Cox called out for 'powered by fiber' ad claim

Cox Communications is being pressed to change or alter its "powered by fiber" ad claims to "clearly and conspicuously disclose" that its cable broadband service is not offered with fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) technologies. The National Advertising Division (NAD) made the recommendation following a challenge raised by AT&T, a Cox competitor that is expanding and upgrading a portion of its footprint to fiber. In its assessment, the NAD noted that Cox's cable broadband service delivers service over fiber to the node, where it's then transitioned to coaxial lines that then route high-speed Internet services to the home. Cox also uses FTTH, but has deployed it on a more limited and targeted basis. While there are examples illustrating that packets travel over fiber for more than 99% of their journey when delivered on hybrid fiber/coax (HFC) networks, the NAD held that Cox's use of "powered by fiber" messaging for cable broadband services doesn't hold up.