Device listings will have to show an equipment authorisation number under a new Commission order

Anyone buying a router, a drone or a home security camera through an online marketplace will, within the next nine months, find an equipment authorisation number displayed beside the product. The Federal Communications Commission adopted the requirement in a Third Report and Order and Third Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in ET Docket 21-232, published in the Federal Register on 11 September 2026 at 91 FR 57798. The final rule is effective 13 October 2026.

The number, an FCC ID, is issued when a radio device clears the Commission's equipment authorisation process. It has not, until now, had to appear at the place where most devices are actually bought.

New section 2.803(c) of the Commission's rules requires an online marketplace to display a valid and accurate FCC ID at the online point of sale. The obligation arrives in two stages. Marketplaces with physical access to or title over the device must comply from 1 March 2027, under section 2.803(c)(1). Marketplaces without physical access or title have until 1 June 2027, under section 2.803(c)(2).

The same order settles whether the Commission's marketing rules reach those platforms at all. New section 2.803(a)(1) states that marketing includes listing regulated equipment on an online marketplace combined with consignment, warehousing, inventory management, order processing, labelling, packaging, billing or fulfilment services, even where the equipment is sold or offered for sale by a third-party seller.

The component part loophole

The other half of the order concerns what is inside a device rather than how it is listed. Since 2022 the Commission has barred new equipment authorisations for devices made by companies on its Covered List. A device that merely contained a component made by one of those companies could still be authorised.

"Since 2022, devices made by Covered List entities, like Huawei, were banned from getting new authorizations, but devices containing Huawei component parts could continue to get approval to enter the U.S. market, even though the compromised component part can make up the whole device."

That is Chairman Brendan Carr, in his statement on the order. The order now bars authorisation for any device containing a logic-bearing hardware component produced by a company on the Covered List, and requires full recertification for any change an entity on that list makes to its equipment.

A logic-bearing hardware component is newly defined in section 2.902 as any device, system, module, sub-assembly, integrated circuit or other physical component that generates and uses timing signals or pulses at a rate above 9,000 pulses (cycles) per second and uses digital techniques, or that generates and uses radio frequency energy to perform data processing functions.

The Commission considered and rejected a categorical ban on all components produced by Covered List entities rather than only logic-bearing ones, finding on the record that it would impose disproportionate redesign, retesting and supply-chain costs. It also rejected taking no action.

Who does not have to display an identifier

Three exemptions sit in section 2.803(c)(3). A listing published before the effective date is exempt unless it is later amended, updated or republished. A listing by a third-party seller who is not a high-volume third-party seller, as that term is defined in 15 U.S.C. 45f(f)(6), is exempt. So is a listing for a used device, meaning one previously sold to a retail customer and marketed as used or otherwise not new.

The order draws a line through what counts as an amendment that ends the grandfathering. A change to a listing's product description, images, specifications or seller information does. A change to search ranking, page layout, translation, pricing or currency display does not.

The order estimates one-time implementation costs of no more than $300 million, largely from online marketplaces updating listing systems to support FCC ID display, and recurring annual costs under $40 million, largely from sellers identifying and including FCC IDs. Against those it estimates benefits that "could exceed $1 billion annually".

The National Retail Federation had told the Commission that platforms "do not have a meaningful way to confidently assess FCC rule compliance for millions of products". The Commission answered that the same members had voluntarily verified and removed three million listings in six months under its Operation Clean Carts initiative. It also rejected the argument that section 230 of the Communications Act bars the requirement, holding that the rule places a duty on the marketplace itself to verify and display the identifier rather than imposing liability for third-party content.

Penalties, and what the record does not settle

The Commission has been issuing supply-chain penalties around the order through the late summer. On 27 August 2026 it adopted a Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture proposing $188,491 each against Hytera Communications Corporation Limited and ZTE Corporation, the statutory maximum for a single act or failure to act, for failing to file the names and contact details of subsidiaries and affiliates identified on the Covered List. It was released on 28 August 2026, giving each company 30 calendar days to file the missing information and to pay or contest the proposed forfeiture.

On 31 August 2026 the Enforcement Bureau issued seven Forfeiture Orders of $25,000 each, $175,000 in total, against Cogito Tech Company Limited, Fikaxo Technology Inc., Lyno Dynamics LLC, Skyhigh Tech LLC, Spatial Hover Inc, SZ Knowact Robot Technology Co., Ltd and WaveGo Tech LLC, each for failing to answer a Letter of Inquiry.

On 11 September 2026 the Bureau issued a Citation against Derycom Certification Services, Inc., finding that it falsely stated it is based in the United States in order to obtain status as a Telecommunication Certification Body and operated beyond its authorised technical scope. Derycom is no longer recognised by the Commission as such a body.

The order never names which specific marketplaces fall on which side of the physical access and title line that separates the March deadline from the June one. The cost figures are the Commission's own, with no independent estimate and no breakdown by platform or by number of affected listings. No document shows whether Hytera or ZTE filed the missing information or paid; a Notice of Apparent Liability is a proposal, not a final penalty. And the seven forfeitures were issued for not answering a Letter of Inquiry, not for any finding that those companies marketed covered equipment. The question the inquiry letters asked is still unanswered on the record.