FCC's Net Neutrality Rules Clear Review Hurdle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Controversial new Internet rules adopted late last year by the Federal Communications Commission will soon be published officially, a step expected to trigger legal challenges.

The White House's Office of Management and Budget signed off on the rules on Friday, according to a notice on the OMB's website, clearing way for publication in the Federal Register, a process which generally takes one to three weeks.

The rules, which try to balance fair treatment of competing content with the need for internet providers to manage their networks, will go into effect 60 days after publication.

Verizon Communications Inc and MetroPCS Communications Inc had accused the FCC of overstepping its authority in a challenge shortly after the FCC's 3-2 vote.

But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in April said the challenges were premature, coming prior to publication in the Federal Register.

The same court ruled last year that the FCC lacked the authority to stop Comcast Corp from blocking bandwidth-hogging applications on its broadband network. A decision leading to the FCC's latest rules.

Criticized by opponents as a legally shaky government intrusion into regulating the Internet, the new rules would prevent network operators from blocking lawful content but still let them ration access to their networks.

The debate surrounding the Internet rules has highlighted a huge divide between those who say the Internet should flourish without regulation and those who say the power of high-speed Internet providers to discriminate against competitors needs to be restrained.

The delay between the FCC's vote and official publication has been unusually long.

Some industry sources and former regulators have accused the FCC of intentional foot-dragging to stall court challenges.

But the FCC has attributed the delay to data collection requirements that were subject to the Paperwork Reduction Act review process.

(Reporting by Jasmin Melvin; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)
Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions

Comments

[TomDi]

04:59 PM on 09/28/2011

Message to the current gansta government. Keep your hands off the internet, especially trying to regulate through the back door with illegal FCC regs.

[PenguinLinux]

04:16 PM on 09/13/2011

I find it funny how people can support net neutrality yet fail to use neutral operation systems on their Internet-connected computers. Many stick with Windows and OS X.

[PenguinLinux]

04:15 PM on 09/13/2011

Test

[PenguinLinux]

04:06 PM on 09/13/2011

I always find it funny that many people who are vocal towards freedom on the Internet, fail to support that same freedom on their own computer which is often running Windows or OS X, and also which is connect to the Internet. It's ironic because their computer is part of the Internet and while they support freedom and net neutrality beyond their home, they don't often seem to support those same things within it.

[pavementends42]

02:32 PM on 09/13/2011

Consumers need to be protected from exploitation and lack of competition by service providers. Internet should be free from corporate control and the government is the only entity that can accomplish this. Any argument against net neutrality regulations comes from the companies/lobbies/politicians who have a financial interest in the manipulation of internet service to exploit lack of competition and extort more money out of consumers. e.g. Comcast limiting traffic to Netflix because they want you to use their cable. I don't want cable. I should have that choice. Another model they should prevent is the prioritization of partner services (or even bandwidth) to manipulate what consumers will use. e.g. Comcast provides the option to pay for a premium internet on top of your general monthly cost, where a handful of media services (Spotify, Amazon Prime or Cloud Drive, Apple tv services) operate at a higher bandwidth (say 10mbs v. your general internet access of 5mbs, neither of which is of course guaranteed). All of these are hypothetical and I use Comcast because that is currently the only ISP I have as an option, but this is what they are moving to prevent. It doesn't hurt competition or provide undue regulatory burden on providers, it merely tries to keep them honest and the internet freely accessible and outside of corporate money-hoarding control. So, don't listen to Verizon and Comcast, since THEY are the ones who want to tell you how you can use your internet service.

[Jan Paynter]

01:48 PM on 09/13/2011

On the subject of net neutrality, Bob Gibson, Executive Director of the University of Virginia’s Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership, recently said: “It’s a debate that is going on in the Congress, and it’s really: Is the Internet going to be something that everyone has free and open access to, or, is it going to be something that is sort of controlled? What we don’t need is a lot of government control in the businesses of the internet. I think what we need is more of what we have with National Public Radio, which is a really true and balanced set of reporting that unfortunately has become politicized. What we are seeing is a shift from “anything goes” on the Internet to a shift where major corporations are shaping the news outlets and buying up more and more of the news outlets and putting them under corporate control and one set of a small number of hands.... We need freeware, we need shareware, and we need open access. People need to be able to trust sources that they can find on the internet, rather than have them controlled in a small number of hands or by the government.” (Gibson appeared on the Charlottesville, VA, interview program Politics Matters with host Jan Paynter discussing journalism http://bit.ly/pm-gibson)

[JohnSawyer]

