Net neutrality

Columbia University law professor Tim Wu popularized the phrase network neutrality as a term designating a network that does not favor one application (for example the World Wide Web) over another (such as online gaming or Voice over IP). Wu claims that the Internet is not neutral "as among all applications" as it favors file transfer over real-time communication.

Additionally, large Internet content and network providers maintain that network neutrality primarily concerns the question of whether or to what extent networks should be able to favor or disfavor certain subdivisions of applications, such as certain websites (e.g. Google) in the case of the World Wide Web or certain brands of Voice Over IP or any other application.

Network neutrality also designates a contemporary controversy mostly local to the United States regarding the role that government should take relative to Internet access providers providing multiple levels of service for different fees. This controversy, which emerged following regulatory developments in the United States, is extremely complex, as it mixes technical, economic, ideological and legal arguments. In essence, network neutrality regulations proposed by Senators Snowe and Dorgan and Representative Markey bar ISPs from offering Quality of Service enhancements for a fee.

Network neutrality is sometimes used as a technical term, although it has no history in the design documents (RFCs) describing the Internet protocols. In this usage, it is claimed to represent a property of protocol layering in which higher-layer protocols may not communicate service requirements to lower-layer protocols, a highly idiosyncratic interpretation of protocol engineering. (In conventional network engineering practice, each protocol in a layered system exposes Service Access Points to higher layers that can be used to request a level of service appropriate to the needs of higher-layer protocols.)

Background

Relevant trends

Some trends affecting the debate are:

• Requirements of VOIP and online games for low latency bandwidth.

• The increasing use of high bandwidth applications, such as online games, and music and video downloading.

• Increasing use of traffic shaping by many or most broadband providers to control P2P and other services.

• Improvements in networking technology, which make providing broadband service, on the aggregate, cheaper.

• The trend of governments funding the construction of high-speed networks in countries like South Korea, France, and for cities to build their own wireless networks, and their more gradual deployment in many areas of the U.S.

• The increasing use of wireless home networks, which allow for neighbors to share an Internet connection, thereby reducing revenues for the service providers. In urban areas this factor can be very large, with a great deal of people sharing one individual person's connection.

• High bandwidth video and audio telecommunications over the Internet (including Voice Over IP technology) which threaten the land line revenues of Telco Internet service providers.

• Increasing centralization of control over internet physical infrastructure, and justifications including protection against gray market file sharing and search applications.

Discriminatory Practices

In 2004, a small North Carolina telecom company, Madison River, blocked their DSL customers from using the Vonage VoIP service. Service was restored after the FCC intervened on behalf of subscribers and fined Madison River. The FCC retains this authority under all telecom legislation pending in the US Congress, with or without "net neutrality" amendments.

Pricing models

Broadband Internet access has most often been provided to users based on bandwidth capacity. Some argue that if ISPs can provide varying levels of service to websites at various prices, this may be a way to manage the costs of unused capacity (or "leverage price discrimination to recoup costs of 'consumer surplus'"). However, purchasers of connectivity on the basis of bandwidth capacity must expect the capacity they purchase in order to meet their communications requirements. This is how high-traffic websites meet demand.

Market economics of network neutrality

A major argument in favor of network neutrality is that a discriminatory network distorts markets that depend on the network, and ultimately may slow national economic growth. For example, if a network favors search engine A over search engine B, A may become dominant even though B's technology is better. Similarly, if the network favors a usage of the network popular at a given time (say, Gopher, enormously popular in the early 1990s) that may slow the competitive arrival of a new usage (like the World Wide Web). In other words, a discriminatory network may "freeze" innovation (particularly application innovation) based on today's dominant applications. The link to national economic growth is as follows: many economists believe innovation is a major catalyst of economic growth, meaning that if a discriminatory network leads to less innovation, a country will grow more slowly. Opponents of neutrality regulation say this argument confuses a necessary form of discrimination, discrimination among packets with different latency requirements, with arbitrary discrimination between applications of the same type, and is therefore blind to network engineering requirements.

The arguments against network neutrality as a principle take several forms, as the principle of neutrality is defined in several ways. The first and most common says that packet-level discrimination is absolutely necessary in order to provide Quality of Service on any packet network. Quality of service commitments could help market additional services.

Another argument says that service bundling creates the revenue streams necessary to encourage investment in the networks of the future. If a broadband carrier is, for example, allowed to charge more for a high-priority voice service when competing services such as Skype run at standard priority, the carrier's voice service will sound better, and this will limit Skype's appeal while increasing the carrier's willingness to invest.

One response to this argument concedes that discrimination results in greater profit for broadband carriers -- but asks whether the costs in terms of application innovation are worth it. In the example, the operator is exploiting a bottleneck in the network to extend its monopoly from the network service to another sector entirely, in this case messaging applications. It also asks whether allowing discrimination is the best way to encourage network deployments. In other words, there may be less distortionary ways to encourage carriers to build out their network, such as using the tax code, or government funding.

