NDP CALLS ON PRENTICE TO DEAL WITH NET THROTTLING

NDP CALLS ON PRENTICE TO DEAL WITH NET THROTTLING

by: Charlie Angus

The federal government must lay down transparent ground rules on internet “throttling” to ensure that consumers aren’t gouged and innovation isn’t stifled. This was the message delivered to Industry Minister Jim Prentice in an open letter by NDP Digital Culture Spokesman Charlie Angus. In the letter, Angus challenged Prentice’s claim that the government has no role to play in ensuring net neutrality because the internet is unregulated.

Angus points out that the CRTC has already regulated 3rd party competition on the internet. As well, the practice of net throttling is an indication that arbitrary regulating of traffic is taking place by the giant telecoms.

“The question is not whether there will be regulation of the internet, but whether or not there will be scrutiny of the practices of the telecoms. In order to ensure consumer confidence, the CRTC needs to examine the issue of traffic management to ensure that such interventions by the giant telecoms are not used as a convenient cover to price-gouge consumers or to degrade the quality of their competitors’ services.”

Angus says Prentice should accept the recommendations of the Telecommunications Review Panel that laid out a practical guide for CRTC involvement on maintaining fair and open access of the internet. The panel stated: "open access is of such overriding importance that its protection justifies giving the regulator the power to review cases involving blocking access to applications and content and significant, deliberate degradation of service."

The fight over net throttling has raised issues of anti-competitive practices by the giant telecoms. Angus reminded Prentice that there is a clear need for transparent rules.

“The New Democratic Party believes the issue of net neutrality must be examined through a lens of ensuring both continued innovation and fairness for everyday Canadians. The internet is both a public commons and a driving force for economic innovation.”

OPEN LETTER TO JIM PRENTICE
OTTAWA
April 17, 2008

Hon. Jim Prentice
Minister of Industry
Confederation (HOC)
229 Wellington St., Room 401, 4th Floor Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6

Dear Minister Prentice,

I am writing you today on the issue of net neutrality, which is quickly emerging as a matter of great mainstream interest. The recent actions of Bell in its fight with third party ISP providers has brought into clear focus the need for the government to develop a coherent and transparent policy for public internet access. Ground rules are needed to ensure that the bandwidth management strategies of the major telecoms will not lead to anti-competitive practices or arbitrary discrimination against end use applications.

The issue has been portrayed in the media as a case of a few bandwidth “hogs” unfairly disturbing the overall traffic flow. However, given the pace with which change takes place in internet use, traditional peer-2-peer traffic has become just one internet application competing for space in a quickly growing field of high-density bandwidth usage.

Bit torrent applications are now being used for the distribution of university course material and television shows; VOIP is emerging as a challenge to the traditional phone providers; VPN encrypted traffic for businesses is on the rise; and the major television content providers are promoting video-on-demand (VOD) services that will be in direct competition with internet content providers who do not control the pipes of the internet. Given the ever-increasing bandwidth requirements of these programs, any unilateral attempts by the telecoms to prioritize or, in some cases to throttle such traffic, could have major implications for consumers and businesses.

Recently in the House of Commons, you responded to a question from me by claiming that since the internet is not “regulated”, your government will maintain a hands-off policy on the issue of bandwidth shaping. I believe that your assessment of the current state of internet regulation is mistaken in three clear areas:

1) The CRTC has already established a precedent for regulation of the internet in regards to ensuring competition. CRTC regulations have mandated that the major ISP providers provide Gateway Access Service (GAS) to smaller third party competitors. This directive is now under direct attack by Bell’s recent court action. Conversely, the issue of anti-competitive practices is at heart of the Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP) challenge to the CRTC.

The reality is that the major ISP players are also telephone and cable/content providers. It is essential to ensure that the telecoms carry out their bandwidth management in a transparent and accountable manner; otherwise they could unfairly target competition from smaller ISP providers or from competing internet applications and content.

2) The practice of bandwidth throttling is evidence that the internet is being regulated – albeit in an ad hoc manner by the major telecoms. Some telecoms have even moved to block politically-disagreeable websites. Canada is not alone in dealing with these issues, as international telecoms muse publicly about relegating some websites to the slow lane if content taxes aren’t being paid. The question is not whether there will be regulation of the internet, but whether or not there will be scrutiny of the practices of the telecoms.

In order to ensure consumer confidence, it is incumbent upon the CRTC to examine the issue of traffic management to ensure that such interventions are not used as a convenient cover to price-gouge consumers or to degrade the quality of their competitors’ services.

3) By refusing to address the impacts of bandwidth throttling you are ignoring the recommendations laid down in the Telecommunications Review Panel that laid down a very reasonable standard for ensuring open access. These recommendations provide a clear guide that are circumspect in their scope and are focused on ensuring that the innovation agenda of Canada is not impeded by telecom financially-motivated interventions.

"The Telecommunications Act should be amended to confirm the right of Canadian consumers to access publicly available Internet applications and content of their choice by means of all public telecommunications networks providing access to the Internet.

This amendment should:

(a) Authorize the CRTC to administer and enforce these consumer access rights,
(b) Take into account any reasonable technical constraints and efficiency considerations related to providing such access, and
(c) Be subject to legal constraints on such access, such as those established in criminal, copyright and broadcasting laws."

The Panel described this protection as necessary because, "open access is of such overriding importance that its protection justifies giving the regulator the power to review cases involving blocking access to applications and content and significant, deliberate degradation of service."

The New Democratic Party believes the issue of net neutrality must be examined through a lens of ensuring both continued innovation and fairness for everyday Canadians. The internet is a public commons as well as a driving force for economic innovation. As Vint Cerf, a leading net neutrality proponent at Google stated: “The internet’s open, neutral architecture has provided an enormous engine for market innovation, economic growth, social discourse and the free flow of ideas.”

I am urging you to adopt the recommendations of the Telecommunications Review Panel in order to send a clear signal that Canada has a plan going forward to ensure continued development of internet technologies and fairness for consumers.

I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience on what steps you will take to implement these important recommendations.

Sincerely,

Charlie Angus
Digital Spokesman for the NDP

View the original at: http://charlieangus.net/newsitem.php?id=318