Right to reply: Google- Verizon net neutrality deal leaves a major loophole

Google and Verizon announced on Monday that they were putting forward a proposal for legislation which would deal with the issue of net neutrality. The proposal would give the FCC clear authority to regulate wireline net neutrality while exempting wireless from all but the transparency requirements applied to wireline. However, it also leaves Verizon and other carriers a major loophole for as yet undefined services which would be exempt from many of the requirements, Ovum’s chief telecoms analyst Jan Dawson believes.


Google and Verizon have done what the FCC has so far failed to do: forge a meaningful compromise on net neutrality between the two sides
Verizon has made real concessions here, notably forgoing paid prioritisation on the public Internet. Google, on the other hand, has made few compromises, getting most of what it always said it wanted
The agreement also proves that last week’s rumors and the accusations lobbed at Google were untrue, and it should get some credit for standing firm on the prioritisation issue in particular. However, the proposed legislation leaves a major loophole in the form of the category of ‘additional, differentiated services’ which would be exempt from most of the requirements.
In essence, this category creates a sort of private Internet which wouldn’t be subject to most new rules. As currently described, the category is wide enough to capture almost anything, and it needs to be significantly tightened in order to be meaningful. However, if this category is clarified and the definition tightened, this may be just the sort of compromise the FCC needs to get the stalled talks back on track, and finally make some progress in this area.
Google and Verizon, which theoretically at least come from opposite sides of the net neutrality debate, have come together to propose legislation which would give the FCC clear authority to enforce certain key net neutrality principles.
Specifically, the legislation would allow the FCC to prevent discriminatory behavior and the blocking of services and applications consumers want to access, forbid prioritization of services or traffic on the public Internet, enforce transparency over services offered and network management, and give the FCC enforcement authority with hefty fines. It would, however, exempt a vague category of ‘additional, differentiated services’ from most of these rules, and would also exempt wireless services from all but the transparency requirement.
The FCC will now have to gather the key stakeholders together once again to confer on whether they find the Verizon / Google proposal acceptable, or whether a revised version might form the basis of an agreement. It has no legal force at present, and parties on both sides of the debate may find it objectionable. But, with the previous set of talks abandoned without any meaningful progress, the FCC should latch onto this compromise as a key plank of its net neutrality strategy. With some tweaks, it may well turn out to be just the sort of compromise the FCC has been looking for.
By Jan Dawson
Chief telecoms analyst
Ovum
www.ovumkc.com/
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