Republican Representatives Elise Stefanik of NY and Mike Gallagher of WI introduced the Foreign Adversary Communications Transparency (FACT) Act to counter the influence of foreign adversaries on the United States’ telecommunications infrastructure. The bill would require the FCC to publish a list of companies that hold Commission authorizations, licenses, or other grants of authority with over 10 percent ownership by foreign adversarial governments, including China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.
“Allowing companies owned by China and our other foreign adversaries to have access to our critical infrastructure is playing with fire, and we must have transparency over the influence they can have over the lives of American citizens,” said Stefanik.
“Despite the threat posed by Chinese Communist Party-directed telecommunications companies, many are still licensed to operate in the United States. Worse, while [evil] actors like Huawei and ZTE have received public scrutiny, other CCP-directed actors are currently flying below the radar. The Foreign Adversary Communications Transparency Act will strengthen our national security by providing badly-needed transparency and pave the way for further action against listed entities in the near future,” Gallagher said.
FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr applauded the bill and he encouraged Congress to quickly pass what he calls “common sense” legislation. “It is vital that we provide a full and transparent accounting of every entity with ties back into the Chinese Communist Party—and the governments of other authoritarian regimes—that are operating inside America’s tech and telecom markets, yet there has never been a public disclosure when it comes to those networks of relationships,” said Carr. “We know the CCP is engaged in a widespread and coordinated campaign to surveil Americans, and they are willing to use every tool at their disposal to advance their goals.” One way they do this, said Carr, “is by developing and exploiting relationships within tech and telecom interests.”
By Leslie Stimson, Inside Towers Washington Bureau Chief
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