47 U.S.C. § 1303 — Improving Federal data on broadband
submitted 18 years ago by Pub. L. 110-385 to r/title-47-TELECOMMUNICATIONS · 530 words · no verdicts yet
The Federal Communications Commission must compare broadband capability in selected foreign communities, survey domestic consumers, and improve Census information about computer and Internet use. The section does not reduce the Commission’s duty to protect proprietary information or require its public release.
(a) Omitted.
(b) International comparison.— (1) As part of its report under section 163, the Federal Communications Commission must compare broadband capability in 75 communities in at least 25 foreign countries. The comparison must include transmission speeds and prices for each Commission data-rate benchmark representing a speed tier. (2) The Commission must choose communities, as far as possible, comparable to U.S. communities in population size, population density, topography, and demographic profile. The countries must be geographically diverse and the selected communities must include their capital cities. (3) For each community, the Commission must identify relevant similarities and differences, including market structure, number of competitors and facilities-based providers, providers’ technologies, the applications and services those technologies enable, the regulatory model, applications and services used, business and residential use, and other media available to consumers.
(c) Consumer survey.— (1) To statistically evaluate national broadband-use characteristics, the Commission must periodically conduct and make public surveys of urban, suburban, and rural consumers in large-business, small-business, and residential markets. The surveys must determine (A) technology used to provide subscribed broadband capability; (B) monthly price; (C) actual transmission speeds; (D) applications and services most often used with it; (E) reasons consumers give for not subscribing; (F) other broadband sources consumers regularly use or rely on; and (G) other information the Commission considers appropriate. (2) The Commission must make survey results public at least once a year.
(d) Improving Census data.—The Secretary of Commerce, consulting the Commission, must expand the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to ask residential households, including households on native lands, whether people there own or use a computer at that address, subscribe to Internet service, and, if so, subscribe to dial-up or broadband service there.
(e) Proprietary information.—Nothing here reduces or removes the Commission’s duty to protect proprietary information, and this chapter does not require the Commission to make proprietary information public.
As part of its report under section 163 of this title, the Federal Communications Commission shall include information comparing the extent of broadband service capability (including data transmission speeds and price for broadband service capability) in a total of 75 communities in at least 25 countries abroad for each of the data rate benchmarks for broadband service utilized by the Commission to reflect different speed tiers.
The Commission shall choose communities for the comparison under this subsection in a manner that will offer, to the extent possible, communities of a population size, population density, topography, and demographic profile that are comparable to the population size, population density, topography, and demographic profile of various communities within the United States. The Commission shall include in the comparison under this subsection—
a geographically diverse selection of countries; and
communities including the capital cities of such countries.
The Commission shall identify relevant similarities and differences in each community, including their market structures, the number of competitors, the number of facilities-based providers, the types of technologies deployed by such providers, the applications and services those technologies enable, the regulatory model under which broadband service capability is provided, the types of applications and services used, business and residential use of such services, and other media available to consumers.
For the purpose of evaluating, on a statistically significant basis, the national characteristics of the use of broadband service capability, the Commission shall conduct and make public periodic surveys of consumers in urban, suburban, and rural areas in the large business, small business, and residential consumer markets to determine—
the types of technology used to provide the broadband service capability to which consumers subscribe;
the amounts consumers pay per month for such capability;
the actual data transmission speeds of such capability;
the types of applications and services consumers most frequently use in conjunction with such capability;
for consumers who have declined to subscribe to broadband service capability, the reasons given by such consumers for declining such capability;
other sources of broadband service capability which consumers regularly use or on which they rely; and
any other information the Commission deems appropriate for such purpose.
The Commission shall make publicly available the results of surveys conducted under this subsection at least once per year.
The Secretary of Commerce, in consultation with the Federal Communications Commission, shall expand the American Community Survey conducted by the Bureau of the Census to elicit information for residential households, including those located on native lands, to determine whether persons at such households own or use a computer at that address, whether persons at that address subscribe to Internet service and, if so, whether such persons subscribe to dial-up or broadband Internet service at that address.
Nothing in this chapter shall reduce or remove any obligation the Commission has to protect proprietary information, nor shall this chapter be construed to compel the Commission to make publicly available any proprietary information.
Source credit: (Pub. L. 110–385, title I, § 103, Oct. 10, 2008, 122 Stat. 4096; Pub. L. 115–141, div. P, title IV, § 402(c), Mar. 23, 2018, 132 Stat. 1089.)
- 2008Enacted · Pub. L. 110-385 · 122 Stat. 4096
- 2018Amended · Pub. L. 115-141 · 132 Stat. 1089
A history note hasn’t been published yet. The record shows enactment by Pub. L. 110-385 on 2008-10-10.
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