Thanks!

It’s one thing to be spooked by how far powerful lobbyists are going to stall bringing Internet access to millions of Americans. But don’t be frightened by their fear-mongering message that our TVs will never be the same if some broadcast channels are used for high-speed Internet.

They’re Ba-ack! Take Action To Open White Spaces

This Halloween, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) is trying to scare Washington with horror stories about “white spaces” — vacant TV channels that can be used to bring a high-speed Internet connection to rural and low-income Americans across the country.

The NAB’s hired guns have bombarded Washington with false claims in a desperate, last-ditch attempt to hoard these airwaves and to disrupt a critical Federal Communications Commission vote taking place in just five days.

The FCC’s five commissioners must not buckle under the intense lobbying pressure: Send a Halloween action card telling the FCC not to give in to the NAB’s scare tactics.

Here are the facts:

• If we open white spaces now, we can deliver the social and economic benefits of a fast Internet connection to tens of millions of Americans now on the wrong side of the digital divide.

• FCC engineers have tested white spaces devices and determined that the technology can deliver high-speed wireless Internet, without interfering with adjacent TV broadcasts.

• The NAB and Big Media are doing everything in their power to close off access to white spaces because they fear competition from innovators and losing control of the public airwaves.

The NAB is furiously spending millions of dollars on dirty tricks and political intimidation to scare the FCC away from white spaces. We must drown out the NAB and make sure the FCC hears from the public.

Take just one minute to sign this Halloween action card and forward it to your friends. Free Press will deliver your cards to the FCC today and make sure the white spaces are opened up for everyone’s benefit.

While the National Association of Broadcasters pulls out its secret weapon against white spaces — Dolly Parton — public interest and civil rights groups, leading Internet innovators, and lawmakers have been rallying the FCC to stay the course and open up white spaces for high-speed Internet access.

The FCC is set to vote on white spaces on Nov. 4, though the NAB is trying to delay the process.

Yesterday, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights advocated for white spaces in a letter to the FCC. “We believe this will not only trigger major investment and innovation; it will help close the digital divide between those who have access to advanced telecommunications services and those who do not,” they wrote. Last week, 12 public interest groups wrote Congress with a similar message.

CEO of Google Eric Schmidt wrote to the FCC lambasting the NAB’s attempts to derail the vote. “We are eight days away from a vote that could transform the way we connect to the Internet,” he said. “Your vote will spark technological innovation in the US directly and globally. The time for study and talk is over. The time for action has arrived.”

Bruce P. Mehlman, executive director of the Technology CEO Council, penned a letter urging the FCC to adopt final rules on white spaces “without further delay.”

“We respectfully urge the Commission in the TV White Spaces proceeding to seize the moment, increasing investment, promoting competition and expanding economic opportunity,” Mehlman wrote. “More than four years of exhaustive technical work on this proceeding has confirmed the lack of interference or other reasons to delay further.”

Michael Dell, CEO of Dell Inc. also reached out to lawmakers to urge them to support white spaces, writing to Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Reps. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), John Dingell (D-Mich.), and Joe Barton (R-Texas).

Other politicians were adding their voices in support of deploying new technology in the white spaces that could bring the benefits of broadband to millions more Americans. Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) co-authored a letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin endorsing white spaces. Another letter in support of white spaces was signed by six members of Congress.

This broad effort for sensible spectrum polices based on sound science is having an impact. According to Reuters, the FCC is moving forward with its plans to vote on Nov. 4.

But just to be sure the commissioners aren’t swayed by the NAB’s scare tactics, we’re sending them a card, signed by thousands of activists, just in time for Halloween.

As the fight over “white spaces” heats up, the technophobes at the National Association of Broadcasters are clinging to outdated scare tactics to protect us from the monsters of innovation.

Stirring up fears about technological advances is a well-worn page in the broadcasters’ playbook. The NAB opposed satellite radio, cable TV, and even the VCR when they were first introduced, calling them a threat to the future of over-the-air television.

Well the future has arrived once again. This time it’s in the form of a technology that uses vacant airwaves to connect millions of people to high-speed Internet services.

White spaces technology works, as evidenced by an exhaustive study by FCC engineers. It doesn’t interfere with adjacent television signals, while delivering the vast economic and social benefits of a connection to people formerly left off the grid.

But don’t tell that to the NAB. They’d rather Washington gave in to their extravagant tales about creatures and ghouls determined to kill your TV.

