NTIA Blog

This fall, NTIA will be joining the U.S. delegation, led by the U.S. Department of State, to an international conference that will consider issues that could impact international telecommunications standards and Internet-related policy issues.

NTIA is currently engaged in a collaborative process with the State Department to develop formal U.S. proposals and positions for the International Telecommunication Union’s World Telecommunication Standardization Assembly (WTSA), which takes place every four years. The WTSA, which runs from October 25-November 3, will set the overall strategic direction for the ITU’s telecommunications standards (ITU-T) work for the next four years.

As the President’s principal advisor on telecommunications and information policy issues, NTIA promotes policies that will help the Internet and the digital economy continue to grow and thrive as a platform for innovation, economic growth and free expression. Given this mission, NTIA wants to ensure that its contributions to the U.S. preparatory process result in proposals to the WTSA that accurately reflect the views and concerns of U.S. businesses and consumers about the Internet and the digital economy and also will help support economic growth and innovation. We also want to ensure that the work plan agreed upon at the WTSA related to upcoming ITU-T work does not duplicate the standards development processes of other bodies. 

This post was cross posted to the State Department’s blog: https://blogs.state.gov/stories/2016/05/16/china-s-internet-domain-name-measures-and-digital-economy

China is a force in the global digital economy and an important player in global Internet policy discussions. Today, more than 700 million people have access to the Internet in China, more than any country in the world. Several of the most valuable Internet-based companies call China home.  Global innovators and service providers from around the world, including from the United States, are eager to enter its market.

That’s why it is incredibly important that China use its power and influence in a manner that supports the continued development of the global Internet and the prosperity of its domestic digital economy. 

Both of our countries participate actively in a range of international organizations and processes that discuss the global development and deployment of the Internet.  We have both argued that the current processes, which rely on the cooperation of all stakeholders including government, industry, and civil society, are working effectively for the Internet’s future development and management.

However, the Chinese government’s recent actions run contrary to China’s stated commitments toward global Internet governance processes as well as its stated goals for economic reform.  

Every day, billions of people around the world use the Internet to share ideas, conduct financial transactions, and keep in touch with family, friends, and colleagues. Users send and store personal medical data, business communications, and even intimate conversations over this global network. But for the Internet to grow and thrive, users must continue to trust that their personal information will be secure and their privacy protected.

NTIA’s analysis of recent data shows that Americans are increasingly concerned about online security and privacy at a time when data breaches, cybersecurity incidents, and controversies over the privacy of online services have become more prominent. These concerns are prompting some Americans to limit their online activity, according to data collected for NTIA in July 2015 by the U.S. Census Bureau. This survey included several privacy and security questions, which were asked of more than 41,000 households that reported having at least one Internet user.

Today, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and the Economics and Statistics Administration (ESA) convened a roundtable to discuss what data is needed to better measure the economic importance of the cross-border information flows that connect people and businesses across the globe. Representatives from the government, private sector, academia, and public interest community spent the morning going through existing resources, identifying gaps, and evaluating what the Commerce Department could be doing to improve its digital economy metrics.

The Internet has connected people around the world in new ways through the free flow of information across borders. In 2014, approximately 56 percent of services exports and 50 percent of U.S. services imports were digitally deliverable. Modern day companies of all sizes are relying on cross-border data flows for their day to day operations. This includes the ability to access global markets, interact with customers across the globe, find new suppliers, and communicate with their overseas affiliates. For example, of 271 tech‐enabled startups surveyed by 1776 and the McKinsey Global Institute, 86 percent had at least one cross‐border activity. People are using cross-border data flows to access knowledge, communicate, and participate in electronic commerce.

This week, broadband leaders from across the country convened at the Schools, Health and Libraries Broadband Coalition’s annual conference to discuss key broadband policy issues important to communities and community anchor institutions such as schools, hospitals and libraries. NTIA had the opportunity to participate in several sessions at the conference to discuss our continued efforts to implement Obama Administration initiatives aimed at promoting broadband access, adoption and digital inclusion.

We also had the chance to meet with about two dozen officials from 15 states who work on broadband initiatives. The meeting was part of our efforts to keep an ongoing dialogue with state broadband leaders to sustain their peer network as a valuable vehicle for knowledge sharing.

Many of these state officials helped run programs that received funding through NTIA’s State Broadband Initiative (SBI). The SBI grants provided funding to each state, territory and the District of Columbia to collect the broadband availability data that helped power the National Broadband Map. In addition, SBI grantees used some of the funding to identify and address obstacles to broadband deployment and adoption in their states or territories.