Another argument against network neutrality relies on the economics of congestion. A neutral network is like a public good, leading to collective action or tragedy of the commons-like problems. Hence a provider may need to discriminate as between users or usage to ensure maximum network performance. For example, if someone uses up too much bandwidth, this argument suggests, a network operator should be allowed to slow it down. The typical answer to this argument goes as follows. There may be more and less distortionary ways of managing bandwidth -- and blocking or disfavoring certain applications is more distortionary. A more neutral way of managing bandwidth is to manage bandwidth at the consumer side - i.e., to limit the users to, say, x gigabytes per month after which their transfer rate is reduced, instead of banning applications (systems of this type have been employed in other countries, e.g. Australia).

However, service providers in the U.S. have resisted these arguments, suggesting that they do not want to charge their users for using higher bandwidth, either because this might not be technically feasible or because it would be a major pricing change which might not be matched by competitors or accepted by the marketplace. Instead, service providers have been proposing to charge content providers to offset the higher bandwidth charges of the end users. This argument omits the fact that content providers already pay a service provider to host data on Internet for end users to consume.

It is possible that bandwidth limits aren't the central issue in this debate, but that latency is. Neutralists argue that charging for access to priority services amounts to "double taxation" If standard service goes for one price, and enhanced service for another, it is arguably consistent not to allow access to enhanced service to those who haven't subscribed to it.

Another argument is deregulatory. It says that network neutrality is a fine idea but that it will require government intervention, and intervention will invariably and inevitably lead to unintended consequences. This argument leads to a larger debate over whether government can ever act in useful ways, which is difficult to summarize. However, in response, some advocates of network neutrality have argued that FCC action alone is sufficient. Others argue that legislation will simply replicate common-carriage principles already long in place for many communications networks.

This argument can also be opposed on the grounds that most high-speed network providers are cable or telephone companies who are still granted local monopolies by the government. Government granted monopolies must be regulated because if the monopolies act improperly market forces don't exist to correct the behavior. Evidence for this can be found in the self-same telephone monopolies work to eliminate competitors from reselling access to their networks—networks paid for with public funds. The networks regulated by the Markey Amendment are not monopolies, however.

"Dumb" versus "intelligent" networks

Network neutrality is a theory of network design closely related to the end to end principle. Under this principle, a neutral network is a dumb network, merely passing packets according to the needs of applications. This point of view was expressed by David S. Isenberg in his seminal paper, The Rise of the Stupid Network to wit:

[In] the Stupid Network, because the data is the boss, it can tell the network, in real time, what kind of service it needs. And the Stupid Network would have a small repertoire of idiot-savant behaviors to treat different data types appropriately. If the data identified itself as financial data, the Stupid Network would deliver it accurately, no matter how many milliseconds of delay the error checking would take. If the data were two-way voice or video, the Stupid Network would provide low delay, even at the price of an occasional flipped bit. If the data were entertainment audio or video, the Stupid Network would provide wider bandwidth, but would not necessarily give low delay or absolute accuracy. And if there were a need for unique transmission characteristics, the data would tell the Stupid Network in more detail how to treat it, and the Stupid Network would do what it was told.

These terms merely signify the network's level of knowledge about and influence over the packets it handles - they carry no connotations of stupidity, inferiority or superiority.

Quality of Service and Internet Protocols

Early Internet routers typically forwarded packets on a best-efforts basis, without regard for application needs. This has changed. Many private networks using Internet protocols now employ Quality of Service, and Network Service Providers frequently enter into Service Level Agreements with each other embracing some sort of QoS.

The IP datagram includes a 3-bit wide Precedence field which may be used to request a level of service, consistent with the notion that protocols in a layered architecture offer services through Service Access Points. Obeying this field is optional and it has rarely been used across public links, although it is commonly used in private networks, especially those including WiFi networks where priority is enforced. Indeed, no single standard describing exactly how such requests would be upheld across independently functioning Internet routers has successfully gained dominance, although SIP, RSVP, IEEE 802.11e, and MPLS define this behavior.

With the emergence of multimedia and VoIP and applications that would benefit from low latency, various attempts to address this oversight have arisen, including the proposition of offering differing, priced levels of service that would shape Internet transmissions at the network layer based on application type. These efforts are ongoing, and are starting to yield results as wholesale Internet transport providers begin to amend service agreements to include service levels.

Router manufacturers have begun to introduce routers that have logic enabling them to route traffic for various Classes of Service in at "wire-speed".

