The FCC’s Plan To Address Racism In Broadband Deployment Sounds Like A Sad Joke

Groups like the National Digital Inclusion Alliance have consistently released studies showing that telecom giants like AT&T, despitebillions in subsidiesandtax breaks, routinelyavoid upgrading minority and low income neighborhoodsto fiber. Not only that, the group has documented how users in those neighborhoods even struggle to have their existing (older and slower) DSL lines repaired.

Regional telecom monopolies have long vehemently denied that they engage in this kind of digital redlining," but thedata speaks for itself, and has beenroutinely validated by third parties. In addition todiscrimination in broadband deployment, big ISPs have also been caught charging lower-income and minority areasmore money than residents of more affluent, less diverse neighborhoods.

The nation's top regulator, the FCC, has been completely asleep on the issue for decades. That changed (potentially) last year, when Congress pushed the FCC toinvestigate the problemaspart of the infrastructure bill. And while the FCC has created a digital discrimination task force" and is circulating a proposal to address the problem behind closed doors, early reports aren't promising.

New Street Research, for example, issued a paywalled report with their analysis of the FCC's planned proposal, and they come away decidedly underwhelmed:

Upon reading the actual item, it is even more benign than we had anticipated. It refrains from making any accusations against any company and declines to consider any historic acts by ISPs as in violation of the digital discrimination rules."

Another complaint made by the report is the fact that the FCC has opted for an informal complaint process instead of a formal one. That means complaints are shared with providers but not the public, reducing transparency and making it politically easier for the FCC to ignore them.

This is par for the course for the feckless FCC. The kind of careerists who can survive the FCC Senate nomination process can't even candidly acknowledge telecom monopolies exist, much less propose any solutions to monopoly harm. Even when the NY AG stepped in to address the industry's use of fake and dead people to undermine FCC proceedings, neither the FCC or AG had the courage to call ISPs out by name.

Even though the FCC's proposal to address digital discrimination in broadband deployment sounds like it's going to be toothless and performative, industry will of course portray it as some kind of severe government overreach" as part of a longstanding quest to portray any and all regulatory oversight of telecom as unhinged extremism. Something New Street says will be unwarranted:

We don't doubt that the item will be criticized by some who allege that the item will result in setting up new barriers for deployments and create new rights for the FCC to micromanage broadband services, but considering what the item actually does, we think such predictions are wrong."

We'll see what the final plan looks like. The FCC's outline of its proposal on digital discrimination is available here, though the agency isn't expected to actually vote on the rules until November 15. Crafting useful rules is one thing, and actually enforcing them will be another. Even expecting the FCC to single out AT&T by name is probably asking a lot for an agency that often engages in regulatory theater.

For example, the Biden FCC wants to ensure broadband subscriptions have nutrition labels" making it transparent how badly you're getting ripped off by your ISP, but they generally have little interest in actually stopping regional mono/duopolies from ripping you off. And even these incomplete efforts are routinely portrayed as draconian overreach" by industry giants.

Consumer groups, keen to be on commissioners' good sides and just happy that the FCC is no longer being lobotomized by industry-blessed Trump appointed sycophants, are generally quiet about the performative nature of these efforts for fear of undermining them. Even many civil rights groups, similarly thrilled that the Biden FCC can even acknowledge this problem exists, aren't keen to criticize it.

But the problem remains a very real one all the same. It's hard to reform an industry dominated by predatory giants when your careerist regulators lack the backbone to even call companies out by name, much less candidly acknowledge that concentrated mono/duopoly power (and the corruption that coddles them) is the primary reason U.S. broadband remains patchy, sluggish, and expensive - a problem notably worse in marginalized and minority neighborhoods.