Sound familiar? In 1974, the broadcasters attempted to frighten us away from cable television with a PSA that’s was as over the top then as are their claims about white spaces today. (play the clip above)

It didn’t work in 1974. Hopefully, the FCC will learn from the past and dismiss the NAB’s latest round of fear mongering as yet another bad TV rerun.

Your Internet service provider is full of secrets — and it’s time they came clean.

From stealthily spying on your every online movement to covertly blocking Internet traffic, broadband providers engage in widespread, anti-consumer practices.

Today, Free Press called on the Federal Communications Commission to require all broadband providers to disclose any practice that monitors or interferes with customers’ Internet use. In addition to transparent “network management” practices, all ISPs should tell consumers what they can really expect from their service by publicly disclosing the minimum broadband speed guaranteed to users.

Two recent high-profile cases of abuse highlight the urgent need for tougher disclosure requirements. Online marketer NebuAd partnered with several broadband providers to secretly monitor and reroute user information into private servers — until a congressional inquiry exposed the dubious practice. Comcast, the country’s largest cable company, secretly blocked users’ access to online applications for more than a year before an FCC investigation forced the company to admit to the illegal practice.

Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press, said consumers are in the dark about their ISP’s actions, and have no way to know if and when their Internet usage is being altered, tracked or redirected.

“Terms of service agreements contain the vaguest language that corporate lawyers can devise — further stacking the deck against the consumer,” Scott said. “It took years to uncover Comcast’s illegal behavior and NebuAd’s intrusive technology. And it could take years more to uncover the next hidden harm.”

Twelve public interest groups today urged Congress to support Internet for everyone by supporting “white spaces.”

White spaces – the empty broadcast TV channels – are one of the U.S.’s most promising ways to close the digital divide and bring high-speed Internet access to all Americans.

The groups sent letters to lawmakers encouraging them to support the Federal Communication Commission’s proposed ruling to open white spaces for public use. The FCC will make its final decision on Nov. 4.

The letters were signed by Free Press, Media Access Project, Consumer Federation of America, Public Knowledge, New America Foundation, Consumers Union, National Hispanic Media Coalition, Prometheus Radio Project, Tribal Digital Village, Acorn Active Media Foundation, CUWiN Foundation, and Ethos Group.

In the face of harsh criticism by the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), who is lobbying against white spaces, the letters makes a clear case for opening up white spaces and puts the NAB’s faulty claims to rest.

“At a time when we should all be thinking about policies that spark economic growth, we have a great chance to support one right now,” says the letter.

Read the full Senate version here.

Read the full House version here.

One of Washington’s most powerful corporate lobbies is at it again. Raising a dust cloud of lies in a last-ditch effort to stop new technology that could better the lives of millions.

For more than five years, now, the television broadcast lobby has tried to deny the American public access to white spaces — unused airwaves that sit vacant between TV channels.

Technology now exists that would tap the near limitless potential of these airwaves and deliver high-speed Internet services to tens of millions of people now left on the wrong side of the digital divide.

The Horse and Buggy Lobby

The benefits of getting Americans connected — fueling economic growth, civic engagement, free speech, telemedicine and distance education, to name a few — are immense.

And the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is poised to deliver, recommending that we open white spaces after exhaustive testing showed that the technology can be used without interfering with adjacent TV signals.

Despite the evidence, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) is clinging to horse-and-buggy notions about technology to protect their government-granted broadcast domains from advances that would let us share the air.

“Opposing innovation is a well-worn page in the broadcasters’ playbook,” writes Jake Ward of the Wireless Innovation Alliance. “They opposed satellite radio, cable TV, and even the VCR, but the newest claims are outlandish even for NAB.”

Don’t take Ward’s word for it.

Listen to what the so-called experts at the NAB actually say, and compare it to the scientific findings of the FCC’s engineers.

FICTION: The NAB told Washington that white space devices will affect the digital television transition, scheduled for February 17, 2009.

FACT: But the FCC won’t allow sale of any white space devices until “after the transition to DTV service is complete and all TV stations are in operation on their permanent DTV channels.”

FICTION: The NAB claims that FCC lawyers are “misinterpreting” the data collected by their engineers.

FACT: But the most recent FCC test report – written by the FCC engineers who collected the actual data – indicates that the FCC’s Office of Engineering and Technology believes that the technology works and “the burden of ‘proof of concept’ has been met.”

FICTION: The NAB claims that devices operating on adjacent television channels will “eviscerate” digital TV signals

FACT: But the FCC tested a device transmitting with more than three times the power that the agency is currently considering. Even then the engineers found that “no interference was observed when the … device transmitted on an immediate adjacent channel even with the transmitter in close proximity to the receiver with a roof-top antenna.”