From the thriving tech hub of Seattle to the small mountain town of Silverton, Colo., communities around the country understand that broadband access and adoption are essential to staying competitive in the 21^st century. A high-speed Internet connection combined with relevant digital skills can unlock a range of opportunities for residents, including better job prospects, access to educational and health care resources, and discounts on goods and services.

As local leaders take on the challenge of expanding broadband in their communities, NTIA is here to help. Our BroadbandUSA program  is harnessing the expertise we gained overseeing the $4 billion in grants issued through the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP). Through technical assistance, regional workshops, guidance and resources, BroadbandUSA is building on the lessons learned from across our grant portfolio to support communities as they seek to build infrastructure, pursue public-private partnerships, or increase adoption.

Americans’ rapid move toward mobile Internet service appears to be coming at the expense of home broadband connections, according to the latest computer and Internet use data released by NTIA. At the same time, many Americans are using a wider range of computing devices in their daily lives. Both of these findings suggest that technological changes are driving a profound shift in how Americans use the Internet, which may be opening a new digital divide based on the use of particular types of devices and Internet services.  These results come from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Computer and Internet Use Supplement to the Current Population Survey (CPS), which includes data collected for NTIA in July 2015 from nearly 53,000 households.

Mobile Internet service appears to be competing more directly with wired Internet connections. According to the data, three-quarters of American households using the Internet at home in 2015 still used wired technologies for high-speed Internet service, including cable, DSL, and fiber-optic connections. However, this represents a sizable drop in wired home broadband use, from 82 percent of online households in July 2013 to 75 percent two years later. Over this same period, the data also shows that the proportion of online households that relied exclusively on mobile service at home doubled between 2013 and 2015, from 10 percent to 20 percent (see Figure 1).

From televisions to tablets to smart phones, consumers can choose from a wide variety of devices made by a range of manufacturers to view the programming they purchase from cable, satellite, and telephone company multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs). But consumers have little choice in the "navigation" devices or set-top-boxes they use to search for, select, interact with, or record that programming.  That could change if the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) finalizes a proposed rule aimed at giving consumers more choice when it comes to the devices they use to access programming provided by MVPDs.

As the FCC notes, MVPDs have expanded the applications their customers can use to access content through a variety of devices. The programming, however, is generally routed first through a set-top-box that is leased to them for a monthly fee by their pay television provider. Those monthly fees add up, resulting in consumer frustration about the lack of lower-cost alternatives. And increasingly, consumers do not differentiate between online video services, such as Netflix and Amazon; pay television channels received from a cable or satellite box; and broadcast channels received over the air.  Regardless of how it's delivered, they want easy ways to search and choose the content they watch, when, and where they want to watch it. Enabling consumer choice and competition in this area is important to the digital economy.

As we work to meet the President’s goal of making 500 megahertz of additional spectrum available for commercial wireless broadband, it has become clear that spectrum sharing will need to be part of the solution to meeting spectrum demand. Accordingly, NTIA is examining ways to improve the technology that would enable greater spectrum sharing between federal and nonfederal users.

In a new report released today, engineers from NTIA’s Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS) and Office of Spectrum Management (OSM) propose a simple and robust method to implement spectrum sharing between commercial communications systems and federal radar operations  in the 3550-3650 MHz (3.5 GHz) band.

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As the headquarters for a number of technology industry pioneers, Seattle has a thriving digital economy. But even in this high-tech hub, 93,000 residents – or 15 percent of the city’s population – don’t subscribe to the Internet.

And across the state of Washington and the wider Pacific Northwest, there are still rural communities that lack access to adequate broadband. The problem is particularly acute for many Native American communities, including the Makah, Quinault and other tribes of the Olympic Peninsula and the Spokane and Colville Federated Tribes east of the Cascade Mountains.

From urban centers such as Seattle and Portland, Ore., to rural towns such as Toledo, Wash., civic leaders, industry officials and community activists are making progress in narrowing the digital divide. But the job is not done. That’s the picture that emerged from a daylong regional broadband workshop that NTIA hosted in partnership with the non-profit Next Century Cities in Seattle this week.

The event was the sixth in an ongoing series of regional workshops that NTIA is organizing as part of our BroadbandUSA program, which provides free hands-on technical assistance, toolkits, guides, webinars and other support to help communities expand local broadband deployment and adoption.