The US government is poised to allocate $65 billion, to be exact to make sure all Americans have speedy internet at home. But it still doesn’t know where the problem areas are. That’s because of bad Federal Communications Commission maps that aren’t detailed enough to show the gaps.
Now a real estate data company thinks it’s created one of the most detailed maps available, showing exactly where coverage is strong and where it’s lacking. LightBox, which helped the state of Georgia build what some experts call the most detailed broadband map in the country, published its own US map late Wednesday that combines its precise address data with information from about 2 billion Wi-Fi access points across the country.
LightBox “basically can, with a high degree of confidence, tell you, ‘This is what the situation is in reality,'” CEO Eric Frank said in an interview ahead of the map’s release. “These are the places that have internet, and these are the places that don’t show any appearance of the internet.”
Millions of Americans around the country lack access to fast internet at home, a need that’s become especially critical over the past years and a half as the COVID-19 pandemic forced everything from family gatherings to classes and business meetings to go online. The federal government has an opportunity to fix this problem through the $1.2 trillion infrastructure spending package the Senate passed in August. The bill, which would allocate $65 billion to help close the digital divide, now must be approved by the House before it can head to President Joe Biden’s desk.
Though federal, state, and local governments want to deliver better internet access, a fundamental flaw remains in not knowing where the problems lie. The faulty FCC national broadband map has essentially made millions of Americans without fast internet “invisible,” as Microsoft put it, and unless the data improves, they’re likely to remain so.
Up to now, FCC maps have been too vague to be helpful. The agency collects what’s called Form 477 data from internet service providers, which contains information about where ISPs say they can provide service within 10 business days. It’s measured at the census block level, the smallest geographic area used by the US Census Bureau, and if only one home in a census block can get service, the whole block is considered served and isn’t eligible for public funds.
The flawed maps present a big hurdle as the government tries to allocate billions through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, or RDOF, which the FCC has called its “largest investment ever to close [the] digital divide.” Since the first phase of RDOF funding ended in November 2020, complaints have surfaced that some winning bids went to entities funding broadband to parking lots or well-served urban areas.
Critics like Steven Berry, head of the Competitive Carrier Association, which represents rural wireless companies, says the FCC’s faulty maps aren’t detailed enough to indicate to the bidders whether the areas they’re bidding on were already served or didn’t require service (the maps included geographies with airport runways or large parking lots).
“Pervasive errors in broadband data, unfortunately, led to some of the nation’s wealthiest, most densely populated areas set to receive RDOF Phase I funds,” he said.
