FCC Takes Spectrum From Auto Industry In Plan To 'Supersize' Wi-Fi (arstechnica.com) 49
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Are Technica: The Federal Communications Commission today voted to add 45MHz of spectrum to Wi-Fi in a slightly controversial decision that takes the spectrum away from a little-used automobile-safety technology. The spectrum from 5.850GHz to 5.925GHz has, for about 20 years, been set aside for Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC), a vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications service that's supposed to warn drivers of dangers on the road. But as FCC Chairman Ajit Pai today said, "99.9943 percent of the 274 million registered vehicles on the road in the United States still don't have DSRC on-board units." Only 15,506 vehicles have been equipped with the technology, he said.
In today's decision, the FCC split the spectrum band and reallocated part of it to Wi-Fi and part of it to a newer vehicle technology. The lower 45MHz from 5.850GHz to 5.895GHz will be allocated to Wi-Fi and other unlicensed services. "This spectrum's impact will be further amplified by the fact that it is adjacent to an existing Wi-Fi band which, when combined with the 45MHz made available today, will support cutting-edge broadband applications," the FCC said. "These high-throughput channels -- up to 160 megahertz wide -- will enable gigabit Wi-Fi connectivity for schools, hospitals, small businesses, and other consumers." "Full-power indoor unlicensed operations" are authorized immediately, while "outdoor unlicensed use" will be allowed "on a coordinated basis under certain circumstances," the FCC said. The FCC ordered DSRC services to vacate the lower 45MHz within one year.
The other 30MHz currently allocated to DSRC is being set aside for a newer vehicle-safety technology called Cellular Vehicle-to-Everything (C-V2X). "Today's action therefore begins the transition away from DSRC services -- which are incompatible with C-V2X -- to hasten the actual deployment of ITS [Intelligent Transportation Systems] services that will improve automotive safety," the FCC said. The FCC still has to finalize technical rules for outdoor unlicensed operations on the lower 45MHz and for how to transition the upper 30MHz from DSRC to C-V2X. Freeing up 45MHz "will supersize Wi-Fi, a technology so many of us are relying on like never before," said FCC Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel. Meanwhile, FCC Democrat Geoffrey Starks called the spectrum reassignment an important step toward reducing congestion "and ensuring that we realize the full potential of our broadband connections."
In addition to improving home Wi-Fi, the extra 45MHz will benefit public Wi-Fi networks that are relied upon by many people without good Internet access at home, he said.
In today's decision, the FCC split the spectrum band and reallocated part of it to Wi-Fi and part of it to a newer vehicle technology. The lower 45MHz from 5.850GHz to 5.895GHz will be allocated to Wi-Fi and other unlicensed services. "This spectrum's impact will be further amplified by the fact that it is adjacent to an existing Wi-Fi band which, when combined with the 45MHz made available today, will support cutting-edge broadband applications," the FCC said. "These high-throughput channels -- up to 160 megahertz wide -- will enable gigabit Wi-Fi connectivity for schools, hospitals, small businesses, and other consumers." "Full-power indoor unlicensed operations" are authorized immediately, while "outdoor unlicensed use" will be allowed "on a coordinated basis under certain circumstances," the FCC said. The FCC ordered DSRC services to vacate the lower 45MHz within one year.
The other 30MHz currently allocated to DSRC is being set aside for a newer vehicle-safety technology called Cellular Vehicle-to-Everything (C-V2X). "Today's action therefore begins the transition away from DSRC services -- which are incompatible with C-V2X -- to hasten the actual deployment of ITS [Intelligent Transportation Systems] services that will improve automotive safety," the FCC said. The FCC still has to finalize technical rules for outdoor unlicensed operations on the lower 45MHz and for how to transition the upper 30MHz from DSRC to C-V2X. Freeing up 45MHz "will supersize Wi-Fi, a technology so many of us are relying on like never before," said FCC Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel. Meanwhile, FCC Democrat Geoffrey Starks called the spectrum reassignment an important step toward reducing congestion "and ensuring that we realize the full potential of our broadband connections."
In addition to improving home Wi-Fi, the extra 45MHz will benefit public Wi-Fi networks that are relied upon by many people without good Internet access at home, he said.
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Why do you think emergency equipment always involve a radio?
Re:Another good decision (Score:2)
[erased]
I started to add more details but it soon became either a history lesson about the division of the spectrum or a physics lesson on propagation theory. The spectrum is monitored for usage and sometimes reassigned when needed. For example, the frequencies for an
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The reason why, is because you clearly don't understand how radio communication works. Fortunately, there's lots of RF engineers that do.