Overprovisioning instead of QoS

One argument in network design asserts that QoS procedures are unnecessary as long as network links are "over-provisioned" to the point that network traffic never encounters delay. The Internet2 project concluded, in 2001, that the QoS protocols were probably not deployable with equipment available at that time. Newer routers are capable of implementing QoS with no loss of performance, unlike the routers used in the Internet 2 study in 2001. However they also claimed that "logistical, financial, and organizational barriers will block the way toward any bandwidth guarantees". . This study was the basis for the testimony of Gary Bachula, Vice President for External Affairs for Internet2, to the Senate Commerce Committee's Hearing on Network Neutrality in early 2006. He expressed the opinion that adding more bandwidth was more effective than any of the various schemes for accomplishing QoS they examined.

Bachula's testimony has been cited by proponents of a law banning Quality of Service as proof that no legitimate purpose is served by such an offering.

Background on the political controversy

For many years, Internet access across the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) was governed by common carrier regulations. These guidelines required unbundling of communications services and ISP functions. However, on August 5, 2005, the FCC reclassified DSL services as Information Services rather than Telecommunications Services, and replaced common carrier requirements with a set of four less-restrictive net neutrality principles. This sparked a debate over whether or not Internet Service Providers should also be allowed to discriminate between different service providers by offering higher network priority to higher-paying companies and customers, allowing some services to operate faster or more predictably and ultimately become more acceptable to end users.

Cable modem Internet access had always been classified an Information Service and not regulated by common carrier law, just as the high-speed data links that make up the Internet's core are non-regulated.

Supporters of net neutrality regulations argue that the current FCC principles are too weak to prevent telecommunications companies from charging fees to certain content providers in exchange for preferential treatment, which they believe will threaten innovation and entrepreneurship on the Internet. They see the Internet as a "level playing-field" which rewards the best ideas rather than the most well-funded ideas and believe that net neutrality guidelines are necessary to maintain this dynamic.

Opponents of net neutrality regulations argue that the Internet is not a level-playing field as companies such as Google and Akamai are free to achieve a performance advantage over smaller competitors by replicating servers and buying high-bandwidth services. Service discrimination, against the real background of today's Internet, actually makes the Internet more neutral, according to this view.

Telecommunications companies, having invested billions of dollars in new network infrastructure, believe they have the right to operate the network with minimal government interference. They believe that imposing net neutrality regulations would prevent them from expanding and improving Internet access for their customers, stifling incentives to develop new technologies and possibly leading to higher prices for consumers. There is currently a debate in Congress over how to best balance the concerns of both groups.

Current practice in interconnection

While the network neutrality debate continues, network providers often enter into peering arrangements among themselves. These agreements often stipulate how certain information flows should be treated. In addition, network providers often implement various policies such as blocking of port 25 to prevent insecure systems from serving as spam relays, or other ports commonly used by decentralized music search applications (often called "P2P" though all applications on the Internet are essentially peer-to-peer). They also present "terms of service" that often include rules about the use of certain applications as part of their contracts with users. Most "consumer Internet" providers implement policies like these.

However, the effect of peering arrangements among network providers are only local to the peers that enter into the arrangements, and cannot affect traffic flow across the global network. And users directly experience the effect of port blocking and other policies.

In the meantime, network engineers recognize the benefits of the design of the Internet Protocol, specifically in terms of its serving as a flexible platform for application innovation.

Approaches to network neutrality

Network Neutrality proposals can take many forms. While all share some features, some of the specific proposals are:

1. Most Favored Nation: operators must offer transit to all companies, transit on equal terms, and cannot discriminate between them.
2. Separate Provisioning of Neutral Internet: operators must provide Internet in accordance with the neutrality of the IP transport layer protocol, but may offer other services, appropriately labeled
3. Radical Bit Anti-Discrimination: operators must pass all packets blindly, and never make any decisions based on information specific to any packet.
4. Enough and as Good: if operators prioritize bandwidth, they must leave enough and as good bandwidth to permit non-prioritized services to reach consumers.
5. Tiering only: Operators may discriminate as between their customers, but must offer the same services to content, application, and service providers.
6. Police what you own: Operators may exercise discrimination with respect to entirely private networks, but not inter-networks.

Relevance of municipal wireless and other "third pipes"

Much of the push for network neutrality rules comes from the lack of competition in broadband services. For that reason, municipal wireless and other wireless service providers are highly relevant to the debate. If successful, such services would provide a third type of broadband access with the potential to change the competitive landscape. For similar reasons, the feasibility of broadband over powerline services is also important to the network neutrality issue. However, as of the Spring of 2006, deployments beyond cable and DSL service have created little new competition.

Cablescos in response to this threat have lobbied Congress for a federal preemption to ban states and municipalities from competing and thereby interfering with interstate commerce. However, there is current Supreme Court precedent for an exception to the Commerce Power of Congress for states as states going into business for their citizens.

