May 11, 2017–The FCC should set a deadline, “preferably at least 90 days before delivery of the state plan created by FirstNet,” for the First Responder Network Authority to release its network policies, according to a memorandum prepared on behalf of the Colorado Office of Information Technology and the FirstNet Colorado Governing Body. “Just as the states cannot design a compliant network without having access to the network policies, the Commission cannot evaluate a state plan for interoperability without having access to the network policies,” said the memo, which was written by Ken Fellman, an attorney for the Colorado government entities, and filed in PS dockets 16-269, 12-94, 06-229, and 06-150. “It is the Commission’s role alone to decide whether state alternative plans comply with FirstNet’s network policies. Because it is the Commission’s role in the Spectrum Act to evaluate alternative state plans against the network policies, the Commission necessarily has the power to demand that FirstNet divulge those same network policies in a manner that will provide the Commission the time necessary to carry out its statutorily required obligations. Continue reading
Month: May 2017
Parties Urge FCC to Delay Action on Ligado NPRM
May 11, 2017–Industry and academic representatives concerned about the impact of a Ligado Networks LLC proposal on the hydrometeorological, transportation, and emergency management communities say the FCC should not move forward with a notice of proposed rulemaking until research has been completed. An ex part filing in IB dockets 12-340 and 11-109 reporting on a meeting with representatives of the Office of Engineering and Technology and Wireless Telecommunications Bureau echoed concerns that have been raised in the proceeding regarding a petition for rulemaking filed by Ligado asking the FCC to allocate and auction the 1675-1680 megahertz band for shared commercial use with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
“Sharing the 1675-1680 MHz radio spectrum poses significant risks to the nation’s forecast, communication, and warning capabilities for extreme events. The potential degradation in this capability would create risks to public health and safety, private sector initiatives, and scientific advancement,” the filing said. “The participants in the briefing stated clearly that 1675-1680 MHz should not be shared in the short term and such sharing should not be considered further until additional research is completed, including the user research to be conducted by NOAA, requested under the Spectrum Pipeline Act of 2015, over the next two years. This means that any consideration of moving forward with a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) should be halted until this research is complete and briefed to all relevant stakeholders.” Continue reading
Senators Introduce Bill Requiring FCC to Collect “Consistent” Coverage Data
May 11, 2017–A group of senators today introduced a bipartisan bill that would require the FCC “to collect broadband coverage data that is valid, consistent, and robust,” a news release noted. “This standardized data is necessary to ensure that policies to expand broadband deployment accurately target the unserved and underserved communities and account for the mobile coverage experience of those living in the most remote parts of the country,” the news release added.
The bill would give the FCC 180 days to adopt “regulations to establish a methodology that shall apply to the collection of coverage data by the Commission for” the universal service program and any similar programs.The bill says that the methodology would have to “(1) contain standard definitions for different speed tiers, such as the 2G, 3G, 4G, and 4G LTE tiers; (2) ensure that coverage data is collected in a consistent and robust way; (3) improve the validity and reliability of coverage data; and (4) increase the efficiency of coverage data collection.”
The Rural Wireless Access Act of 2017 was introduced by Sens. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.), Roger Wicker (R., Miss.), Brian Schatz (D., Hawaii), Deb Fischer (R., Neb.), and Jerry Moran (R., Kan.). Other original cosponsors include Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D., Minn.) and Gary Peters (D., Mich.). Continue reading
House to Hold Emergency Alerting Hearing
May 10, 2017–The House communications and technology subcommittee plans to hold a hearing May 17 on the future of emergency alerting. The hearing is scheduled to start at 10 a.m. in room 2123 of the Rayburn House Office Building.
“Our communications networks are becoming more advanced and providers are taking advantage of technological innovation and advancements with better targeted, more informative emergency alerts,” said subcommittee Chairman Marsha Blackburn (R., Tenn.). “I’m looking forward to hearing from a variety of stakeholders as to what improvements have been made and what more can be done to ensure the American public is promptly notified of an emergency situation.”
Courtesy TRDaily
House, Senate Committees Begin Task on Creating “Operational,” DHS Cyber Unit
May 10, 2017–Discussions are underway between the Democrat and Republican staffs of the House and Senate homeland security committees on ways to turn the Department of Homeland Security’s National Protection and Programs Directorate into an “operational” unit focused on cybersecurity and infrastructure protection, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D., Mo.) said today. “I’m excited that our bipartisan and bicameral staffs are discussing legislation that aims to appropriately elevate and operationalize DHS’s cyber mission,” said Sen. McCaskill, ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. Continue reading
Senators: U.S Needs Better Strategy to Counter Cyber-Cognitive Attacks
May 9, 2017–Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) complained today that the Trump administration had not met its self-imposed deadline of issuing a strategy for protecting U.S. interests and deterring adversaries in cyberspace. “We were hopeful that after years without any serious effort to develop a cyber deterrence policy and strategy by the last administration, the new administration promised one within 90 days of the inauguration,” Sen. McCain said during a hearing of the Armed Services Committee, which he chairs. “But 90 days have come and gone, and no such policy or strategy has been provided,” he said. “Our nation remains woefully unprepared to address these threats.”
