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US Senator asks telcos nicely to keep net neutrality

by on24 October 2014

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U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy has asked the large Internet providers to pledge that they will not strike deals that may help some websites load faster than others or give similar "fast lanes" to affiliated services.

Leahy wrote to chiefs of AT&T, Verizon Communications, Time Warner Cable and Charter Communications asking them to formally commit to no so-called "paid prioritisation" deals in which content companies could pay Internet providers to ensure smooth and fast delivery of their traffic.

This is an attempt to defuse the net neutrality row, by effectively asking the telcos to back down with the advantage that new laws will not have to be drafted that they might like even less.

The Federal Communications Commission has received 3.9 million comments after it proposed new web traffic rules that would prohibit ISPs from blocking content, but suggested allowing some "commercially reasonable" paid prioritisation deals.

Large ISPs, including Verizon, Comcast and AT&T, have been asserting that they had no plans for such paid prioritisation arrangements and FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has said he would not tolerate anti-competitive or anti-consumer prioritisation deals.

Nonetheless, consumer advocates and other critics are concerned that opening the door for paid prioritisation, could create "fast lanes" for some content and so relegate other websites and applications to "slow lanes."

"These types of arrangements pose a significant threat of dividing the Internet into those who can afford to compete and those who cannot," Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, wrote in his letters.

 

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