FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said on Wednesday the Commission will vote during its April 25 meeting to restore Net Neutrality. She says that would bring back a national standard for broadband reliability, security, and consumer protection. If adopted, the agency says the Chairwoman’s proposal would ensure that broadband services are treated as an essential resource deserving of FCC oversight under Title II authority.
“The pandemic proved once and for all that broadband is essential,” said Rosenworcel. “After the prior administration abdicated authority over broadband services, the FCC has been handcuffed from acting to fully secure broadband networks, protect consumer data, and ensure the internet remains fast, open, and fair,” she continued. “A return to the FCC’s overwhelmingly popular and court-approved standard of net neutrality will allow the agency to serve once again as a strong consumer advocate of an open internet.”
The FCC’s rationale is there are no national Net Neutrality protections. States can step in and regulate the internet. Roughly 12 have done so, according to a senior Commission official speaking to reporters yesterday.
Opponents say restoring net neutrality would enable rate regulation. A senior FCC official said it would not.
Reaction was swift and strong. USTelecom President/CEO Jonathan Spalter was not impressed. “Here we go again. It’s been two years since the White House asked Congress and the country to be all in on Internet for All. But just as this goal is now within reach, the FCC is pumping the brakes with this entirely counterproductive, unnecessary, and anti-consumer regulatory distraction. America deserves better.”
Benton Institute for Broadband and Society Senior Counselor Andrew Jay Schwartzman praised the concept. “By restoring broadband as subject to the Commission’s authority under Title II of the Communications Act, the FCC will assure that a handful of powerful telecommunications companies will not favor themselves and their business partners over consumers, nonprofits and small businesses who also seek to speak and to receive information over the internet,” he said.
Schwartzman said the issue is about “much” more than preventing ISPs from throttling speeds or blocking certain content in favor of paid prioritization. It’s also about “public safety, national security and privacy,” Schwartzman explained. “Title II protects first responders’ ability to use the internet during emergencies and gives the FCC more authority to protect the integrity of America’s telecommunications networks from cyberattacks. Right now, the FCC can do little more than rely on ISPs’ promises to protect customers’ information; Title II rules make them enforceable.”
Evan Swarztrauber is a Senior Fellow on broadband and telecom policy at the Foundation for American Innovation, a Washington, D.C. think tank whose mission is “to develop technology, talent, and ideas that support a better, freer, and more abundant future,” according to its website. Swarztrauber is a former policy advisor to then-FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner Brendan Carr.
Swarztrauber said, “Unleashing a regulatory onslaught on the very industry needed to close the digital divide is a questionable choice in an election year.” He explained the “hysterical predictions of doom” didn’t happen when it was repealed in 2017. “So, the FCC is now rebranding net neutrality as key to national security—a cynical attempt to justify what cannot be justified based on the facts.”
The FCC plans to make a draft of the order publicly available today.
By Leslie Stimson, Inside Towers Washington Bureau Chief
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