Resilient Networks; Disruptions to Communications

<RULE> FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION <CFR>47 CFR Part 4</CFR> <DEPDOC>[PS Docket Nos. 21-346, 15-80; ET Docket No. 04-35; FCC 23-71; FR ID 209914]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Resilient Networks; Disruptions to Communications</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Communications Commission. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule; withdrawal; re-issuance; announcement of compliance date. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Federal Communications Commission (Commission or FCC) published a document in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> on January 26, 2024, concerning an Order on Reconsideration that addresses the Petition for Clarification and Partial Reconsideration (Petition) filed by CTIA and the Competitive Carriers Association (CCA) (collectively, Petitioners) of the Commission's Report and Order regarding the “Mandatory Disaster Response Initiative” (MDRI) by extending the compliance deadline to implement elements of the MDRI to May 1, 2024. In its Order on Reconsideration, the Commission also agrees with the request to treat Roaming under Disaster arrangements (RuDs) as presumptively confidential when filed with the Commission. In this document, the Commission is withdrawing its previous <E T="04">Federal Register</E> publication of the Order on Reconsideration and substituting the present document to correct certain information regarding the compliance date and effective date. In addition, this document announces that, on October 27, 2023, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approved, for a period of three years, the information collection requirements associated with the rules adopted in the Report and Order. The OMB Control Number is 3060-1317. The Commission also announces that compliance with the rules will be required, and revises its rules to specify this date and to remove text advising that compliance was not required until OMB review was completed. This action is consistent with the 2023 Order on Reconsideration, which stated that the Commission would publish a document in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> announcing a compliance date and revise the rule accordingly. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> <E T="03">Withdrawal date:</E> The rule published at 89 FR 5105, January 26, 2024, is withdrawn March 26, 2024. <E T="03">Effective date:</E> This rule is effective April 25, 2024. <E T="03">Compliance date:</E> Compliance with the provisions of 47 CFR 4.17 is required beginning May 1, 2024. </EFFDATE> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> For additional information on this proceeding, contact James Wiley, Deputy Division Chief, Cybersecurity and Communications Reliability Division, Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, (202) 418-1678 or via email at <E T="03">James.Wiley@fcc.gov</E> or Logan Bennett, Attorney-Advisor, Cybersecurity and Communications Reliability Division, Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, (202) 418-7790 or via email at <E T="03">Logan.Bennett@fcc.gov.</E> If you have any comments on the information collection burden estimates listed below, or how the Commission can improve the collections and reduce any burdens caused thereby, please contact Nicole Ongele, Federal Communications Commission, via email to <E T="03">PRA@fcc.gov</E> and to <E T="03">nicole.ongele@fcc.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> This is an updated summary of the Commission's Order on Reconsideration, FCC 23-71, adopted September 14, 2023, and released September 15, 2023. The full text of this document remains available by downloading the text from the Commission's website at: <E T="03">https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-23-71A1.pdf.</E> This document also announces that OMB approved the information collection requirements in § 4.17 on October 27, 2023. The Commission publishes this document as an announcement of the compliance date of the rules. If you have any comments on the burden estimates listed below, or how the Commission can improve the collections and reduce any burdens caused thereby, please contact Nicole Ongele, Federal Communications Commission, 45 L Street NE, Washington, DC 20554, regarding OMB Control Number 3060-1317. Please include the applicable OMB Control Number in your correspondence. The Commission will also accept your comments via email at <E T="03">PRA@fcc.gov.</E> To request materials in accessible formats for people with disabilities (Braille, large print, electronic files, audio format), send an email to <E T="03">fcc504@fcc.gov</E> or call the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau at (202) 418-0530 (voice), (202) 418-0432 (TTY). <HD SOURCE="HD1">Congressional Review Act</HD> The Commission has determined, and the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget (OMB), concurs, that this rule is non-major under the Congressional Review Act, 5 U.S.C. 804(2). The Commission has sent a copy of the Order on Reconsideration to Congress and the Government Accountability Office pursuant to 5 U.S.C. 801(a)(1)(A). <HD SOURCE="HD1">Paperwork Reduction Act</HD> As required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. 