Debate

The Center for American Progress held a 90 minute debate on Monday July 17, 2006 in Washington DC office with "grandfather of the Net" Vinton Cerf, Vice-President of Google; and David J. Farber, Distinguished Career Professor of Computer Science and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University. It was shown on CSPAN on Saturday July 22, 2006 at 6:30PM.

Some broadband providers proposed to start charging content providers in return for higher levels of service. Packets originating from providers who pay the additional fees would in some fashion be given better than "neutral" handling, while those content providers who do not pay the higher fees would get a lesser level of service. Given this ability to accelerate the handling of selected packets, the service providers would perhaps give Quality of Service guarantees to given senders or recipients. This points out that once the net moves away from common carrier rules there are at least two levels of pricing: the price an ISP charges consumers for access and the price the ISP could charge Websites by varying bandwidth.

Advocates of "non-neutrality" point to advantages with respect to rationing what perhaps will be scarce bandwidth. Indeed, the topic was opened because of what may be a substantial increase in bandwidth consumption as multi-media uses of the Internet expand. Carriers want content providers who support bandwidth-intensive multi-media Internet traffic to pay the carriers a premium to support further network investments.

On the other hand, advocates of network neutrality observe that any practice that shapes the transmission of bits in the transport layer based on application designs will undermine the design for flexibility of the transport. Others claim collecting premium fees from certain "preferred" customers would distort the market for Internet applications in favor of larger and better-funded content providers and against small providers. They argue for banning such financial arrangements, even if those payments might offset total network operating costs ultimately charged to consumers. There is also the question of the service impact on the end user who has purchased broadband access from a carrier, only to experience differing response times in interacting with various content providers, some of whom paid the carrier a "premium" and some who did not.

Numerous commentors have cautioned that authorizing incumbent network providers to override the separation of the transport and application layers of the Internet signals the end of the authority of the fundamental Internet standards and indeed, of the standards-making processes for the Internet themselves.

The debate has moved into the regulatory and legislative arena in a somewhat unusual way, because those who prefer to leave the status quo unchanged are advocating legislation in the U.S. to formalize elements of "net neutrality." Those would want to change by introducing "non-neutrality" do not presently want any further legislation.

The two proposed versions of "neutrality" legislation to date would prohibit: (1) the "tiering" of broadband through sale of voice- or video-oriented Quality of Service packages; and (2) content- or service-sensitive blocking or censorship on the part of broadband carriers. These bills have been sponsored by Representatives Markey, Sensenbrenner, et. al., and Senators Snowe, Dorgan, and Wyden. Advocates of continuing with the status quo include content providers such as Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft and several prominent social-action non-profits, and media critics such as Robert McChesney.

On the other hand, Verizon, Comcast, AT&T and other companies in the telecommunications industry who want to offer "non-neutral" Internet broadband services are calling for the Congress and regulators to take a "hands off" approach. Presumably they do not feel the need for additional enabling legislation or regulation to make such changes. The telecommunications companies have found allies in various groups such as the US Chamber of Commerce, the National Black Chamber of Commerce, and the League of United Latin American Citizens -- alliances the telecommunications companies forged in exchange for promises to provide improved Internet services to certain communities.

Complicating the discussion is the practical reality that the Internet is a highly federated environment composed of thousands of carriers, many millions of content providers and more than a billion end users - consumers and businesses. Prioritizing packets is complicated even if both the content originator and the content consumer use the same carrier. It is probably infeasible if the packets have to traverse multiple carrier networks, because the packet getting "premium" service while traversing network A may drop down to non-premium service levels in network B.

Further, the discussion has been very U.S.-centric and very terrestrial-network centered, even though the Internet is inherently global and mobility is the fastest growing source of new demand.

The immediate debate over "neutrality" does not capture the many dimensions of this topic; for example, should voice packets get higher priority than packets carrying email? Some further discussion of neutrality follows.

Positions taken by major incumbent broadband access providers

While the prospect of accomplishing QoS across the IP layer has been the subject of ongoing research for many years, recent regulatory and judiciary developments have marked the occasion for major incumbent broadband providers to declare that they will begin offering priced, prioritized delivery by directly shaping—as a differentiated, priced service offering—the behavior of the network layer in service of particular applications, sources and destinations.

Strict network neutrality rules would counter this development.

The discussion of how the existing practices of network providers often already do not administer to users the full capacity of the Internet as designed, combined with the fact that the IP network design does not serve low latency applications well when the network is close to capacity, has resulted in a debate on network neutrality conducted not in terms of the Internet's actual design merits, but in terms of the prospect of network providers differentiating their services by charging for prioritization.

Some access providers have taken the other tack of declaring that they follow a net neutrality policy. For example, Cogent Communications has issued a statement that it practices network neutrality.