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Thank you FCC Chairperson Ajit Pai and thank you Donald Trump!
Pai was appointed to the FCC by Barack Obama.
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Pai was appointed to the FCC by Barack Obama.
And Obama deserves a full ration for that shite decision.
But Trump made him chairman, and that gets an extra ^2 helpings.
All politicians are created equally terrible, but some are more equal than others.
WRONG (Score:2)
1) The FCC chair pick was Trump.
2) Mitch McConnell picked him for the FCC because law required a republican.
3) find the least corrupt republicans and Mitch would reject them; possibly anybody Obama suggested would have been rejected by Mitch... Obama simply asked Mitch to select somebody for him to put up for approval; side stepping the political theater.
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Another bullshit comment by an uneducated Deplorable.
No matter how you may feel about the origins of that label, every now and then a fucking idiot rightfully earns that moniker.
Stopped clock (Score:2)
Stopped clocks can be right 0.14% of the time too, just like Ajit Pai.
This is exactly the kind of thing the FCC should be doing - reviewing licenses for if the spectrum is being used or not, and reclaiming what isn't. Note that this isn't a partisan issue, because at least two commissioners appointed by a Democrat president voted in favor.
Good job trying to make partisan shit out of nothing though. Your guy still lost.
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I can hate someone and still agree with some of their actions.
Even Hiter made some good decisions. For instance, he was an advocate of laws against animal cruelty.
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Mussolini kept the trains running on time.
No he didn't.
Records from the era show that trains in Italy were no more likely to be on-time than in the pre-Mussolini era.
Mussolini did not make the trains run on time [snopes.com].
There is no "upside" to fascism.
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Techies also hate shitty generalizations, one of which you just made.
Wifi 6e+? (Score:4, Interesting)
So they came out with WiFi 6, quickly followed by Wifi 6e that uses the newly allocated 6GHz frequency. Now what will they call it with the use of this new range? Will it be WiFi 6e+? The new naming using WiFi 6 instead of 802.11ax was supposed to simplify things, but of course immediately the simple becomes complex. At least it's nothing like the the mess of USB branding.
In any case, I'm not clear on how much better than 6e this will be, but there's a new bar to hit to have the latest and greatest. Hopefully this new frequency will be within range of existing hardware, so it should just be a firmware upgrade as opposed to requiring new hardware.
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Re:Wifi 6e+? (Score:4, Interesting)
You don't need to upgrade to benefit.
If your neighbor upgrades, you benefit because there is less congestion on the original bands.
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Could be interesting for other countries too. For a long time 2.4GHz band 13 was supposed to be Japan only but you could enable it on most devices with a bit of hacking, and it was nice and clear with a very low probability of anything bad happening as a result of using it.
Even if other countries don't free up the same spectrum, given the low range of 6GHz signals it is probably safe to use in your home and nobody will notice.
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The use of channel 13 is what led to the FCC to force manufacturers to restrict ac
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Not sure about the firmware upgrades. If it requires any re-certification they might not bother for older products and instead release new ones.
Gimme That Bandwidth (Score:1)
Hurry up. The net is slow here.
Maybe they should wait... (Score:1)
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Since Pai is soon to be looking for a job ...
Pai's term began in 2017 and lasts for 5 years. So he has the job until 2022.
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Nope. In January he's still on the committee, but is no longer the head, and three of the five (including the new head) will be Democrats. Pai's relevance to any decisions is mostly done.
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You forgot one BIG problem in your rant. Obama may have appointed Pai to the FCC but (and this is a big but) at the time of the appointment Obama was obligated to appoint a Republican to the position (the FCC is uaually divided 3-2 with the majority being from the party in power).
The agency is directed by five commissioners who are appointed by the President of the United States and confirmed by the U.S. Senate. The president also selects one of the commissioners to serve as chairman. Only three commissioners can be of the same political party at any given time and none can have a financial interest in any commission-related business. All commissioners, including the chairman, have five-year terms, except when filling an unexpired term.
https://www.fcc.gov/about-fcc/... [fcc.gov]
Pai has been a commissioner at the FCC since 2012, when he was appointed by then-President Obama and confirmed by the Senate. Though an Obama appointee, Pai does not share Obama’s progressive views and is by no means someone Obama would have chosen to lead the commission. Rather, there’s a tradition of letting the minority party pick two commissioners, since the majority can only legally hold three seats; in nominating Pai — at the recommendation of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican — Obama was sticking to that tradition.
https://www.theverge.com/2017/... [theverge.com]
There is a second problem in your rant. Obama appointed Pai to be a commissioner of the FCC he did not appoint him as chairman. Trump selected Pai as chairman of
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If you paid the slightest attention you would know that this was approved by many members of the board, not just Pal. Including Democrats.
