The United States and its Complicated Relationship With Net Neutrality

The United States and its Complicated Relationship With Net Neutrality

Abstract

Net Neutrality is the belief that all users of the Internet should have the same service regardless of the type of content, source or destination of the traffic, if you are an average consumer, a tech company, or even if you are the owner of a major web platform. While many seek that reality for all who use the internet, there are many who oppose it. Technological companies, consumers and the government are all involved, and all have conflicting viewpoints on how the internet should be utilized, whether it should be regulated and by who. This is further complicated by the way the internet has had to be regulated by being interpreted under a federal communications act that was originally made to regulate the telephone industry. This paper seeks to explore the complicated relationship between the U.S. and the internet by examining past and current policies and their impacts on net neutrality today. The paper concludes with an ideal outcome for net neutrality and its policies.

           Keywords: net neutrality, internet, Communications Act of 1934, FCC

The United States and its Complicated Relationship With Net Neutrality

Net Neutrality is the general concept that all users of the Internet should have the same service regardless of the type of content, source or destination of the traffic, or whether you're the owner of a web platform. To sum it up, net neutrality means the internet service provider (ISP) cannot throttle or slow down your network bandwidth depending on what you're doing. While this sounds like common sense, there are many obstacles in the way of making net neutrality a reality. Some of these obstacles include people and organizations that oppose it. The main argument for those who oppose it is that they believe it is not necessary. Those who are for net neutrality think that without it, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) could charge unfair prices, deny access and high-quality bandwidth, block certain content or websites, among other reasons. Another great obstacle comes through the political actions and policies of governments. The impact of net neutrality can be great and severe, not just on companies and organizations, but on the information technology profession and on individuals as well. This paper will explore the history of net neutrality, policies, and its impacts specifically within the United States.

           A unique challenge to net neutrality is that the United States has no singular federal communications law that is directly related to the internet and its services (Higgins & Regan, 2016). Instead of having its own law, rules and regulations have been built upon older ones, starting with the Communications Act of 1934. The Communications Act of 1934 was for regulating telephones and was extended to include cable in 1984 with the Cable Communications Policy. It became the duty of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to interpret new orders that fell under the Communication act and relate them to the internet, even though it was not originally intended for the internet (Higgins & Regan, 2016)  In 2018, the FCC repealed the Open Internet Order of 2015. The crucial difference between the two orders was that it “classified ISPs as “telecommunications services” under Title II of the 1934 Communications Act, and in 2018, it classified them as “information services” under Title I” in the Restoring Internet Freedom Order (Chin, 2019). A Title II classification allowed the FCC “to regulate pricing, interconnection rates, privacy, and other practices” of telephones originally (Chin, 2019).  Under Title II, the power of ISPs has weakened, and the FCC became stronger again. In 2018, Mozilla, the open-source web browser, sued the FCC because of the reclassification and their belief that FCC had overstepped their authority. In 2019, the D.C. Circuit court decided in Mozilla V. FCC that the FCC had not overstepped their authority in reclassifying, but they rejected four of the changes that had been made in the Restoring Internet Freedom Order. The D.C. Circuit court explained that the FCC “needed to more adequately explain how a Title I classification might affect internet access for public safety workers; pole attachments in broadband deployment; and the eligibility of lower-income consumers to receive Lifeline benefits” (Chin, 2019). Chin (2019) says that this ruling could pave the way for states to continue fighting for their own net neutrality laws, cause Congress to come together to create a classification for ISPs, or update and modernize the Communication Act in the best interest of net neutrality.

Without net neutrality, there are so many people, organizations, and businesses that can be affected. In 2015, under the Obama administration, there was regulation and rules that were put into place to protect net neutrality and was called the Open Internet Order (Chin, 2019; Collins, 2018). The regulation made it so that “broadband service was considered a utility under Title II of the Communications Act, giving the FCC broad power over internet providers” (Collins, 2018). These rules included that ISPs could not block certain websites, nor throttle data, or develop “an internet fast lane for companies and consumers who paid premiums, and a slow lane for those who didn’t” (Collins, 2018). If ISPs sold internet data plans, it would be similar to buying cable and only those who could afford it or higher data rates would have better access, or access at all. Businesses would be affected too, because only larger, wealthier businesses would be able to afford faster speeds and smaller businesses wouldn’t. While the regulation and rules put in place in 2015 offered protections to individuals, businesses, and other users of the internet, it was repealed in 2017 by FCC. It was also determined that states could not implement their own net neutrality laws (Collins, 2018). The dissolution of the regulation and rules were put into effect in June of 2018 with the Restoring Internet Freedom Order and ISPs have not chosen to make changes to their services at least at the moment (Chin, 2019; Collins, 2018). More recently in 2019, advocates for the repealed regulation and rules asked for a rehearing (Shepardson, 2020). Those who supported a rehearing included 15 states and businesses such as Facebook Inc, Amazon.com Inc, among others. However, in February of 2020, the U.S. Court of Appeals decided to not rehear the case. Due to the current circumstances, it stands to reason that without protections to net neutrality, ISPs can now freely alter the service of their consumers “ as long as they disclose changes” and these changes may be yet to come (Collins, 2018).

