Big tech accountability? Read how we got here in The Closing of the Net
EU policy-makers should take note as they contemplate the Telecoms Package and 'degradation of service'
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) which oversees telecoms regulation in America, has officially sanctioned the Internet provider Comcast for throttling traffic. Comcast was accused of 'throttling' - that is, slowing down - its users' connections every time they attempted to download video files from the BitTorrent website. Bit Torrent is the company behind the peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing technology of the same name, only in America, it operates a licenced service.
The FCC determined that Comcast "unlawfully" disruputed the transfer of video files, thereby violating an important principle of the Internet, namely the open and interconnected nature of the public Internet and that broadband networks should be widely available, open, afforedable and accessible to all. The decision sets a legal precedent for cases where ISPs are accused of throttling. For European policy-makers and law-makers, it represents a landmark case against the current political will to go along with content industry requests for filtering equipment to be installed.
For the full story, see TelecomTV.
Iptegrity.com is the website of Dr Monica Horten. I’ve been analysing analysing digital policy since 2008. Way back then, I identified how issues around rights can influence Internet policy, and that has been a thread throughout all of my research. I hold a PhD in EU Communications Policy from the University of Westminster (2010), and a Post-graduate diploma in marketing. I’ve served as an independent expert on the Council of Europe Committee on Internet Freedoms, and was involved in a capacity building project in Moldova, Georgia, and Ukraine. I am currently (from June 2022) Policy Manager - Freedom of Expression, with the Open Rights Group. For more, see About Iptegrity
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"original and valuable" Times higher Education
" essential read for anyone interested in understanding the forces at play behind the web." ITSecurity.co.uk
Find out more about the book here The Closing of the Net
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In 2012, I presented my PhD research in the European Parliament.