Net neutrality lives... in Europe, anyway: Top court supports open internet rules, snubs telcos and ISPs
- Reference: 1600239549
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/09/16/net_neutrality_lives_in_europe/
- Source link:
In a [1]ruling [PDF] on Tuesday, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) decided that “the requirements to protect internet users’ rights and to treat traffic in a non-discriminatory manner preclude an internet access provider from favouring certain applications and services.”
Or, in other words, people come before telco business models. And that includes the edge case of “zero tariff” arrangements where data caps don’t apply to specific apps or services that the ISP or telco designates. Picture a broadband provider allowing, say, Netflix streams to not count toward subscribers' monthly download limits, which squeezes Netflix's competitors out of the market. Blocking access to, traffic slowdowns of, and “fast lanes” for specific applications are also out.
The decision was welcomed by consumer-rights groups and internet companies, though ISPs and telcos are disappointed: they feel the net neutrality rules are too restrictive, and prevent them from bringing in new revenue to replace falling income from traditional telephone lines.
The judgment came after a Hungarian court asked for guidance when one of its telcos, Telenor Magyarorszag, offered a zero-tariff option to subscribers. The country’s technology regulator said that approach broke Europe’s [2]net neutrality rules , which were passed back in 2015, and the telco challenged its decision.
It is, to the best of our knowledge, the first time the CJEU has weighed in on the open internet. Interest in the case was made clear by the number of comments from countries’ governments that were submitted to the court for review: Austria, the Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Romania, and Slovenia all weighed in.
The court summarized the zero-tariff approach: “The specific feature of those packages is that the data traffic generated by certain specific applications and services does not count towards the consumption of the data volume purchased by customers. In addition, once that volume of data has been used up, those customers may continue to use those specific applications and services without restriction, while measures blocking or slowing down data traffic are applied to the other available applications and services.”
Reasoning
The court said its interpretation of the relevant regulations was that no company had the right to limit people’s right to an open internet and that people exercised those rights “via their internet access service.”
A zero-tariff approach “is liable to limit the exercise of end users’ rights,” it decided, as they “are liable to increase the use of the favoured applications and services and, accordingly, to reduce the use of the other applications and services available.”
It went on: “Furthermore, the greater the number of customers concluding such agreements, the more likely it is that, given its scale, the cumulative effect of those agreements will result in a significant limitation of the exercise of end users’ rights, or even undermine the very essence of those rights.”
It also rejected the idea there should be a measure of the impact of a zero-tariff service to see if it did in fact infringe rights, saying there was nothing in the law that required anyone to “assess whether the general obligation of equal and non-discriminatory treatment of traffic in that provision has been complied with.”
And, just to stick the knife in, it argued that any “measures blocking or slowing down traffic are based not on objectively different technical quality of service requirements for specific categories of traffic, but on commercial considerations, those measures must in themselves be regarded as incompatible with Article 3(3).”
In essence, Europe’s top court decided that money does not come before people’s rights. In the United States, meanwhile, the issue of net neutrality has everything to do with money.
Currently, with a Republican administration that takes a lot of money from Big Cable, net neutrality rules are seen as a [3]terrible thing . Come November, if there is a switch to a Democratic administration, and the balance of money comes instead from Big Internet, no doubt there will be yet another re-evaluation of the rules. ®
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[1] https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2020-09/cp200106en.pdf
[2] https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/open-internet-net-neutrality
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2020/02/21/fcc_net_neutrality/
[4] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
It just places another hurdle in the way of anyone who tries to set up an alternative to the favoured services.
You're also likely to find that the ISP will be more willing to cap the rest of the traffic because the sites the user uses the most are 'free'. This will then add another hurdle for 'alternative' sites when they soak up a users precious cap, and the users only option being to go back to the 'free' service.
Re: users only option being to go back to the 'free' service
Herding cattle. Not OK unless you're happy to see yourself as livestock. Mind you, 2.7 billion Facebook users can't be wrong
While there are certain situations where this kind of approach might have merit, current deals are merely commercial: the content providers are paying the networks for privileged access to consumers and this cannot be welcome.
What I think we will see over time is some kind of minimal, free service that all networks must provide. Say 500 MB a month at 3G speeds (adjust these numbers to suit). This would allow most people to communicate and stay informed, I also think we'll see more of the T-Mobile US approach to "unlimited" video usage but only at lower resolutions – bandwidth contention is more of an issue that total data traffic – but this should apply to all providers.
"are good for the consumer"
Which consumer? Some consumer may have no use for such services, and what if one gives you Netflix for free but not Sky, Disney or Youtube, or any combination of them? That's not good for the user at all, which is jailed to some services. And those agreement may even change with time...
On the one hand I can see that these zero cost tariff options (e.g. Netflix, Facebook, Youtube traffic doesn't count) are good for the consumer
Actually the court, according to this article, is quite clear that these are NOT in fact good for the consumer in the medium and long term because they reduce competition. From the article:
It went on: “Furthermore, the greater the number of customers concluding such agreements, the more likely it is that, given its scale, the cumulative effect of those agreements will result in a significant limitation of the exercise of end users’ rights, or even undermine the very essence of those rights.”
A thought
Since all of my traffic goes out via a VPN I presume I would gain no benefit from these 'free' sites ...... unless I take down my VPN so that my ISP can (re)start tracking what I'm doing.
Europe that terrible overbearing beurocracy
Protecting ordinary people from the 'nice' money men (and women)
... again.
/s
Re: Europe that terrible overbearing beurocracy
another good reason for Brexit! Just look where unfettered capitalism brings the society in the US! Such profits!
/s
“measures blocking or slowing down traffic are based not on objectively different technical quality of service requirements for specific categories of traffic, but on commercial considerations, those measures must in themselves be regarded as incompatible with Article 3(3).”
That's traffic shaping dealt with then. Good. Oh, we in the UK don't benefit, of course. We've TBC so the ISPs can do as they like.
Another Reason to Rejoin the EU
Good decision!
So does this mean that zero rated services in the UK like Three' Go Binge are... illegal?
if the government continues to go the Chinese way and renege on the treaties or agreements it signed, you'll be able to enjoy "free" services.
I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand I can see that these zero cost tariff options (e.g. Netflix, Facebook, Youtube traffic doesn't count) are good for the consumer and are a way for an ISP to differentiate itself in the market.
But I can also see that it could be seen as a slippery slope to only allowing blessed video streaming or social media companies.