The NAB’s Toxic Blend

The NAB believes that a mix of lies and lobbyists will win out over the facts in Washington.

The sad truth is that they may be right: Many DC decision-makers simply lack the bandwidth to look into what’s already known about white spaces technology. Instead, they rely upon industry lackeys who come knocking with tales of interference and disruption.

The NAB is now trying to stop the FCC from following good science with good policies.

Unless our leaders cut through the NAB static, we could be kept from using the airwaves to fill one of the biggest holes in our national infrastructure.

A huge decision is going to be made on Election Day that could change the lives of millions of Americans. And it’s not about Obama or McCain.

On Nov. 4, the Federal Communications Commission will vote to open unused television airwaves to provide affordable, wireless Internet services nationwide. Help sway the vote by calling Congress today.
Opening up these vacant airwaves – called white spaces — might be our best opportunity to close the digital divide. White spaces can be used to transmit an Internet signal over mountains and through concrete walls.

FCC engineers just completed an exhaustive 18-month study that shows new technology can use white spaces without harming adjacent TV signals. The agency released its report on Oct. 15 and will vote on its conclusive findings on Nov. 4.

The facts are pretty clear: White spaces can be used to deliver Internet service to people near and far. But that hasn’t stopped the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), a powerful group representing the nation’s largest media companies, from deploying their lobbyists to try to keep Americans from gaining access to these airwaves.

Right now, NAB lobbyists are lining the halls of Congress to convince our lawmakers that using white spaces is a bad idea. And now they’re trying to delay the FCC’s ensuing decision by demanding the agency issue an official comment period for its report – despite the public’s existing opportunity to weigh in on the findings.

It’s another scare tactic by the NAB, and it’s getting old. It’s time we ended the NAB’s decades-long effort to control our airwaves.

We must move quickly to make sure we don’t lose the chance to connect all of America to affordable Internet service.

In rural parts of the country, more than 75 percent of TV airwaves sit vacant. Even urban areas, where the spectrum is crowded, stand to gain from opening up white spaces. Making these airwaves available for Internet access has bipartisan support at the FCC and in Congress. It just makes sense.

On Nov. 4, the FCC needs to simply follow good science with good policy — shedding outdated standards that have placed our airwaves under the lock and key of the broadcast lobby.

Time is running out. Don’t miss your chance to help make history on Election Day by urging Congress and the FCC to open up white spaces.

For months, the FCC has been debating whether to open the vacant public airwaves between TV channels — called “white spaces” — for high-speed Internet access.

In an exciting victory for consumers and innovators, the agency released a report yesterday supporting new technology that would use the empty channels to connect millions of people to the Internet.

The agency has been conducting exhaustive field tests of white space prototype devices  — think of a cell phone or laptop that gives you a high-speed Internet connection using the vacant spectrum. The report endorsed the unlicensed use of white spaces, and the FCC is expected to officially vote on how to use the spectrum on Nov. 4.

Coinciding with the report, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin issued a promising statement that “white spaces can be used as long as it does not interfere with broadcasters.” The National Association of Broadcasters has long predicted that white space devices will interfere with TV transmissions, but yesterday’s report concludes that it is possible to use white spaces without impinging on existing channels.

Harnessing white spaces to connect people to the Internet could help close the digital divide.

“Nearly every market in the United States has empty white spaces — in some communities, more than three-quarters of the broadcast spectrum is unused,” said Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press. “Unlicensed devices make efficient use of the airwaves because they’re low-power and smart enough to detect and avoid other broadcasters and services.”

Scott said the endorsement from the technical experts means its times to free the airwaves.

“We urge the FCC to move forward with policies that will increase competition and innovation, paving the way for this revolutionary new wireless marketplace,” he said.

You would think that AT&T, Verizon and Time Warner execs had formed a new front to defend your online rights.

Late last month, they lined up before the Senate to mouth principles that would, in their words, ensure that “consumers have ultimate control over the use of their personal information and guards against privacy abuses.”

The issue spins around the use of a content-filtering technology called “deep packet inspection” or DPI, which allows network managers to inspect, track and target user Internet content as our information passes along the Information Superhighway.

Headlines following the Senate hearing struck a reassuring note, declaring these companies were taking a stand with consumers and “keeping their distance” from DPI.

But we did our own packet inspection and found that the telcos’ actions often speak louder than their testimony.