09:02 PM on 09/14/2011

Unfortunately, even some people who seem to have a handle on this issue, blurt out they don't want to see "government control" over the Internet. For some odd reason, they fail to see that the government is currently the only entity that can prevent the corporations from ending net neutrality. Either that, or they're talking out of both sides of their mouth, deliberately trying to fake concern over corporate destruction of net neutrality, in order to use it as a vector to insert paranoia over the government's role in being the only entity to prevent this, hoping that if that paranoia prevails, then the corporations will get their way. So far, I haven't seen any government regulations, in place or proposed, that would interfere with corporations being able to make oodles of money from the Internet, which is the level of profit they should be satisfied with, instead of making oodles and oodles, which infringes on the very purpose of the Internet.

[Barbarian At The Gate]

11:41 AM on 09/13/2011

Net Neutrality is like the Civil Rights movement for the Internet. More freedom for Internet users and small businesses and less legal restrictions and suppression by large corporations.

[pavementends42]

02:34 PM on 09/13/2011

Yes! I guess I could've just said that....

[flinthfp]

03:10 PM on 09/13/2011

F and f and LOL Badge !!!!!!

[Gurinder Dhillon]

09:36 AM on 09/13/2011

"FCC's Net Neutrality Rules Clear Review Hurdle"
What happened did the 60th Senator get his check last night?

[pavementends42]

02:36 PM on 09/13/2011

More like the 60th senator turned down his check. It's the ISP's that are paying people off, trying to get more money for less service, not the FCC. I can't imagine the FCC does a lot of paying off other branches of the government to allow them to protect consumers from corporate abuses.

[Chiron090]

03:03 AM on 09/13/2011

Let's get one thing straight in this article: No one is regulating *the internet*. The proposed rules are to regulate internet *providers*. Big - effin' - difference.

[benji85]

10:23 AM on 09/13/2011

Exactly, they are telling the gatekeepers how they can control the access, not the pilgrims what they can take on their journey.

[KarateKid]

03:59 PM on 09/13/2011

But one leads to the other.

[Acert]

04:10 PM on 09/13/2011

Yes, however these regulations are to stop ISPs from restricting people's connections.

[Caseybug]

02:20 AM on 09/13/2011

It's funny how big business picks and chooses what the government should regulate. If big business wants it regulated, rest assured it's not good for you.

Free market enterprise, if it is clogging your network, increase your capacity or the next company will and you will be history. No government intervention needed.

[Draekia]

02:52 AM on 09/13/2011

But now the companies are so big, and there are so few of them, there is very little incentive for them to increase capacity -- even if they do now, they'll keep the same rates or raise them to "defray the costs.". Or some such bs

[dtallwalk]

09:02 PM on 09/12/2011

I wonder this is in the end about money so someone has to pay
And the way people are giving up things like credit cards and cable TV
If you do not hide those cost well most will leave
If I have to pay a fee to AT&T every time I to go to a web site
Nope I will sign off I do not need the net that bad. I will make my company foot the bill
As will others and do what I need to do at work. At least until AT&T get the government
To pass a law no surfing from 9 to 5

[JohnSawyer]

08:01 PM on 09/12/2011

The article is wrong when it says: "The debate surrounding the Internet rules has highlighted a huge divide between those who say the Internet should flourish without regulation and those who say the power of high-speed Internet providers to discriminate against competitors needs to be restrained."

"Those who say the Internet should flourish without regulation" are corporations and their individual tools, and what they want is to establish their own "regulations" which end net neutrality, and replace it with restrictions to make the corporations yet more money at users' expense; and "those who say the power of high-speed Internet providers to discriminate against competitors needs to be restrained", are the people who want to prevent corporations from restraining the Internet.

[flinthfp]

02:59 PM on 09/13/2011

The corporations are experts at twisting truth, names like "Citizens Unites" oh that means that a corporation is a legal person with constitutional rights !!!
Thanks for making this situation clear and obvious and as we know the GOTP have a bill to repeal Net Neutrality and we also know who they support !!!!!
F and F

[JohnSawyer]

08:50 PM on 09/14/2011

Agreed. The Citizens United decision was another step to reinforce the false notion that corporations are the only real people, and people are machines that serve them.

[kd1s]

07:20 PM on 09/12/2011

One they get in the Federal Register they are pretty much codified and law. Good, I'm glad the FCC is actually doing something on this front. And MetroPCS, I'm a customer and not happy that you are against this.

[Niet]

07:07 PM on 09/12/2011

As soon as net neutrality is no more, the first ISP to offer a neutral plan will quickly be the only game in town.