Michael Rogers, commander of U.S. Cyber Command and director of the National Security Agency, told the committee that the “new team” was working on a plan. “And the check is in the mail,” Sen. McCain replied.
Sen. McCain suggested that the U.S. needed a dedicated cyber force, modeled on one recently created in the United Kingdom. The U.S. Coast Guard offers an “analog” to such a cyber force because it has authority to operate in multiple domains — U.S. territorial waters as well as international waters — to accomplish a multifaceted mission that combines civilian and military functions, he said. “The very fact that each agency of government believes that it is responsible for defending the homeland [in cyberspace] is emblematic of our dysfunction,” he said. “We have developed seams that we know our adversaries will use against us, yet we fail to summon the will to address these seams.” Continue reading
Groups Submit Revised Alarm Proposal
May 9, 2017–The Monitoring Association (TMA) and the Land Mobile Communications Council (LMCC) have submitted proposed rule revisions to the FCC concerning greater part 90 use of central station alarm frequencies. The revisions submitted yesterday in WP docket 16-261 follow up on a consensus proposal that was detailed by the TMA and LMCC last December in reply comments in a proceeding in which the FCC is considering expanding access to private land mobile radio (PLMR) frequencies (TR Daily, Aug. 18, 2016).
Courtesy TRDaily
Southern Linc Reiterates Points on FirstNet Plan
May 9, 2017–Southern Linc has reiterated points it made concerning the submission to the FCC of alternative plans by states to those plans prepared by the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) (TR Daily, Oct. 24, 2016). In an ex parte filing yesterday in PS docket 16-269 and GN docket 17-83, the carrier submitted, “additional information in support of its position that the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012 (the Spectrum Act) allows states to propose plans to opt-out of FirstNet’s nationwide public safety broadband network (NPSBN) that include both a radio access network (RAN) and an evolved packet core (EPC or core). …
Additionally, the Commission cannot create atextual and extra-statutory procedural hurdles to that application process because the Spectrum Act created only a limited role for the FCC in reviewing state opt-out plans. The Commission’s review under the Act is two-fold: it must determine whether a state’s proposed plan (1) complies with the FCC Technical Advisory Board’s minimum technical interoperability requirements, and (2) is interoperable with the NPSBN. So long as these interoperability requirements are satisfied, the Commission lacks the authority to demand additional showings. Accordingly, the Commission cannot mandate that opting-out states award contracts based on their requests for proposals (RFPs) within 180 days of a state providing notice of its intention to opt-out. Nor can the Commission redefine the manner in which a Governor chooses to submit his or her opt-out notification. Finally, the Spectrum Act requires the FCC to provide a state with an opportunity to cure defects in its original opt-out proposal and to provide a written explanation of the agency’s final decision on an opt-out plan sufficient to enable judicial review.”
Courtesy TRDaily
Andy Seybold’s Public Safety Advocate, May 11, 2017
Translating for LMR and LTE Worlds A number of vastly different languages are spoken within the wireless industry. I don’t mean different languages such as English and French, I mean different groups within the same profession having their own way of describing their particular specialty. This is particularly true with the LMR Public Safety and LTE/broadband worlds. As broadband comes to Public Safety there is often confusion about the meaning of a term. It is, perhaps, helpful to remember that Land Mobile Radio (LMR) was developed as two-way radio and put into use by Public Safety in the 1930s.
LTE is still the new kid on the block having been designed as the fourth generation of cellular primarily for data and video. Voice services were added much later and are, in essence, using the LTE data technology since voice is converted to digital packets, transmitted, and then put back into understandable voice at the other end. Although there are some statewide systems up and running, LMR systems are local in nature. They are usually designed to cover a local jurisdiction very well and they have been added to and enhanced over time.
In many places today LMR systems have an advantage over commercial LTE networks covering the same geography in counties and cities, but LTE has better coverage over much wider areas including Interstates and major state highways. Currently, the greatest difference is that many LMR systems have evolved over time to provide coverage where it is needed by Public Safety including inbuilding coverage, while commercial LTE covers a much broader area. In many places inbuilding communications is handled via Wi-Fi off-loading rather than inbuilding LTE extensions although there are a number of LTE extensions or Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS) in major venues.
