In a pre-production draft of the Fabric, analysis indicates that the location data may need to be corrected in 70 percent of cases in rural areas, either by omission or error.
Many Indian Country is left out by either incorrectly labeling areas as “served” or simply omitting data points.
Indian Country could lose out on up to $5 billion in funding it should receive from the BEAD program if the data were accurate.
Currently, Indian Country does not uniformly have access to the data required to advocate for inclusion in each state’s BEAD funding allocation process. If accurate data is not obtained, Indian Country will likely be left behind again for the bulk of broadband funding.