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Net Neutrality Counterattacks
New Democratic legislation end-runs Republican bills by giving Internet freedom the force of law.

May 3, 2006
Despite early setbacks, the Net neutrality forces are regrouping and their first major counterattack comes in the form of a new bill proposed by a group of Democrats that goes well past two other telecommunications bills by strictly barring phone companies from establishing Internet tolls.

The Network Neutrality Act of 2006 defines Net neutrality and gives it the force of law, a development that could cost phone companies billions in lost revenue and may spare corporations that depend on Internet traffic a major additional cost.

The bill outlines a limited number of exceptions, including the routing of emergency communications and spam blocking. It also includes a complaint process that enables grievances and violations to be arbitrated and expedited within 30 days.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Edward Markey (D-Massachusetts), is based on an amendment he proposed to the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006 (COPE). The act passed, but the amendment was voted down by a U.S. House subcommittee and committee (see Phone Firms Win on Hill).

The COPE bill gives the phone companies national entrée to the pay-TV business. COPE basically kept the status quo on Net neutrality, allowing the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to arbitrate complaints.

Senate Passed on Net Neutrality
A similar bill introduced in the Senate this week also refuses to wrap the force of law around Net neutrality. Instead, the Communications, Consumer’s Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006 does essentially the same thing as COPE. It passes the responsibility for Net neutrality decision making to the FCC (see US Senate Punts Net Neutrality).

The Net Neutrality Act of 2006 states that broadband network owners may not block, impair, or degrade the ability of any person to use a broadband connection to access the content, applications, and services available on the Internet (see Congress Meets on Net Tolls).

The bill, sponsored by Representatives Rick Boucher (D-Virginia), Anna Eshoo (D-California), and Jay Inslee (D-Washington), specifically outlaws any tiered service for which broadband service providers can charge a fee for enhanced quality of service (see Setback for Net Neutrality).

“It is a choice between favoring the broadband designs of a small handful of very large companies, and safeguarding the dreams of thousands of inventors, entrepreneurs, and small businesses,” said Rep. Markey.

The bill takes the neutrality approach to service provided by the phone and cable companies themselves. If a broadband provider gives its VoIP service priority on the network, it has to offer that same level of service to VoIP traffic from its competitors.

So AT&T, for instance, cannot give its VoIP traffic any advantage over that of Skype or Google Talk under the bill.

World Wide Web Rights
The bill also gives consumers the wide-ranging right to attach any device to the broadband network. This aspect of the bill covers popular network-attached devices such as Internet phones, Wi-Fi routers, set-top boxes, or “any other innovative gadget invented in the coming years.”

Net neutrality has emerged as an issue after court decisions weakened certain neutrality protections on the Internet. The chief executive of the largest phone company, AT&T’s Edward Whitacre, has introduced the idea of tiered services that would require some companies to pay for service on the Internet.

The phone companies have argued that companies such as Google, Yahoo, and eBay’s Skype have made billions of dollars on the Internet without contributing to the upkeep of the broadband network.

The tolls charged to companies such as Google would go toward ongoing investment in the network.

That debate has now spiraled into a battle for a kind of freedom of use of the Internet—a development the rest of the world is watching.

“Broadband network owners should not be able to determine who can and who cannot offer services over broadband networks or over the Internet,” said Rep. Markey. “The detrimental effect to the digital economy would be quite severe if such conduct were permitted and became widespread.”