Net Neutrality, like most other controversial notions, has both strong supporters and opposers. On one side the supporters of net neutrality want the internet to be free and open for everyone. There are two main subsections in the supporters of net neutrality: content providers, and consumers/ human rights advocates. Content providers support net neutrality because it puts them at risk of being exploited by internet service providers. Most consumers on the other hand worry that without net neutrality the internet could become censored similar to most cable television networks. For example, imagine if your ISP started charging you an extra fee for having access to the news or for video streaming services. Most opposition to net neutrality comes from the belief that the FCC should have limited authority in regulating the internet. They also think that regulation of the internet would hurt the economy. Some think that “fast lanes” would be useful and beneficial for hospitals or other medical places. Additionally, opponents assert that government regulation could decrease technological advances because there would be more management. In the Open Internet Order of 2015, the internet was classified to be more like a utility. Opponents did not like this because they felt “imposing century-old-telephone-utility regulations would choke growth and improvement” (Higgins & Regan, 2016). In response to this, companies came together to sue the FCC in 2015. These companies included “USTelecom Association, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, CTIA-The Wireless Association, the American Cable Association, the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association, AT&T, and CenturyLink” (“United States Telecom,” n.d.). In the US Telecom Association et al. v. FCC, they had four main concerns. They believed that the FCC did not have the right to start regulating the industry after not previously regulating it, that it was illegal under the internet's new classification as an information service, that it misrepresented the Telecommunications Act, and they believed it had not been properly thought out before it had been carried out. The FCC stated that because it “was the expert on telecommunications services, it— not the courts— should be allowed to interpret the act” (Higgins & Regan, 2016). In 2016, the D.C. Circuit ruled that the reclassification of the internet was legal, and that the FCC was within their authority to do so (“United States Telecom,” n.d.).  However, Judge Williams both agreed and dissented. One of his beliefs was that the FCC had not really given solid justification for changing classification.

Net Neutrality is important to information technology professionals because it affects how they conduct their work. According to Higgins and Regan (2016), multiple large technology companies including Cisco and IBM signed a letter that argued net neutrality would not only slow down innovation but could also lead to a recession, or a depression. They argued that if tech companies don’t believe they will see a return on their initial investment, then they will be less likely to innovate and will instead become more complacent. I believe the ideal outcome of net neutrality is that the internet should become a utility. I believe by categorizing the internet as a utility it would force internet service providers to continue to expand to more areas and innovate further within technology. It would also protect major media streaming platforms like YouTube and Netflix from being extorted by ISP in order to have their content served.

Net neutrality protects consumers and businesses by forcing internet service providers to treat all internet traffic equally no matter where it originated or where it’s heading. There are two opposing sides when it comes to net neutrality. Those that support it believe that without it, ISPs would begin issuing a pay per use model where consumers may have to pay for each individual website they wish to visit. They also believe without net neutrality, ISPs could begin forcing companies and consumers to pay extra in order to have their internet traffic prioritized. Those that oppose net neutrality generally believe it hinders innovation since many companies won’t invest in innovation if they aren’t guaranteed a return on their investment. They also believe if the internet is allowed to operate in the free market it could cause competition, which would drive prices down while forcing the ISP to innovate. In my opinion, the ideal outcome for this is that the internet should be classified as a utility since it is now vital to everyday life. This would force the internet service providers to continue to expand their service area while forcing them to compete with local municipalities.

References

Chin, C. (2019, October 7). In the net neutrality debate, what might follow Mozilla v. FCC?   Retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/blog/techtank/2019/10/07/in-the-net-neutrality-debate-what-might-follow-mozilla-v-fcc/

Collins, K. (2018, June 11). Net Neutrality Has Officially Been Repealed. Here's How That Could Affect You. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/technology/net-neutrality-repeal.html

Higgins, M., & Regan, M. (2016). Net neutrality. Retrieved from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com

Shepardson, D. (2020, February 6). U.S. appeals court will not reconsider net neutrality repeal ruling. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-internet/u-s-appeals-court-will-not-reconsider-net-neutrality-repeal-ruling-idUSKBN20032K

United States Telecom Association v. FCC, et al. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.chamberlitigation.com/cases/united-states-telecom-association-v-fcc-et-al