FCC scraps net neutrality protections in controversial vote

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which governs US broadband and internet service providers among others, has voted to roll back protections that enshrined the principles of net neutrality into law. The Commission, which voted three to two to change the laws, has been criticised heavily by the tech industry and net neutrality advocates for the alterations.

The decision reverses many of the rules introduced under President Obama to ensure the internet remained open and accessible. Under the new provisions, internet service providers will be reclassified as information services, rather than telecommunications firms, and will no longer be directly regulated by the FCC.

This will enable them to speed up or slow down different companies’ data and charge consumers according to which services they access, as long as they disclose such practices. In other countries with weak net neutrality protections, such as New Zealand and Portugal, it is not uncommon for ISPs and mobile networks to break down data offerings into packages where only traffic from certain websites or apps is included, and others are charged at high rates.

The change is already facing legal challenges, with New York’s attorney general Eric Schneiderman announcing that he will lead a lawsuit that challenges the FCC’s decision. The vote was widely protested, with opponents gathering outside the FCC’s building, and the FCC has been accused of failing to investigate possible abuses of the public commenting process, with as many as 2m identities, including some of dead people, used to post comments on the FCC website.

The FCC members who voted against the change were vocal in their opposition, speaking at length about the potential dangers to consumers and businesses that come from undoing the net neutrality protections, especially in a market like the US, where ISPs often hold monopolies over certain areas.

“I dissent to this legally-lightweight, consumer-harming, corporate-enabling, destroying-internet freedom order,” said Democrat Commissioner Mignon Clyburn ahead of the vote.

However, Republican Commissioner Michael O’Rielly dismissed such concerns, saying that FCC staff had been able to discard the allegedly illegitimate public comments ahead of the vote, and the fears raised by objectors were a “scary bedtime story for the children of telecom geeks”.

The dissenting FCC Commissioners are not the only ones to have spoken out. Following the decisions announcement, tech executives from Facebooks chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg to Microsoft president and chief legal officer Brad Smith have critcised the decision. Firms including Netflix, Google, Reddit and Airbnb have all voiced concerns, and many have suggested they will support legal challenges to the decision.