The US government on Thursday banned internet service providers (ISPs) from meddling in the speeds their customers receive when browsing the web and downloading files, restoring tough rules rescinded during the Trump administration and setting the stage for a major legal battle with the broadband industry.
With Thursday’s party-line vote, the FCC redefined internet service as similar to legacy telephone lines, a sweeping move that comes with greater regulatory power over the broadband industry.
Leading FCC officials have said restoring net neutrality rules, and reclassifying ISPs under Title II of the agency’s congressional charter, would provide the FCC with clearer authority to adopt future rules governing everything from public safety to national security.
“Broadband is a telecommunications service and should be regulated as such,” said Justin Brookman, director for technology policy at Consumer Reports. “The Title II authority will ensure that broadband providers are properly overseen by the FCC like all telecommunications services should be.
“These 400-plus pages of relentless regulation are proof positive that old orthodoxies die hard,” said Jonathan Spalter, CEO of USTelecom, a trade association representing internet providers.
My god the fucking irony. The trade association made up of Broadband ISPs, arguing that they shouldn’t be regulated as Telecom providers, is literally called… USTelecom.
“Don’t treat us like ducks!” said the trade association representative from USDucks.
I think net neutrality is a good thing, but could this reclassification mean that the FCC will have increased authority to police content online? There has been a lot of worrying activity around that lately in general, and the FCC has a history of imposing censorship on traditional media.
These net neutrality policies ensured you can go where you want and do what you want online without your broadband provider making choices for you. They made clear your broadband provider should not have the right to block websites, slow services, or censor online content. These policies were court tested and approved. They were wildly popular. In fact, studies show that 80 percent of the public support the FCC’s net neutrality policies and opposed their repeal.
The closest we get to online censorship is obscenity laws, which one might think applies to porn, but obscenity is actually defined much more narrowly than just “content designed to arouse”. Obscenity is basically stuff that even Hugh Hefner would find offensive, stuff the average adult would find deeply repulsive and abhorrent (not just a little bit, the exact language is “patently offensive”). Adult content in general (obscenity & indecency) is banned from broadcast media during daytime hours to keep kids from seeing it; subscription-based services are exempt from such rules, which presumably means that the adults who pay for the subscription are supposed to be the ones preventing kids from using it to view adult material, if such is possible. I expect this is why anything which does manage to qualify as obscene is typically very hard to get to unless you really want to see it, so nobody who might report it ever actually finds it.
It’s worth mentioning that obscenity laws apply whether Net Neutrality is a thing or not, so having it will be a net reduction in the avenues through which content may be censored or policed. Now if only they’d ban ISPs from selling your data to brokers…
My god the fucking irony. The trade association made up of Broadband ISPs, arguing that they shouldn’t be regulated as Telecom providers, is literally called… USTelecom.
“Don’t treat us like ducks!” said the trade association representative from USDucks.
Thanks for pointing that out! That’s … truly special 😂
I think net neutrality is a good thing, but could this reclassification mean that the FCC will have increased authority to police content online? There has been a lot of worrying activity around that lately in general, and the FCC has a history of imposing censorship on traditional media.
Net Neutrality is about not policing content online. That’s kind of its whole thing:
The closest we get to online censorship is obscenity laws, which one might think applies to porn, but obscenity is actually defined much more narrowly than just “content designed to arouse”. Obscenity is basically stuff that even Hugh Hefner would find offensive, stuff the average adult would find deeply repulsive and abhorrent (not just a little bit, the exact language is “patently offensive”). Adult content in general (obscenity & indecency) is banned from broadcast media during daytime hours to keep kids from seeing it; subscription-based services are exempt from such rules, which presumably means that the adults who pay for the subscription are supposed to be the ones preventing kids from using it to view adult material, if such is possible. I expect this is why anything which does manage to qualify as obscene is typically very hard to get to unless you really want to see it, so nobody who might report it ever actually finds it.
It’s worth mentioning that obscenity laws apply whether Net Neutrality is a thing or not, so having it will be a net reduction in the avenues through which content may be censored or policed. Now if only they’d ban ISPs from selling your data to brokers…