Law evolution

In the early 2000s, legal scholars such as Tim Wu and Lawrence Lessig raised the issue of neutrality in a series of academic papers addressing regulatory frameworks for packet networks. Wu in particular noted that the Internet is structurally biased against voice and video applications. The FCC subsequently adopted principles which ensured "consumers are entitled to access the lawful Internet content of their choice." In 2006 a bill called Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act of 2006 was introduced in the US House of Representatives, which referenced the principles enunciated by the FCC and authorized fines up to $750,000 for infractions. An attempt to amend the bill by Democrat Ed Markey with additional network neutrality regulations banning fee-based Quality of Service offerings was defeated 269-152.

Disputed Claims of Discriminatory Practices in the US and Elsewhere

Save The Internet, an advocacy organization lead by media critic Free Press, has cited several situations as examples of discrimination by ISPs, including some in the US.

• In 2005, Canadian telephone giant Telus blocked access to voices-for-change.ca, a website supporting the company's labour union during a labour dispute, as well as over 600 other websites, for about sixteen hours.

• Shaw Cable, a major Canadian internet provider, offers a "quality of service" upgrade for their VoIP service. A number of competing VoIP providers have issued complaints that Shaw may be downgrading competitor's traffic No evidence has been offered to support any such claim.

• In April, Time Warner's AOL blocked all emails that mentioned www.dearaol.com, an advocacy campaign opposing the company's pay-to-send e-mail scheme. An AOL spokesman called the issue an unintentional "glitch."

• In February, 2006, some of Cox Cable's customers were unable to access Craig's List because of a software bug in the Authentium personal firewall distributed by Cox Cable to improve customers' security. Save the Internet said this was an intentional act on the part of Cox Cable to protect classified ad services offered by its partners. The issue was quickly resolved by correction of the software bug and finally by a change in the network configuration used by Craig's List. Craig Newmark acknowledges this was not intentional.

Arguments of involved parties

Residential broadband providers such as Verizon, Comcast, and AT&T propose tiered service offerings, which they claim allow them to recoup their investment in the last mile of the Internet, and encourage future network development. Some claim that as bandwidth-intensive peer-to-peer applications such as BitTorrent become commonplace, the traditional Internet congestion management system, which was not designed to handle continuous, high-bandwidth usage, may no longer be viable, so alternate methods may become necessary. These alternate methods include bandwidth limits and priority-based Quality of Service for voice and video. Proponents of tiered pricing include some large communication companies, manufacturers of network equipment, academics, Internet engineers, and business-oriented interest groups. They argue that the Internet is in the midst of tremendous change due to fiber to the home, peer-to-peer applications, VoIP, and IPTV, and regulations offered to date are potentially damaging to network operation and investment.

Those favoring neutrality include some content providers such as Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, academics, Internet engineers, media reform and watchdog groups, musicians, bloggers, most of the major public and consumer advocacy groups including Free Press, Consumers Union and Common Cause as well as right- and left-wing grasssroots groups such as the Christian Coalition of America and Moveon. They contend that any non-neutral scheme could allow ISPs to unfairly discriminate and control which data they prioritize, such as data from their own sponsors or media interests, resulting in a two-tiered Internet. They generally claim that passage of the COPE Act turns control of the Internet over to the carriers, who will then convert it into something resembling cable TV.

Recent regulatory developments in America

In America Broadband services were once regulated differently according to the technology on which they were delivered. While cable Internet has always been classified by the FCC as an information service free of most regulation, DSL was once regulated as a telecommunications service subject to unbundling requirements. As the two types of networks have increasingly provided the same services, it has become difficult to justify different sets of rules, leading to the question of which rules should apply to both.

Towards the end of 2004, the US legal system voided the rules requiring telephone operators to unbundle certain parts of their networks at regulated prices, which had as a consequence the economic collapse of many competitors in access services.

In America DSL and cable Internet access were formerly regulated by the FCC according to different rules, but in 2005 the FCC re-classified DSL according to the more permissive cable rules which was the same year that the US Supreme Court in Brand X upheld the classification of cable Internet access as an information service.

An additional regulatory complexity is that cable operators and telephone operators are competing beyond broadband Internet access: cable operators by providing telephone service, and telephone service providers by upgrading their networks with FTTX in order to provide enough bandwidth to support television services.

Advocates of network neutrality wish to re-classify both under the old rules for DSL, which require unbundling and several other restrictions. Opponents of these regulations, pointing to the technical progress and market success gained by cable under Information System guidelines, argue that the current regulatory situation is adequate.

Other aspects of "neutrality"

Columbia University Law School professor Tim Wu observed the Internet is not neutral in terms of its impact on applications having different requirements. It is more beneficial for data applications than for applications that require low latency and low jitter, such as voice and video: "In a universe of applications, including both latency-sensitive and insensitive applications, it is difficult to regard the IP suite as truly neutral." In presenting this analysis Wu shifts focus away from the design of the network for application flexibility. He has proposed regulations on Internet access networks that define net neutrality as equal treatment among similar applications, rather than neutral transmissions regardless of applications. He proposes allowing broadband operators to make reasonable tradeoffs between the requirements of different applications, while regulators carefully scrutinize network operator behavior where local networks interconnect.

