to intermediary carriers that connect robocallers to the consumer's phone company, reminding them of their responsibility to help facilitate the offering of blocking technologies.  Wheeler called on carriers and standards groups to accelerate the development and deployment of technical standards that would prevent spoofing of caller ID and thus make blocking technologies more effective.  He asked the companies to respond within 30 days with concrete, actionable solutions to address these issues.  Robocalls are currently the number one complaint the FCC receives from consumers. 

Separately, Wheeler applauded AT&T’s response to his letter.  AT&T committed to making robocall-blocking technology available to its customers and will lead an industry strike force to develop an action plan for providing consumers with robust robocall-blocking solutions. Wheeler urged industry participants to join the effort and to produce conclusions within 60 days.  

New Jersey

The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities announced that it will hold public hearings to gather information from the public concerning Verizon’s service quality.  The hearings will take place in: Atlantic County, Burlington County, Salem County, Gloucester County, and Cumberland County.  Click here for further details.