Empowering Broadband Consumers Through Transparency; Delete, Delete, Delete

FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION <CFR>47 CFR Part 64</CFR> <DEPDOC>[CG Docket No. 22-2, GN Docket No. 25-133; FCC 25-74; FR ID 319500]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Empowering Broadband Consumers Through Transparency; Delete, Delete, Delete</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Communications Commission. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Proposed rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> In this document, the Commission seeks comment on several changes to the broadband label rules. Specifically, the Commission proposes to eliminate requirements that providers: (1) read the label to consumers over the phone; (2) itemize state and local passthrough fees that vary by location; (3) provide information about the now-concluded Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP); (4) display labels in customer account portals; (5) make labels available in machine readable format; and (6) archive labels for at least two years after a service is no longer offered to new customers. The Commission also seeks comment on streamlining and eliminating any other label requirement, such as the multilingual display requirement, that may be unduly burdensome and costly. The Commission also proposes to end our inquiry into new requirements that would take the labels out of alignment with the authorizing statute. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Comments are due on or before January 2, 2026 and reply comments are due on or before February 2, 2026. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> You may submit comments, identified by CG Docket No. 22-2 and GN Docket No. 25-133, by any of the following methods: • <E T="03">Electronic Filers:</E> Comments may be filed electronically using the internet by accessing the ECFS: <E T="03">http://apps.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. • Filings can be sent by hand or messenger delivery, by commercial courier, or by the U.S. Postal Service. All filings must be addressed to the Secretary, Federal Communications Commission. • Hand-delivered or messenger-delivered paper filings for the Commission's Secretary are accepted between 8:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. by the FCC's mailing contractor at 9050 Junction Drive, Annapolis Junction, MD 20701. All hand deliveries must be held together with rubber bands or fasteners. Any envelopes and boxes must be disposed of before entering the building. • Commercial courier deliveries (other than U.S. Postal Service Express Mail and Priority Mail) must be sent to 9050 Junction Drive, Annapolis Junction, MD 20701. • Filings sent by U.S. Postal Service First-Class Mail, Priority Mail, and Priority Mail Express must be sent to 45 L Street NE, Washington, DC 20554. • <E T="03">People with Disabilities.</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 & Governmental Affairs Bureau at 202-418-0530 (voice), 202-418-0432 (TTY). <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Michelle Branigan of the Consumer Policy Division, Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau, at <E T="03">michelle.branigan@fcc.gov,</E> 202-418-1345. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> This is a summary of the Commission's Second Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (Second NPRM), in CG Docket No. 22-2 and GN Docket No. 25-133; FCC 25-74, adopted on October 28, 2025 and released on November 3, 2025. The full text of document FCC 25-74 is available online at <E T="03">https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-proposes-simplify-broadband-labels-consumers</E> . To request this document in accessible formats for people with disabilities ( <E T="03">e.g.,</E> Braille, large print, electronic files, audio format) or to request reasonable accommodations ( <E T="03">e.g.,</E> accessible format documents, sign language interpreters, CART), send an email to <E T="03">fcc504@fcc.gov</E> or call the FCC's Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau at 202-418-0530 (voice). <E T="03">Initial Regulatory Flexibility Act:</E> The Commission has prepared an Initial Regulatory Flexibility Analysis (IRFA) concerning the potential impact of rule and policy change proposals on small entities in the Notice. The Commission invites the general public, in particular small businesses, to comment on the IRFA. Comments must be filed by the deadlines for comments on the FNPRM indicated on the first page of this document and must have a separate and distinct heading designating them as responses to the IRFA. <E T="03">Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995:</E> This document may contain proposed new and revised information collection requirements. The Commission, as part of its continuing effort to reduce paperwork burdens, invites the general public and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to comment on the information collection requirements described in this document, as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Public Law 104-13. In addition, pursuant to the Small Business Paperwork Relief Act of 2002, Public Law 107-198, see 44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(4), we seek specific comment on how we might further reduce the information collection burden for small business concerns with fewer than 25 employees. <E T="03">Providing Accountability Through Transparency Act:</E> The Providing Accountability Through Transparency Act, Public Law 118-9, requires each agency, in providing notice of a rulemaking, to post online a brief plain language summary of the proposed rule. The required summary of this Second Further Notice of Proposed Rule Making is available at <E T="03">https://www.fcc.gov/</E> proposed-rulemakings. To request materials in accessible formats for people with disabilities ( <E T="03">e.g.</E> Braille, large print, electronic files, audio format), send an email to <E T="03">fcc504@fcc.gov</E> or call the Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau at 202-418-0530. <E T="03">Ex Parte Rules:</E> The proceeding the Second FNPRM initiates shall be treated as a “permit-but-disclose” proceeding in accordance with the Commission's <E T="03">ex parte</E> rules. Persons making <E T="03">ex parte</E> presentations must file a copy of any written presentation or a memorandum summarizing any oral presentation within two business days after the presentation (unless a different deadline applicable to the Sunshine period applies). Persons making oral <E T="03">ex parte</E> presentations are reminded that memoranda summarizing the presentation must (1) list all persons attending or otherwise participating in the meeting at which the <E T="03">ex parte</E> presentation was made, and (2) summarize all data presented and arguments made during the presentation. If the presentation consisted in whole or in part of the presentation of data or arguments already reflected in the presenter's written comments, memoranda or other filings in the proceeding, the presenter may provide citations to such data or arguments in his or her prior comments, memoranda, or other filings (specifying the relevant page and/or paragraph numbers where such data or arguments can be found) in lieu of summarizing them in the memorandum. Documents shown or given to Commission staff during ex parte meetings are deemed to be written ex parte presentations and must be filed consistent with § 1.1206(b) of the Commission's rules. In proceedings governed by § 1.49(f) of the Commission's rules or for which the Commission has made available a method of electronic filing, written <E T="03">ex parte</E> presentations and memoranda summarizing oral <E T="03">ex parte</E> presentations, and all attachments thereto, must, when feasible, be filed through the electronic comment filing system available for that proceeding, and must be filed in their native format ( <E T="03">e.g.,</E> .doc, .xml, .ppt, searchable .pdf). Participants in this proceeding should familiarize themselves with the Commission's <E T="03">ex parte</E> rules. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Synopsis</HD> 1. In this document, the Commission seeks comment on proposals to eliminate certain broadband label requirements that may impose unnecessary costs and burdens on providers without improving the utility of the broadband label for consumers. Specifically, the Commission proposes to eliminate requirements that providers: (1) read the label to consumers over the phone; (2) itemize state and local passthrough fees that vary by location; (3) provide information about the now-concluded Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP); (4) display labels in customer account portals; (5) make labels available in machine readable format; and (6) archive labels for at least two years after a service is no longer offered to new customers. We also seek comment on streamlining and eliminating any other label requirement, such as the multilingual display requirement, that may be unduly burdensome and costly. We also propose to end our inquiry into new requirements that would take the labels out of alignment with the authorizing statute. 2. The Commission believes that these proposals are consistent with Congress's intent in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Public Law 117-58, 135 Stat. 429, section 60504(a) (2021) (Infrastructure Act), when it directed the Commission to “require the display of broadband consumer labels.” The remaining broadband label requirements fulfill the Infrastructure Act's goals of preserving consumer access to clear, easy-to-understand, and accurate information about the cost for broadband services, empowering consumers to choose services that best meet their needs and match their budgets, and ensuring that they are informed about a service plan's offerings. 3. The Commissio ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 19k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━