Law professor Susan Crawford, on the other hand, proposes open access (or unbundling) as a means of promoting network neutrality. Crawford defines net neutrality differently from Wu, stipulating that the Internet's transport layer should not be shaped in accordance with particular applications but should rather provide only the transport service appropriate to the careful file transfer that was defined in the early 1970s as the Internet's canonical application. According to Crawford's view, bits are bits, and accurate timing of packet delivery is a form of anti-competitive discrimination that ultimately leads to corporate control of the public commons. Crawford argues that networking is a commodity, like electricity, best provided by the government.

In Wu's view of net neutrality, the network should adapt to the diverse needs of emerging applications; in Crawford's view the network's traditional service structure provides a flexible transport designed to support a broad variety of applications.

Regulatory related considerations

The topic is very much complicated by differing regulatory histories of the Internet versus most communications services. The Internet was essentially unregulated, while most telecommunications services were highly regulated. The "neutrality" debate in some sense represents a convergence in that carrier services are now much more deregulated, while neutrality advocates may bring more regulation to the Internet.

Some of the arguments associated with network neutrality regulations came into prominence in mid 2002, offered by the "High Tech Broadband Coalition", a group comprising developers for Amazon.com, Google, and Microsoft. However, the fuller concept of "Network neutrality" was developed mainly by legal academics, most prominently law professors Tim Wu and Lawrence Lessig and Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell, the first government official to endorse Network Neutrality. It is worth noting, however, that the ideas underlying Network Neutrality have a long pedigree in telecommunications regulation.

Proposals for network neutrality laws are generally opposed by the cable television and telephone industries, and some network engineers and free-market scholars from the conservative to libertarian, including Christopher Yoo and Adam Thierer. Opponents argue that (1) Network neutrality regulations severely limit the Internet's usefulness; (2) network neutrality regulations threaten to set a precedent for even more intrusive regulation of the Internet; (3) imposing such regulation will chill investment in competitive networks (e.g., wireless broadband) and deny network providers the ability to differentiate their services; and (4) that network neutrality regulations confuse the unregulated Internet with the highly regulated telecom lines that it has shared with voice and cable customers for most of its history.

According to this view, the Internet has succeeded in attracting users and applications because it has been an oasis of deregulation in the midst of a highly regulated telecom market. Critics of Internet regulation in the name of "net neutrality" also say the Internet is much less neutral than proponents claim, pointing to such practices as the Type of Service header in the IP Datagram, the practice of active queuing described in RFC 2309 and the existence of Integrated Services and Differentiated Services enabling Quality of Service over IP. According to this view, the Internet is still very weak at meeting the needs of real-time and multimedia applications, and its continued evolution is stymied by the onerous regulations proposed in the name of network neutrality.

These views may be said to contrast with the historical development of network neutrality, which involves a retreat from intrusive regulation, and expanded investment in network construction, consumer and business subscriptions, and the technology sector which requires an open and neutral platform for its business model; they may also be said to more accurately describe the Internet as it has been and may become if not stifled by overly-zealous regulation.

There is also the issue of regulatory capture, where the supposedly regulated entities manipulate the system to their advantage (through political power gained by campaign contributions or independent expenditures), either over competitors, or in collusion with them, largely to increase profits and/or exclude market entrants (partcularly those employing new technologies). This exclusion and control by various means has been shown historically to be to the ultimate detriment of consumers, both from higher cost and from slowed innovation.

Legal history

Originally, the Internet was not legally available for commercial use. It became available in the late 1980s.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, consumers and businesses began to attach new devices to their internet connections, and use internet services that were not in existence in the mid-1990s.

One reaction of many broadband operators was to impose various contractual limits on the activities of their subscribers. In the best known examples, Cox Cable disciplined users of virtual private networks (VPNs) and AT&T, as a cable operator, warned customers that using a Wi-Fi service for home-networking constituted "theft of service" and a federal crime. Comcast blocked ports of VPNs, forcing the state of Washington, for example, to contract with telecommunications providers to ensure that its employees had access to unimpeded broadband for telecommuting applications.

These early instances of "broadband discrimination" prompted both academic and government responses. FCC Chairman Michael Powell in 2004 announced a new set of non-discrimination principles, which he called the principles of "Network Freedom". In a speech at the Silicon Flatirons Symposium in February 2004, Powell stated that consumers must have the following four freedoms:

1. Freedom to access content.
2. Freedom to run applications.
3. Freedom to attach devices.
4. Freedom to obtain service plan information.

