Quick Links

Mobile Security Industry News

[May 26, 2006]

House panel OKs 'network neutrality'

(Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) May 26--WASHINGTON -- The House Judiciary Committee voted 20-13 on Thursday to keep telephone and cable companies from imposing fees on businesses that use their wires to connect with customers.

That was good news for Google Inc., eBay Inc. and other online companies, and consumer groups were thrilled as well.

The lawmakers "voted to protect our rights to an open Internet," Chellie Pingree, president of Common Cause, a public interest group, said in a statement. "Many struggles remain, but we have won a key battle."

The part of her statement that phone and cable companies would agree with is that many struggles remain on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers are still making their way through a maze of legislative options as they try to decide whether, and how, to preserve "network neutrality" for Internet users.

Many Democrats and a fair number of Republicans want legislation to require providers of high-speed Internet access to treat all Web sites and services in a neutral way. They believe a phone company should continue to give a DSL subscriber the same level of speedy service whether she is using Google Video or YouTube to view a video.

This camp warns that giving big phone and cable companies the power to act as gatekeepers could change the basic character of the Internet. Big, established Internet companies would gain a huge advantage over start-ups that can't afford such fees, they say, and consumers would be deprived of the innovations that these start-ups are now able to put forward on a level playing field.

However, phone and cable companies say they need to charge fees to the companies using their wires most heavily. Under that scenario, if Google were to pay up, then its videos would download more quickly than its competitors'.

The broadband providers say that would pay for a dramatic upgrade of the nation's Internet infrastructure.

"Radical Net neutrality proposals would chill the investment climate for broadband networks, deter and delay broadband rollout and lock in today's Internet architecture and levels of performance," said Tom Tauke, executive vice president for Verizon Communications Inc., a phone company.

Members of Congress agree that the issue is momentous, but they are far from a consensus.

The bill approved Thursday by the House Judiciary Committee treats network neutrality as an antitrust matter and would require broadband service providers to abide by tough network neutrality principles.

"The FCC recently reported that 98 percent of American consumers get their high-speed broadband from either a cable company or a DSL provider," said Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), the panel's chairman and the bill's sponsor. If Congress doesn't act, then broadband providers will be free to "preselect, favor or prioritize Internet content."

When the telecom reform legislation comes up for a House vote in coming weeks, Sensenbrenner is expected to offer his bill as a floor amendment. A separate House panel, the Energy and Commerce Committee, already has approved a Net neutrality provision as part of its telecom reform legislation.

Consumer groups had wanted something tougher than that provision, which gives the Federal Communications Commission power to investigate Web-site blocking abuses after the fact.

But the Senate Commerce Committee, which held a separate hearing on Net neutrality Thursday, barely touches on the issue in its competing telecom reform legislation.

The bill offered by Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) merely calls for the FCC to do an annual study on it. Unhappy with that approach, committee members Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) have introduced a tougher network neutrality bill that they want incorporated into the telecom legislation, which the committee will vote on next month.

[ Back To Mobile Security Homepage's Homepage ]

Request a Demo

Weekly Demonstration: SAP Mobile Secure
Solution including SAP Afaria Cloud

Free 30-day Trial

Best MDM in the cloud. Best MDM
Analytics. Best MDM price.

Featured Whitepapers

What Is Your Mobile Content Policy? A Checklist for Content Risk Mitigation
We are living in a world that only 20 years ago was the realm of science fiction. Devices once just barely imaginable have become common consumer items, carried casually in pockets and purses, with constantly growing capabilities.

SAP Enterprise Mobility: Bringing a Cohesive Approach to a Complex Market
Mobility and consumerization are creating complexity in the enterprise, but embracing the change can lead to more productive mobile workers as well as better communications with employees, partners, customers, and consumers. The trends in the enterprise mobility landscape drive a need for technology solutions to emerge.

View All

Featured Datasheets

Securing Enterprise Mobility for Greater Competitive Advantage
We are living in a world that only 20 years ago was the realm of science fiction. Devices once just barely imaginable have become common consumer items, carried casually in pockets and purses, with constantly growing capabilities.

Secure Mobile Content Management for the Enterprise
Every day employees move business files onto their mobile devices so they can work at home, on the road, or at client sites. The mobile workforce is a reality, as 80% of employees say they need to access work documents from outside the office.1 Instead of insecure, consumer-based tools, enterprises need a safe, reliable platform for managing content on mobile devices.

View All

Featured Webinar

Mobile Drives Field Service Productivity at Satellites Unlimited
Field service has never been more competitive or faster changing than it is today. Going mobile is a must to stay ahead of the competition, provide improved services, and keep up with ever-increasing customer expectations.

View All

Featured Webcast

End to End Mobility Requirements: IDC and SAP explore the 3rd Platform
A new IDC study states that we're in the midst of a shift that takes place once every 20 - 25 years - introducing a new technology platform that will inspire growth and innovation for enterprises of all sizes. IDC calls it the 3rd Platform - built on mobile devices and apps, cloud services, mobile broadband networks, "Big Data", analytics, and social technologies.

View All

Featured On-Demand Webinar

Analyst Webcast: Secure Content Management in a Mobile Age
Securing and managing content is taking on new importance as organizations try to cope with the explosion of business-oriented file sharing services while at the same time taking advantage of the proliferation of "smart" mobile devices.

View All