President Obama said he wants to classify the internet as a utility and is asking the Federal Communications Commission revisit an attempt to come up with rules to protect net neutrality.
“Net neutrality” has been built into the fabric of the Internet since its creation — but it is also a principle that we cannot take for granted,” Obama said in a statement. “We cannot allow Internet service providers to restrict the best access or to pick winners and losers in the online marketplace for services and ideas.”
Net neutrality is the idea that internet providers and governments should treat all data equally without discriminating or charging differently user, content, site, platform, application, type of attached equipment, or mode of communication.
Obama said the FCC is an independent agency and the decision is theirs but he recommends implementing four “common-sense steps” to help protect net neutrality: no blocking, no throttling, increased transparency and no paid prioritization.
The president said the FCC tried to implement rules four years ago but its efforts were challenged and struck down but not because the court disagreed with net neutrality. The problem was with the legal approach the FCC used in attempting to implement rules, Obama added.
For almost a century, our law has recognized that companies who connect you to the world have special obligations not to exploit the monopoly they enjoy over access in and out of your home or business. That is why a phone call from a customer of one phone company can reliably reach a customer of a different one, and why you will not be penalized solely for calling someone who is using another provider. It is common sense that the same philosophy should guide any service that is based on the transmission of information — whether a phone call, or a packet of data.
Watch President Obama explain his plan:
Chad Hemenway is Managing Editor of Advisen News. He has more than 15 years of journalist experience at a variety of online, daily, and weekly publications. He has covered P&C insurance news since 2007, and he has experience writing about all P&C lines as well as regulation and litigation. Chad won a Jesse H. Neal Award for Best Single Article in 2014 for his coverage of the insurance implications of traumatic brain injuries and Best News Coverage in 2013 for coverage of Superstorm Sandy. Contact Chad at 212.897.4824 or [email protected].
