Tech

Verizon chides FCC on Internet regulations

Verizon is fighting mad — again — over the federal government’s attempt to regulate the Internet.

The telecommunications giant is ready to fight the Federal Communications Commission’s move to implement what it called innovation-stifling rules in the name of net neutrality, Verizon said Monday in a 12-page letter to Tom Wheeler, the regulators’ chairman.

“No problems threatening competition or consumers’ enjoyment of the Open Internet have emerged,” Verizon said in the letter, which the FCC posted on its website alongside its proposal.

The FCC should wait to see if “actual problems develop before promulgating rules that could flash freeze innovation,” the company said. “Such actions will do far more benefit to consumers than another prolonged struggle over net neutrality rules.”

In January, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, in a 63-page ruling, tossed the FCC’s controversial net neutrality rules on Internet fairness after Verizon sued.

The court found, in part, that the FCC did not distinguish between anti-discrimination and anti-blocking rules.

FCC Chairman Tom WheelerReuters

Such a stance, the court wrote, was “patently insufficient” and ordered the FCC to go back and rewrite its rules.

In February, Wheeler proposed a new set of rules that would adhere to the appeals court’s concerns — mainly that the FCC not treat Internet service providers as utility companies.

Lawyers for Verizon told the powerful DC court panel that they wanted to be allowed to charge both subscribers and the companies that provide the content, like Netflix — a “two-sided market” potential that was being hampered by the FCC’s rules.

The FCC’s new proposed rules stay away from touchy cost issues, and focus instead on forbidding ISPs from blocking content unfairly.

The new rules would also require ISPs to disclose how they manage Internet traffic to help the FCC protect against anti-competitive behavior.

Consumer advocates have also blasted the new rules, saying they will pave the way for cable-style blackouts if, say, Netflix refuses to pony up to ISPs in a new “two-sided” marketplace.