Consumer Concerns & Broadband Reliability
The online ecosystem is ever evolving, and Americans today rely on communications networks more than ever for fundamental daily tasks like working from home, shopping, health care and education. As community-based providers, NTCA members have a clear incentive to make sure that their customers (who are also their neighbors) can purchase and make effective use of trusted communications services.
Why It Matters
Affordability
The prices of consumer goods and services are on the rise, and the cost of everyday essentials like food and gas are making American families think differently about their budgets. As more of our lives move online, it’s vital that broadband subscriptions stay affordable—which is especially challenging in rural areas where the costs of deploying and operating networks are higher than in more densely populated urban markets. NTCA advocates for the long-term sustainability and affordability of rural broadband through the FCC's Universal Service Fund and other programs, while seeking to ensure that smaller broadband providers who in many cases may only have a few dozen employees are not unreasonably burdened by participation in these initiatives.
Consumer Privacy and Data Security
NTCA members have a strong incentive to protect their networks and deploy them in a manner that will keep them up and running in the face of both natural and human threats. It is important that rules and regulations intended to protect consumers are tailored to address risks without unreasonably burdening service providers or creating regulatory uncertainty. NTCA advocates for clear rules that protect consumers and communications networks while also giving providers reasonable flexibility to best address the specific and unique risks in their operations. Any framework for consumer privacy and data security should rest upon three principles:
- Notice—Providing clear, conspicuous explanation of privacy practices
- Choice—Giving consumers options to decide which entities can access various levels of sensitive data
- Security—Protecting data in accordance with best practices
Robocalls
NTCA’s hometown providers are committed to combating spoofing and reducing unwanted calls and are working to adopt STIR/SHAKEN, a caller-ID spoofing-mitigation technology, and other technologies to reduce the number of unwanted calls their subscribers receive. FCC initiatives can help address unwanted robocalls, but care must be taken to ensure that efforts to address these calls do not inadvertently block legitimate calls made by rural consumers.
NTCA Statement on Sixth Circuit Decision on Net Neutrality
NTCA–The Rural Broadband Association released a statement from Executive Vice President Mike Romano after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit released a decision overturning the FCC’s net neutrality order.