As remarked upon by David Isenberg, Chairman Kevin Martin later modified these four freedoms to read:

1. Consumers are entitled to access the lawful Internet content of their choice;
2. Consumers are entitled to run applications and services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement;
3. Consumers are entitled to connect their choice of legal devices that do not harm the network; and
4. Consumers are entitled to competition among network providers, application and service providers, and content providers.

On August 5, 2005, the FCC adopted a policy statement stating its adherence to these principles.

Under pressure from the FCC and consumer groups, the broadband operators generally relaxed their most glaring restrictions on network usage.

In early 2005, in the Madison River case, the FCC for the first time showed a willingness to enforce its network neutrality principles by opening an investigation about Madison River Communications, a local telephone carrier that was blocking voice over IP service. While it is often thought that the FCC fined Madison River Communications following the investigation, it did not. The investigation was closed before any formal factual or legal finding. Instead, there was a settlement in which the company agreed to stop discriminating against voice over IP traffic and to make a $15,000 payment to the US Treasury in exchange for the FCC dropping its inquiry. Since the FCC did not formally establish that Madison River Communications violated laws and regulation, the Madison River settlement does not create a precedent. Nevertheless, the FCC's action established that it would not sit idly by if other US operators discriminated against voice over IP traffic.

Congress

By late 2005, network neutrality regulations were included in several Congressional draft bills, as a part of ongoing proposals to reform the Telecommunications Act of 1996. They would generally require internet providers to allow consumers access to any application, content, or service. However, important exceptions allow providers to discriminate for security purposes, or to offer specialized services like "broadband video" service. These regulations generally forbid ISPs from offering different service plans to their customers.

In April 2006 a large coalition of bloggers, educators and citizen/consumer-oriented advocacy groups -- such as Free Press, American Library Association, Consumers Union and MoveOn -- created "Save The Internet," a grassroots coalition supporting network neutrality regulations. Within two months of its establishment, over 1,000,000 signatures were delivered to Congress in favor of a network neutrality. Campaigns have also been launched by content providers (including Google, eBay, Microsoft, Yahoo! and Amazon.com) in support of neutrality and regulation, and by service providers (including AT&T and Verizon) against it. The service provider groups, including "Hands off the Internet," have been labeled "Astroturf" for accepting corporate money to create the false appearance of grass-roots support for their issue.

The following legislative proposals have been introduced in Congress to address the network neutrality question:

Title	Bill number	Date introduced	Sponsors	Provisions	Status
Internet Non-Discrimination Act of 2006	S. 2360	March 2, 2006	Ron Wyden (Oregon)	Prohibits blocking or modification of data in transit, except to filter spam, malware, and illegal content; mandates common-carrier rules for subscriber network operators.
Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act of 2006	H.R. 5252	March 30, 2006	Joe Barton (R-Texas and Chairman of the House Commerce Committee)	Proposes to create a national franchise for video providers, and additionally addresses net neutrality, e911, and municipal broadband.	Passed 321-101 by the full House of Representatives on June 8, 2006.
Network Neutrality Act of 2006	H.R. 5273	April 3, 2006	Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts)	Amends the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006 (COPE) to make its existing neutrality provisions more strict.	Defeated 34-22 in committee with Republicans and some Democrats opposing, most Democrats supporting.
Communications, Consumer’s Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006	S. 2686	May 1, 2006	Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii)	Aims to amend the Communications Act of 1934 and addresses net neutrality by directing the FCC to conduct a study of abusive business practices predicted by the Save the Internet coalition and similar groups.	Sent to the full Senate in a 15-7 committee vote and defeated by the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, & Transportation on June 28, 2006.
Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act of 2006	H.R. 5417	May 18, 2006	Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin), John Conyers (D-Michigan)	Makes it a violation of the Clayton Antitrust Act for broadband providers to discriminate against any web traffic, refuse to connect to other providers, block or impair specific (legal) content; prohibits the use of admission control to determine network traffic priority.	Approved 20-13 by the House Judiciary committee on May 25, 2006.
Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2006 (casually known as the Snowe-Dorgan bill)	S. 2917	May 19, 2006	Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota)	Amends the Communications, Consumer’s Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006. Introduces more rigid net-neutral standards including a ban on the blocking/degradation of lawful content, and a ban on QoS deals between network providers and specific content providers. States that FCC would be responsible for enforcing complaints and conducting reports on the state of the broadband market.

Congressman Adam Schiff (D-California), one of the Democrats who voted for the Sensenbrenner-Conyers bill, said: "I think the bill is a blunt instrument, and yet I think it does send a message that it's important to attain jurisdiction for the Justice Department and for antitrust issues."

