Special temporary authority
In U.S. broadcast law, a special temporary authorization or special temporary authority (STA) is a type of broadcast license which temporarily allows a broadcast station to operate outside of its normal technical or legal parameters. In the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) station database (CDBS), broadcast STA applications have a prefix of BSTA (general), BLSTA (legal), BESTA (engineering), or BLESTA (both). STAs can also be issued for other telecommunication services under FCC regulation.