Re: Maybe they should wait... (Score:3)
Allocating more bandwidth to wifi seems reasonable, and the auto industry hasn't really used it. I suspect the new protocol has more data rate more reliably with less of the spectrum than the unused one it's replacing too.
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the auto industry hasn't really used it.
My car connects to the Internet using standard WiFi.
So shutting down DSCR and transferring the spectrum to WiFi should be good for cars.
Re: Maybe they should wait... (Score:2)
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I'm surprised it uses wifi and not cellular for internet access.
It uses both. WiFi if available. Cellular if not.
OTA software updates require WiFi. They only happen when the car is in the garage and connected to my home WiFi.
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This bit of spectrum wasn't used for connection to the Internet. It was for inter-vehicle communication for warning about road conditions ahead. And it wasn't used, like, at all. 15,000 cars out of the millions on US roads have hardware for this, which means there are probably zero non-car radios out there to use for seeding the messages.
It's a defunct technology that was never adopted, and it's time to give that spectrum back.
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So I would like to point out to you that we happen to be entering the era of self driving cars that need spectrum, and finally due to this change they will get it.
Please stop fighting progress, self-driving cars are coming no matter how much you want to fight it.
Changes like this will make them that much safer for everyone.
You're only hurting yourself by being known as the person favoring spectrum squatting and fighting progress.
I'm not sure you are understanding exactly what the changes are. The spectrum that was allotted for automobiles was actually reduced by these changes. Since the spectrum was reduced it is difficult to see how "finally due to this change they will get it."
The spectrum that is being taken away from automobiles is being reallocated to the open spectrum that WiFi uses. The only way that autonomous cars are going to get more spectrum is if they use the WiFi spectrum that is being used freely by anyone that wants
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To be fair, they are reducing the frequency allotted to technology in cars that no cars actually implement. Reclaiming the spectrum and reprovisioning it to a modern automotive use (half) and the other half to a technology that literally everyone uses every day is good governance.
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I doubt a 20 year old technology that has only been implemented on 15k vehicles total would be very useful for self-driving cars. Vehicles can probably do a lot more with the new standard on 30MHz than they could with that old standard in 75Mhz (75Mhz based techs 20 years ago might have given a couple hundred mbit/s, a 30mhz tech today achieves about 1.5 gbit/s)
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Well, any large WiFi deployments (such as those found in malls, airports, company offices, etc.) will benefit from this. Therefore, a large swath of US citizens will benefit from this at least a little. And literally nobody is going to be hurt by it - the 15,000 cars in total that had the tech to use this spectrum have probably never received even a single message via it, and most of those cars probably found their way to the crusher in the last 20 years anyway.
What are you bitching about again?
DSRC (Score:1)
Maybe, just maybe, there is so little use of this spectrum for DSRC because automated driving has not yet taken off?
I don't know what exactly is communicated over DSRC, but I imagine it to be something like "Hi, I'm this 40t truck in your vicinity and I stepped on the brake hard 2ms ago" or "Hey, slow down, there is the tail of a traffic jam around the next corner". Stuff like that significantly improves safety by reducing the reliance on image recognition.
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Assuming the facts in the summary are straightforwardly presented, DSRC doesn't sound like it would be a relevant technology.
It was carved out 20 years ago and only seen 15k installations. Looks like it had a data rate of 27 Mb/s. It's an old technology that was speculatively carved out around the turn of the century and then pretty well abandoned.
Even without being sunset, it appears the C-V2X would be preferred anyway. Couldn't find throughput numbers, but other contemporary technology could deliver ove
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DSRC and C-V2X are both in their infancy. Allocations were made in the 90s when ITS infrastructure was just taking off, but autonomous vehicles took longer than expected. Note that Pai parrots the talking point about DSRC's low deployment, but never cites numbers about how C-V2X is even less deployed. It's bald-faced, but journalists don't seem to be calling it out.
To put it very simply: DSRC is a peer-to-peer technology, and inherently allows more individual privacy, since you're only communicating with ve