The premise of FirstNet is that Public Safety will be supported where needed. It is to Public Safety’s benefit that AT&T is making its entire existing network available as it builds out the FirstNet spectrum. This will enable users to experience the coverage that now exists and perhaps be able to assist in helping FirstNet and AT&T provide coverage where it is needed but not available today. While all this is happening, it is important that the LMR and LTE communities be able to communicate effectively. It is also important that the LMR community becomes more conversant with the LTE/broadband world and that the LTE/broadband world understands the fundamentals of Land Mobile Radio.
LMR is not going away anytime soon. Those claiming it will are giving Public Safety personnel serious problems as they submit their budgets for LMR systems to elected officials who see FirstNet/AT&T as a way to save money for their jurisdictions and don’t understand the differences between FirstNet and LMR. The elected officials are not steeped in wireless technology, most them only know wireless as in smartphones and tablets. It is, therefore, important that the LMR and broadband communities speak with a common voice, understand each other, and are able to convey to those who hold the purse strings that these networks are complementary and will remain so for many years. This in turn means that both groups understand what the other brings to the party and they understand each other rather than speak over each other.
Some examples of terms meaning different things to different people come to mind right off the top. My least favorite concerns the term “Mission Critical Push-To-Talk over LTE.” Mission-critical implies that those within the Public Safety community can trust their lives to PTT voice over LTE. This is simply not true and won’t be true until AT&T can harden portions of its network and the FirstNet network, which will take time. Even PTT over LMR is not always on a mission-critical network, but the network is more mission-critical than today’s commercial LTE networks. Further, LMR networks offer fall-over or fallback modes. The number of modes differs depending on the type of LMR network but the final fallback mode is “simplex” or “talk-around.” Most LTE-speak people’s eyes will glaze over when they hear the term “simplex” or “talk-around.” I have found that saying “peer-to-peer” and “one-to-many peer-to-peer” helps them better understand. However, they still have an issue when the LMR community talks about off-network and in-coverage of the network simplex communications.
If, in LTE-speak, you are in range of a network your phone works. However, if you are not in range of the network it won’t work. If you are in range of the network, why in the world would you need to talk unit-to-unit without the network? It takes a while to explain why organizations such as FDNY use simplex on a daily basis even when they are in range of their LMR system. First, it moves traffic off the network and second, if the incident is deep inside a building or sub-basement, simplex may be the only way to talk from the street to those inside. In that case you would have one handheld within network coverage and one out of coverage but still be able to communicate. Simplex or talk-around is one of the most difficult things for those in the broadband world to comprehend.
The standards body for LTE is working on a technology called ProSe that is supposed to be the answer for off-network communications using LTE devices but so far it does not appear as though even the standards body truly understands unit-to-unit requirements. If for no other reason, the use of simplex or talk-around should be enough to justify keeping an LMR system in place at least for the foreseeable future. What will happen in years to come no one knows, but in the meantime I see numerous vendors working on combination LTE and LMR devices to try to solve the two-device-per-person issue. It will be interesting to see how this plays out over time.
Other terms that are confusing to both groups include LMR base stations, repeaters, simulcast system, trunked systems, P-25 digital systems, talk-groups, time-out-timers, and many more. On the LTE side of things are the Radio Access Network(RAN), the Evolved Packet Core (EPC), IP, Asynchronous Balanced Mode (ABM), Access Class (AC), Quality of Services (QoS), and priority, pre-emption, and ruthless pre-emption, which seem to be used interchangeably even though each carries a different set of implications. For antennas, the term MIMO is confusing to LMR folks. Multiple Input, Multiple Output antenna technology has an impact on the number of antennas needed on a tower, on a vehicle, and in a handheld device. Today there is 2X2 MIMO and 3X3 MIMO, each offering more throughput and capacity, and work continues on adding even more antennas to an antenna array. Continue reading
CDC: Majority of U.S. Homes Have Only Cellphones
May 5, 2017–For the first time, a majority of U.S. homes have only cellphones, according to preliminary survey results for the second six months of 2016 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). The survey results “indicate that 50.8% of American homes did not have a landline telephone but did have at least one wireless telephone … — an increase of 2.5 percentage points since the second 6 months of 2015,” CDC said. “More than 70% of all adults aged 25-34 and of adults renting their homes were living in wireless-only households.”
CDC added, “Among households with both landline and wireless telephones, 38.0% received all or almost all calls on wireless telephones, based on data for July–December 2016. These wireless-mostly households make up 15.0% of all households. During the second 6 months of 2016, about 41 million adults (16.7%) lived in wireless-mostly households.”
Courtesy TRDaily