From PC World: The strange saga of the FCC and open-source router firmware continues. After new FCC rules encouraged TP-Link and other router manufacturers to block open-source firmware, the FCC is now forcing TP-Link to do the opposite, and support open-source firmware.
As Ars Technica noticed, TP-Link just came to a settlement with the FCC. TP-Link was selling routers that allowed users to change the country code to operate in unlicensed ways in the United States. TP-Link agreed to pay a fine of $200,000 and follow the FCC’s rules in the future. But, most interestingly, TP-Link also agreed to enable open-source firmware to function on its routers.
That’s interesting because TP-Link’s violation had nothing to do with open-source router firmware. In fact, the FCC doesn’t require manufacturers to support third-party router firmware. Furthermore, recent FCC rules even made it more difficult for manufacturers to support open-source router firmware, by requiring manufacturers to ensure that the open-source firmware wouldn't allow a router’s radio to operate in an unlicensed fashion. Linksys, for its part, has been going out of its way to enable open-source firmware, but most router manufacturers just chose to not bother.
But the FCC isn’t coming down hard against third-party router firmware. In fact, it went out of its way to extract a pledge that TP-Link “will investigate for certain of its router models the development of U-NII security solutions that would allow for the use of third-party firmware with its devices while meeting the Commission’s U-NII security requirements and maintaining the integrity of critical radio parameters.” The details are in the settlement itself.
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