Commissioner Kroes plans public consultation on net neutrality

In a speech last week in Paris, Neelie Kroes, EU Commissioner for the Digital Agenda announced that she plans to consult the public on net neutrality, in order to progress the debate.

In the speech, Kroes observed that net neutrality elicits emotional responses from a wide range of actors. And that so far, this has led to little consensus on what net neutrality exactly means, let alone to what sensible policies would entail.

The passionate nature of the debate suggests that there is a consensus that the Internet is not an inherently neutral platform, but that choices need to be made about issues such as traffic shaping and filtering. This brings underlying questions to the fore about government censorship and who has the mandate to set policies for the World Wide Web.

The debate in Europe is still in its infancy, compared to the US. Kroes pointed to four principles for user rights that the US Federal Communications Commission have formulated as a basis for policies to stimulate broadband deployment and unfettered, open access to the Internet. These principles, which Kroes emphasised she underlined, are that users are entitled to access to lawful internet content of their choice, to run applications and services of their choice, to connect devices of their choice and to have competition amongst ISPs.

New EU regulations, adopted in 2009, contain clauses of a similar nature. First, the regulatory framework requires Member States to promote “the ability of end-users to access and distribute information or run applications and services of their choice”. Secondly, EU members can, if market forces do not solve these issues themselves, set minimum service requirements for ISPs. In doing so, states can act if traffic management leads to degraded services. Third, the EU will force the market to become more transparent, requiring ISPs to be open about their shaping behaviour so that consumers know what they can expect and get what they bargained for.

Further policies will build on these first steps. Kroes emphasised that future actions will be guided by principles of freedom of expression, transparency, investment in new networks, fostering innovation and competition.

18 April 2010