Breaking and Entering

DPI forms the cornerstone of plans to police the Internet and profit from Web content. Using DPI companies like AT&T, Verizon and Time Warner would be able to decide whether a packet can pass or be routed to a different lane on the Superhighway. It lets them pry open user’s trunks, erect new tolls and sell off or bar privileged access based on what they find inside.

Cicconi: Trust AT&T. We Won’t Spy on You.

“Simply put, Deep Packet Inspection is the Internet equivalent of the postal service reading your mail,” Public Knowledge founder Gigi Sohn said during the September hearing. “They might be reading your mail for any number of reasons, but the fact remains that your mail is being read by the very people whose job it is to deliver it.”

In January, AT&T lobbyist James Cicconi said the company was testing Web technology so that it could scour user traffic.

The company’s stated goal was to help the copyright cops in the recording and motion picture industry stop illegal sharing of music and movies. (This is why these same companies have also formed a bulwark against Net Neutrality rules that would prevent such snooping.)

But once the technology is in place, AT&T can use it to inspect so much more.

Internet Troopers

DPI is already being used by other governments, including China and Burma to prevent politically sensitive information from making it in or out of their countries.

AT&T could easily tweak this same technology to let Ma Bell peer into all of your Internet use.

And if history is any guide, the communications giant is not to be trusted with our most privileged information. Americans have already been subjected to the National Security Agency’s domestic spying program courtesy of AT&T.

DoubleTauke

Verizon is similarly flirting with DPI — and has a similar history of abuse.

“To be clear, Verizon has not used — and does not use — packet inspection technology to target advertising to customers,” Thomas J. Tauke, Verizon’s top lobbyist told worried senators during the September hearing. “And we have not deployed the technology in our wireline network for such purposes.”

DoubleTauke: Let Me “Manage” You.

But note Tauke’s careful parsing of terms: DPI is not being used by Verizon to target advertising, but the Verizon exec left the field open for other applications. “Packet inspection can be a helpful engineering tool to manage network traffic and enable online services and applications consumers may wish to use,” he said.

Indeed, Verizon has reportedly been seeking technology vendors who can help it fulfill these gatekeeper ambitions.

But you won’t hear that from the company’s executives themselves.

Telcos Mum on Plans to Filter

According to an April report in the Washington Post, Verizon, AT&T and other providers were reluctant to reveal the extent of their Web filtering, but the companies that sell the technology — companies such as NebuAd, Phorm and Front Porch — were more forthcoming.

Front Porch collects detailed Web-use data from more than 100,000 U.S. customers through their service providers. At the time, NebuAd had agreements with providers covering 10 percent of U.S. broadband customers, chief executive Bob Dykes told the Post.

But what’s good for their business is clearly bad for the public’s Internet.

With billions of dollars at stake in controlling your online experience, it’s little wonder that these companies see DPI as the Holy Grail of Internet profits.

It’s also no surprise that they’re having troubles telling us the whole truth about their plans to use it.

= = = =
UPDATE: Stacey Higginbotham of GigaOm reports on Verizon’s notion that free market pressure alone will protect consumers from abuses. Seems that line of argument sunk with the stock market earlier this month.

A coalition of people and organizations across the political spectrum has been urging both John McCain and Barack Obama to make the presidential debates more “of the people” by bringing them more fully into the Internet age.

Last night, both candidates endorsed the Open Debate Coalition’s call. Specifically, the coalition asked the candidates to support two “open debate” principles:

1.    The presidential debates are for the benefit of the public. Therefore, the right to speak about the debates ought to be “owned” by the public, not controlled by the media.
2.    “Town hall” Internet questions should be chosen by the people, not solely by the media.

But now that the candidates and the public both agree, will the media give up its stranglehold on the debates and act in the public interest?

The coalition is now posing three questions directly to the media and the Commission on Presidential Debates:

1. Will the media pool choose to put their video of the debates in the public domain, so folks can freely blog key moments and share them without fear of being deemed a lawbreaker?

2. Will Tom Brokaw use some bottom-up debate questions collected and voted on Google’s site, in addition to or in place of the top-down ones the Commission collected?

3. Will the Commission adopt these principles for future debates, now that the candidates from both major parties embrace them?

Don’t just watch and find out. Hold the debate moderators accountable by rating the debates right after they happen. We’ll tally your response along with thousands of others and inject our people-powered feedback into the news cycle, giving citizens a chance to talk back to the media spin.

Don’t miss this rare opportunity to hold our future leaders — and the media that cover them — accountable.