Delete, Delete, Delete; Removal of Obsolete Regulations

<RULE> FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION <CFR>47 CFR Parts 1, 24, 63, and 79</CFR> <DEPDOC>[GN Docket No. 25-133; FCC 25-40; FR ID 306663]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Delete, Delete, Delete; Removal of Obsolete Regulations</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Communications Commission. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Direct final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> In this document, the Federal Communications Commission acts to eliminate certain outdated, obsolete, and unnecessary rules. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This rule is effective October 3, 2025 without further action, unless significant adverse comment is received August 14, 2025. In the event the Commission receives significant adverse comments, the Commission will publish a timely withdrawal in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> informing the public the provisions of the rule(s) for which adverse comment were received and will not take effect. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> You may submit comments, identified by GN Docket No. 25-133, electronically or on paper. See <E T="02">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION</E> for specific information and addresses for electronic or paper filings. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Marcus Maher, Federal Communications Commission, Office of General Counsel. Email: <E T="03">Marcus.Maher@fcc.gov;</E> telephone: (202) 418-2339. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> This is a summary of the direct final rule portion of the Commission's <E T="03">Direct Final Rule,</E> GN Docket No. 25-133; FCC 25-40, adopted on July 24, 2025, and released on July 28, 2025. The full text of this document is available for public inspection and can be downloaded at <E T="03">https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-deletes-obsolete-telegraph-rabbit-ear-receiver-phone-booth-rules-0.</E> Alternative formats are available for people with disabilities (Braille, large print, electronic files, audio format) by sending an email to <E T="03">fcc504@fcc.gov</E> or calling the Commission's Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau at (202) 418-0530 (voice), (202) 418-0432 (TTY). <E T="03">Comment Period and Filing Procedures.</E> Interested parties may file comments on or before the dates provided in the <E T="02">DATES</E> section of this document. Comments must be filed in GN Docket No. 25-133. Comments may be filed using the Commission's Electronic Comment Filing System (ECFS). <E T="03">See Electronic Filing of Documents in Rulemaking Proceedings,</E> 63 FR 24121 (1998). • All filings must be addressed to the Commission's Secretary, Office of the Secretary, Federal Communications Commission. • <E T="03">Electronic Filers:</E> Comments may be filed electronically using the internet by accessing the ECFS: <E T="03">https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/.</E> <E T="03">Paper Filers:</E> Parties who choose to file by paper must file an original and one copy of each filing. If more than one docket or rulemaking number appears in the caption of this proceeding, filers must submit two additional copies for each additional docket or rulemaking number. • Commercial overnight mail (other than U.S. Postal Service Express Mail and Priority Mail) must be sent to 9050 Junction Drive, Annapolis Junction, MD 20701. • U.S. Postal Service first-class, Express, and Priority mail must be addressed to 45 L Street NE, Washington, DC 20554. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Procedural Matters</HD> <E T="03">Paperwork Reduction Act.</E> This document does not contain new or modified information collections subject to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA), 44 U.S.C. 3501-3521. In addition, therefore, it does not contain any new or modified information collection burden for small business concerns with fewer than 25 employees, pursuant to the Small Business Paperwork Relief Act of 2002, 44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(4). <E T="03">Congressional Review Act.</E> The Commission has determined, and the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget concurs, that this rule is “non-major” under the Congressional Review Act, 5 U.S.C. 804(2). The Commission will send a copy of this Direct Final Rule to Congress and the Government Accountability Office pursuant to 5 U.S.C. 801(a)(1)(A). <HD SOURCE="HD1">Synopsis</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Introduction</HD> Today marks the next step in a bold initiative to modernize the Commission's regulatory framework and pave the way for the next generation of innovation. In this proceeding, we have launched a sweeping review eventually aimed at eliminating outdated rules, reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens, accelerating infrastructure deployment, promoting network modernization, and spurring innovation. Our goal is clear: streamline, simplify, and smartly deregulate across multiple fronts simultaneously to better serve the public and support technological progress. In initiating this proceeding, we generally sought to identify rules that are outdated, obsolete, unlawful, anticompetitive, or otherwise no longer in the public interest. In today's item, we specifically focus on the repeal of certain rules for which prior notice and comment are unnecessary, but for which we elect to provide an opportunity for input on that assessment. Absent any significant adverse comments in response to this <E T="03">Direct Final Rule,</E> these rules will be repealed. Pursuant to the framework established here, direct final rule procedures also can be employed in the future in other scenarios where prior notice and comment is unnecessary under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). We thus reject commenters' unwarranted concerns that direct final rule procedures will be employed by the Commission outside scenarios where prior notice and comment is unnecessary under the APA. Where deregulation triggers the notice-and-comment rulemaking process required by the APA, the Commission will proceed in that manner, just as it is doing with respect to other deregulatory items this month on which the full Commission will vote. <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Discussion</HD> <E T="03">Good Cause to Forgo Notice and Comment.</E> Under the APA, when an agency for “good cause” finds that notice and public comment “are impracticable, unnecessary, or contrary to the public interest,” it need not follow notice and comment procedures before modifying or repealing rules. Prior notice and comment are “unnecessary” when “‘the administrative rule is a routine determination, insignificant in nature and impact, and inconsequential to the industry and to the public.’” We have identified 11 rule provisions—covering 39 regulatory burdens, 7,194 words, and 16 pages—that plainly do not serve the public interest any longer because they govern obsolete technology, outdated marketplace conditions, expired deadlines, or repealed legal obligations. Applying the “good cause” standard discussed above, we conclude that prior notice and comment are unnecessary before repealing the rules identified in this document. <E T="03">Direct Final Rule Process.</E> At times when the Commission has found prior notice and comment unnecessary before modifying or repealing rules, it simply adopted the relevant rule change without any additional process. Although we reserve the right to proceed in that manner, we elect in this decision to proceed using what commonly is known as a “direct final rule” process. Although the FCC is not bound by the Administrative Conference of the United States' (ACUS's) direct final rule recommendations or the practices employed by other agencies, we have considered them to the extent that they provided a useful point of reference subject to tailoring appropriate to our specific circumstances. By proceeding through a direct final rule, the Commission chooses to provide <E T="03">expanded</E> opportunities for public comment when it is not legally required to do so under the “good cause” standard. We thus reject claims that our actions somehow seek to evade the APA or neglect the proper importance of notice and comment. Further, although the Commission has adopted specific rules codified in the Code of Federal Regulations related to notice-and-comment rulemaking procedures, there is no legal requirement that we adopt rules before employing processes permitted by the APA and the Communications Act. Under a direct final rule process, rule changes are adopted without prior notice and comment, but accompanied by an opportunity for the public to file comments—and if we conclude that significant adverse comments have been filed, the relevant rule changes would not take effect until after a full notice and comment process. In particular, we will publish this item adopting direct final rules in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> , and allow for comment from interested parties within 10 days of <E T="04">Federal Register</E> publication. Although some commenters advocate for a longer comment period such as the 30 day period reflected in ACUS's recommendations, we are not persuaded to adopt such timeframes for this particular direct final rule. Under the APA's good cause exception, we would have been justified proceeding immediately to rule as we have in the past without providing an opportunity for comment, but have elected to employ direct final rule procedures to guide future action. An unnecessarily long comment period would simply represent an unwarranted penalty on the Commission for electing to pursue this approach. And given the discrete number of rules and rationales for repeal implicated in this order, we are not persuaded that a longer comment cycle is needed. That is particularly true where, as here, advocates for groups that might be interested in the rules at issue have shown themselves to already be well aware of the c ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 24k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━