WIDE RANGE OF PROVIDERS TRY TO ESCAPE REPORTING DUTIES

摘要

Wireless carriers, cable companies, satellite operators and rural local exchange carriers asked the FCC not to impose Automated Reporting Management Information System reporting requirements on them, as part of an FCC push to gather more data on broadband deployment. But some state commissions and the public interest group Free Press said the ARMIS requirements provide useful information and should be extended to all broadband providers. The industry may face a tough fight to avoid new duties. In September, the FCC cut back significantly on reporting requirements for the major wireline carriers but also started a rulemaking exploring whether to ask for new types of data to be filed by all broadband providers. The FCC's Democrats, Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein, who will be in the commission majority next year, stressed the importance of the data submitted under ARMIS and said the requirements should be updated instead of scrapped. nnThe CTIA said the ARMIS requirements served a purpose originally: "To place a check on the behavior of large, incumbent local exchange carriers at the inception of the price cap regulation system in the early 1990s." But today they are "antiquated, unnecessary and ineffectual." Mike Altschul, CTIA general counsel, said in an interview that the ARMIS data would be of little use to consumers. "A lot of this information is available to the public outside of FCC reporting," he said. "It's available through consumer reports and J.D. Power a lot faster and in a lot friendlier format than an official government report is ever going to be." Imposing wireline reporting requirements on wireless makes little sense, Altschul added.