After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC broadband map mistake

Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by barkerja on Thursday February 23, 2023 @01:23PM (#34914379)

There's a national (fiber) ISP that claims -- according to the FCC broadband map -- to provide 1000/1000 to my entire village. According to their own website, the closest address they service is about 25 miles away.

I submitted an FCC challenge about 2 months ago, and just today received notice "provider subject to your challenge has conceded the challenge and is required to submit a correction for the challenged location in the online portal within 30 days".

I am curious what benefit a provider receives from feeding this false information to the FCC? Is it funding (grants, etc.) related? It will also be interesting to see if the updated data will only reflect for my specific address, or if it will also apply to other areas around me that aren't serviced by the provider.

If it's the former, I will be submitting more challenges.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by gurchik on Thursday February 23, 2023 @01:43PM (#34914621)

> Correcting false data is important because the map will be used to determine which parts of the US are eligible for $42.45 billion in federal grants to expand broadband availability starting in mid-2023.

> One of those investigations began after our report about an Ohio ISP called Jefferson County Cable, which admitted to lying to the FCC about the size of its network in an attempt to block funding to rivals.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by barkerja on Thursday February 23, 2023 @02:01PM (#34914848)

Thanks for that info! I live in a somewhat rural area (central NY) and my Town is in the process of rolling out its own municipal broadband. They are relying on grants to continue the rollout of service.

I've brought this to their attention, a neighboring ISP has fed false data and it could potentially be harming their options for funding.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by aidenn0 on Thursday February 23, 2023 @02:12PM (#34914970)

In that context, it's really hard not to see this as intentional. Be aware that only the challenged address must be fixed, so (after the 2 week update period) you might want to randomly sample some addresses in town to challenge as well.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by gurchik on Thursday February 23, 2023 @02:17PM (#34915028)

Consider reaching out to Jon Brodkin (journalist who has been covering this for Ars Technica). It sounds like Comcast was just going to get away with this until Brodkin shined a spotlight on it.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by grecy on Thursday February 23, 2023 @02:47PM (#34915472)

> I am curious what benefit a provider receives from feeding this false information to the FCC?

I think the more interesting question is what are the penalties for a provider submitting this false information to the FCC.

Clearly there's a LOT of money up for grabs, and it seems like whoever tells the biggest lies will get the lions share. With no consequences for lying, you'd be stupid not to.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by mistrial9 on Thursday February 23, 2023 @05:19PM (#34917420)

> you'd be stupid not to

people wonder why businessmen and thieves are sometimes indistinguishable

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by theFletch on Thursday February 23, 2023 @04:28PM (#34916738)

I work for a rural ISP and would say that the data can be pretty overwhelming. We rely on the counties for GIS information regarding addresses, which in a lot of cases is not great (especially rural). For the big guys, and maybe even some smaller, there is a certain amount "land grabbing" for protection from competition. When you ask what the benefit would be, it could simply be the equivalent of a rounding error too. Maybe someone drew the polygon too big. It certainly matters though when it comes to not only the availability of funds to each state, but also the application process for certain areas.

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Re:After defending false data, Comcast admits another FCC br... by Zigurd on Thursday February 23, 2023 @06:30PM (#34918336)

"We have given away $40 billion in the last 10 years ... and haven't solved the problem," said Tom Wheeler, who was FCC chairman in Obama's administration.

It is very likely that many billions of that and subsequent subsidies have simply disappeared without anything to show for it, to the point of it being outright fraud. Nobody in the US seems to have the balls to recover this money.

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