WASHINGTON-House telecommunications subcommittee Chairman Billy Tauzin (R-La.) said he will sponsor legislation to expand legal privacy protection for wireless communications and outlaw all modifications of radio scanners that enable electronic eavesdropping.At the same time, lawmakers at last Wednesday's hearing criticized the wireless telecom industry...
WASHINGTON-With the wireless industry and hearing impaired community unable to agree on long-term solutions for hearing-aid compatibility and interference problems after more than a year of negotiations, federal regulators could be forced to intervene as part of a congressional mandate to enforce the disability...
RCR missed boat on NextWave storyDear Editor: RCR is a respected wireless trade publication known for its journalistic standards. It inexplicably departed from those standards in its Jan. 13 edition, which contains analysis and commentary on the Federal Communications Commission's recent decision to conditionally grant...
WASHINGTON-The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association agreed last week to insure Wireless Technology Research L.L.C. scientists against lawsuit damages, while dashing speculation that it wants to dissolve WTR over the indemnification issue.The stalemate over legal coverage threatened to shut down the already struggling research program,...
Clinton II and greener pastures are generating more exits, some through the infamous revolving door.Bob McNamara, chief of the FCC's Private Wireless Division, is leaving the agency after 21 years to join Nextel Communications Inc. in McLean, Va.FCC antitrust guru James Olson is leaving...
SEATTLE-Toll Free Cellular has announced plans for national expansion of its #800 free cellular calling services.The national expansion is propelled by an infusion of capital, provided primarily by limited partnerships affiliated with Goldman, Sachs & Co., and supported by agreements with a number of...
MONTREAL-Bell Canada International Inc., with its Indian partner, the Tata Group, launched the first mobile telephony network in Andhra Pradesh, India. The company, operating under the name Tata Communications, has licenses to serve nearly 70 million residents, 850 large-scale and 100,000 small businesses, the...
WASHINGTON-Wireless Technology Research L.L.C. last week declared digital pocket phone interference with cardiac pacemakers not to be a public health problem, saying interference problems can be minimized in the short run by increased consumer awareness and in the long run by improved design of...
WASHINGTON, D.C.-There were 38.2 million cellular and personal communications services subscribers at the end of June, a penetration rate of 14.5 percent, according to a new survey from the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association.More than 10 million new customers signed up for service during the...
A cellular company in San Francisco is working to provide equal access to all people by providing special discounted prices on wireless phones and service to people with visual or mobility impairments.Since 1992, Cellular One, in conjunction with handset provider Motorola Inc. and the...
Digital wireless technologies were designed to answer issues of quality, capacity and cost. But by releasing huge swaths of new spectrum, the Federal Communications Commission has changed the rules, and capacity is now much less important than cost-but not everybody in the industry has...
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla.-Fractal Antenna Systems Inc. said it is offering an antenna for wireless phones that is much smaller than conventional antennas but just as powerful.Fractals are geometric patterns that repeat their patterns on ever-increasing size scales, the company said. Fractals have very large...
WASHINGTON-President Clinton last week launched a new anti-crime program to equip neighborhood watch groups with cellular telephones donated by industry, while threatening to veto a Republican appropriations bill that increases funding for law enforcement.The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association will provide 50,000 wireless phones and...
WASHINGTON-The United States and China last week averted a high-profile trade war over intellectual property rights that threatened to cut into wireless telecommunications commerce between the two countries.The U.S.-Sino accord was reached just hours after the Clinton administration-imposed June 17 deadline passed for slapping...
WASHINGTON-The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association's board of directors authorized $6.7 million for the current fiscal year 1997 for a five-year study of possible health risks associated with the use of wireless phones.The money is paid into a deposit-only escrow account managed by the independent...
Dear Editor: Once again it is necessary to correct the misinformation which you are giving your readers regarding the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association's efforts relative to Wireless Telecommunications Research L.L.C. Your May 27 story, "Research fund may fall $4M short of goal," is wrong, principally...
WASHINGTON-Clinton Watson of San Jose, Calif., who created the "Lifetime Phone" software program used in cloning cellular phones, was sentenced to six years in federal prison and ordered to pay more than $300,000 in restitution to wireless carriers, according to the Cellular Telecommunications Industry...
WASHINGTON-At a time when Wireless Technology Research L.L.C. is scraping for cash to determine whether pocket telephones pose a potential public health risk, the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association is pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars annually into public affairs to convince consumers that the...
WASHINGTON, D.C.-Wireless Technology Research L.L.C. issued a progress report confirming that wireless phones interfere with cardiac pacemakers to varying degrees. But, the report also notes that no pacemaker malfunction due to wireless phone interference has been reported to date.In "Evaluation of Interference Between Hand-Held...
Dear Editor: Your article in Monday's RCR is a great disappointment in which you misled your readers.Somehow you have turned a story about differences in opinion between CTIA and a handful of manufacturers, regarding the assessments collected by CTIA for it's health and safety programs,...
WASHINGTON-Wireless Technology Research, L.L.P., the entity created with funding from the wireless telecommunications industry three years ago after a highly publicized lawsuit claimed pocket phones cause brain cancer, is losing the support of some manufacturers and members of the scientific community amid charges that...
WASHINGTON-The Supreme Court's consideration of whether manufacturers of medical devices that malfunction can be sued in state court potentially adds a new twist to the wireless interference issue.Up to now, the issue has been largely framed by consumer advocates in terms of what digital...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission is believed to be leaning toward radio frequency radiation exposure guidelines that incorporate Environmental Protection Agency recommendations, a policy shift the wireless telecommunications industry and others oppose and believe is politically driven by FCC Chairman Reed Hundt and EPA head...
Dear Editor: Once again, in the interest of accuracy, I am compelled to respond to a letter to you from Mark Ross, Ph.D. (SHHH) in the Feb. 10 issue of RCR.First of all, I do not know whom Mr. Ross had the imaginary conversation with,...
