HARRY REID 
NEVADA 
The Honorable Tom Wheeler 
Chairman 
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WASHINGTON, DC 20510-7020 
June 14, 2016 
Federal Communications Commission 
445 12th Street, SW 
Washington, D.C. 20554 
Dear Chairman Wheeler: 
DEMOCRATIC LEADER 
I appreciate your effort to expand consumers' choice of set-top boxes by improving competition 
in video navigation systems through your proposal to "unlock the set-top box." I am concerned 
that your proposal does not contain mechanisms to ensure that third-party set-top box providers 
will be required to adequately protect programming content or consumer privacy. I urge you to 
give careful consideration to these possible consequences and ensure that they are resolved 
before proceeding with your proposal. 
Programmers do not rely on copyright laws alone to protect their content. Rather, the complex 
licensing and contractual arrangements they negotiate are the means through which they exercise 
their legal copyright protections. As drafted, the FCC's proposal would not extend these 
licensing or contractual arrangements to third-party box providers, and it is unclear what, if any, 
duty such providers would have to protect programming content or otherwise comply with the 
licensing agreements. It also is unclear whether programmers would have any ability to enforce 
these agreements directly with the third-party providers. As a result, programmers may be forced 
to rely primarily on costly and lengthy litigation to protect their content. As we have seen in 
other contexts, relying on litigation as a sole remedy for copyright infringement creates an 
environment where piracy may flourish and the ensuing damage cannot be undone. 
Moreover, it has become increasingly clear that for third-party box providers, the real value is 
not in producing or selling the box but in the data that the box will collect. Consumers will be 
handing over a significant amount of information about their viewing habits and, as the 
television interface is used more expansively, about themselves. While the FCC has jurisdiction 
to regulate how multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) use the consumer data 
they collect, the FCC has no similar jurisdiction over third-party box providers. As a result, a 
consumer using a third-party set-top box could have minimal recourse to ensure the strong 
privacy protections that the FCC currently obligates for MVPDs, leaving the FCC in the position 
of mandating privacy protections that it has no jurisdiction to enforce and leaving consumers 
without any meaningful remedy. 
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As you continue to pursue greater competition in the set-top box marketplace, I ask you to 
closely review the impact of this proposal on all affected parties and resolve these issues as you 
move forward. 
Thank you for your attention to this matter. 
Democratic Leader 
United States Senate