3507), the FCC is notifying the public that it received final OMB approval on October 27, 2023, for the information collection requirements contained in § 4.17. Under 5 CFR part 1320, an agency may not conduct or sponsor a collection of information unless it displays a current, valid OMB Control Number. No person shall be subject to any penalty for failing to comply with a collection of information subject to the Paperwork Reduction Act that does not display a current, valid OMB Control Number. The foregoing notice is required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Public Law 104-13, October 1, 1995, and 44 U.S.C. 3507. The total annual reporting burdens and costs for the respondents are as follows: <E T="03">OMB Control Number:</E> 3060-1317. <E T="03">OMB Approval Date:</E> October 27, 2023. <E T="03">OMB Expiration Date:</E> October 31, 2026. <E T="03">Title:</E> Resilient Networks. <E T="03">Respondents:</E> Business or other for-profit entities. <E T="03">Number of Respondents and Responses:</E> 75 respondents; 1,725 responses. <E T="03">Estimated Time per Response:</E> 1 hour-20 hours. <E T="03">Frequency of Response:</E> One-time, on occasion reporting and annual reporting requirements. <E T="03">Obligation to Respond:</E> Mandatory. Statutory authority for this information collection is contained in sections 1, 4(i), 4(j), 4(o), 201(b), 214(d), 218, 251(e)(3), 301, 303(b), 303(g), 303(j), 303(r), 307, 309(a), 309(j), 316, 332, 403, 615a-1, and 615c of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended, 47 U.S.C. 151, 154(i)-(j) & (o), 201(b), 214(d), 218, 251(e)(3), 301, 303(b), 303(g), 303(j), 303(r), 307, 309(a), 309(j), 316, 332, 403, 615a-1, and 615c. <E T="03">Total Annual Burden:</E> 4,575 hours. <E T="03">Total Annual Cost:</E> No Cost. <E T="03">Needs and Uses:</E> The nation's communications networks provide a significant lifeline for those in need during disasters and other emergencies. Recent events, including Hurricane Ida, earthquakes in Puerto Rico, severe winter storms in Texas, and active hurricane and wildfire seasons, have demonstrated however that the United States' communications infrastructure is susceptible to disruption during disaster events. To address this issue, the Federal Communications Commission adopted a Report and Order in June 2022 to improve the reliability and resiliency of mobile wireless networks. See 87 FR 59329 (2022). In the Report and Order, the Commission introduced the Mandatory Disaster Response Initiative (MDRI) and set forth requirements that the nation's facilities-based mobile wireless providers must take to ensure their compliance the MDRI. Pursuant to the MDRI, these providers must take action related to roaming with other providers, mutual aid agreements, municipal preparedness and restoration and consumer readiness and preparation. These providers must also submit reports to the Commission detailing the timing, duration, and effectiveness of their implementation of the MDRI's provisions on request, perform annual testing of their roaming capabilities and related coordination processes, and issue written denials of roaming requests, among other requirements. The Commission submits this information collection, which seeks to have collected information described in the Report and Order, to support its adoption of the MDRI. The collected information will be used by the Commission, consumers and consumer groups, service providers to realize significant public safety benefits. For example, consumers and consumer groups will use the information to increase consumer education and improve consumer preparedness for disasters and other emergencies. Further, providers will use the information to ensure that roaming will work expeditiously in times of emergencies and to better understand their network capabilities related to roaming and ensure their networks roam as effectively as possible when a disaster strikes. Further, the Commission will use information as a basis for potential future improvements to the MDRI and other programs in furtherance of public safety, including by gauging providers' compliance with the MDRI's roaming provision, ensuring accountability by providers who fail to comply and for resolving disputes related to roaming agreements. Thus, the information sought in this collection is necessary and vital to ensuring that the MDRI is effective at protecting the life and property of the public. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Synopsis</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Introduction</HD> The Report and Order adopted the Mandatory Disaster Response Initiative (MDRI) to improve networ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 69k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━