Neutrality as law

Net neutrality in the common carrier sense has been instantiated into law in many countries, including the United Kingdom, South Korea, and Japan, but none of these countries bans tiered service plans as American regulations would. In Japan, for example, the nation's largest phone company, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone, operates a service called Flet's Square over their FTTH high speed internet connections that serves video on demand at speeds and levels of service higher than generic internet traffic.

In the United States, New York has established net neutrality as a telecommunications standard (See 16 NYCRR Part 605). Many advocates have spoken loudly on its behalf. This, combined with worries over favoritism by telecoms, prompted Congress to begin hearings on the subject.

On February 7, 2006, Congress called upon prominent members of the technology industry to testify on behalf of the standard, including Vinton Cerf, a co-inventor of the Internet Protocol (IP), and current Vice President and "Chief Internet Evangelist" at Google. In his testimony, he said, "allowing broadband carriers to control what people see and do online would fundamentally undermine the principles that have made the Internet such a success."

Critics regarded Dr. Cerf's testimony as hyperbolic, since only one example of the abusive behavior he decries has ever been recorded in the US (see the F.C.C. Consent Decree in In the matter of Madison River Communications, LLC).

The proposals for implementing network neutrality have since taken the form of various laws and regulations to govern Internet communications, including commercial interconnection agreements between Internet Service Providers (ISPs), carriers, on-line service providers, and broadband users, usually on the basis of principles of public service obligations associated with special access to public rights of way. In this sense, network neutrality means a state in which Internet providers provide interconnection services on a uniform basis, or "without discrimination", although there is considerable disagreement about how this principle applies to applications with different needs.

Advocates and opponents

An electronic petition supporting net neutrality has over one million signatures and several hundred organizations also support it. A broad coalition of leading voices including Steve Wozniak, Susan Crawford, and David Reed have endorsed a distinctive legislative proposal for net neutrality. Most of the major internet application companies are advocates of neutrality regulations, including IAC/InterActiveCorp, Ebay, Amazon, Yahoo!, Earthlink and especially Google. Software giant Microsoft has also taken a stance in support of neutrality regulation. Non-profits in support include Moveon.org, Consumer Federation of America, AARP, American Library Association, Gun Owners of America, Public Knowledge, the Media Access Project, Free Press, the Christian Coalition, and TechNet. Tim Berners-Lee (the inventor of the World Wide Web) has also spoken out in favor of net neutrality.

Common carrier implications of network neutrality regulation is strongly opposed by the Bell companies and by some major cable companies. They view non-discrimination as compelled speech prohibited by the First Amendment because they think that cases like Chesapeake and Potomac and even FCC v. Turner stands for the rule that Telcos and Cablecos are First Amendment speakers, and as such cannot be compelled to promote speech they disagree with. Cable operators, like Comcast have taken a somewhat mixed position -- they have repeatedly affirmed that they consider neutral networks desirable, but think regulation is a mistake. The Bells, on the other hand, have actively pushed for tiered networks, arguing that they're more application-neutral than the idealized TCP/IP Internet.

Non-profit pro free-market organizations, including the Freedom Works Foundation, National Black Chamber of Commerce, Progress and Freedom Foundation, New American Century (also referred to as PNAC), and the Ludwig von Mises Institute oppose neutrality regulations. The Weekly Standard hasn't taken a side, arguing that using eminent domain against the Telcos is the best alternative.

Finally, network equipment manufacturers such as Cisco, 3M, and the National Association of Manufacturers believe neutrality regulations are premature. However, observers such as Democratic Media point out that manufacturers have much to gain with a revamped network architecture: offerings like Cisco's Service Exchange Framework promise significant new revenue opportunities should the rules of net neutrality change.

Some U.S. technology trade associations have remained noncommittal on the issue. The U.S. financial sector has similarly remained neutral, though advocates hope this will change as the heavily Internet-dependent banking industry considers both sides of the debate.

See also

• Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act of 2006
• Common Carrier
• End-to-end principle
• Dumb network
• Series of tubes
• traffic shaping

External links

Academic Papers

• Network Neutrality, Broadband Discrimination by Tim Wu, original proposal of Network Neutrality
• Broadband Debate, a User's Guide' by Tim Wu
• Would Mandating Broadband Network Neutrality Help or Hurt Competition? A Comment on the End-to-End Debate by Christopher Yoo, Vanderbilt University School of Law
• New Arch: Future Generation Internet Architecture by David Clark, et al., Air Force Research Laboratory, 12.31.2003
• Toward an Economic Framework for Network Neutrality by Barbara van Schewick
• Nuts and Bolts of Network Neutrality by Ed Felten, Princeton, 7.6.2006
• "Utility Potential Comes from Controlled Flow" at [5] http://newton.nap.edu/html/whitepapers/ch-61.html White Papers The Unpredictable Certainy Information Infrastructure Through 2000 (c)1997 National Academy Press The Awakening 3.0 by Jack Thompson, Page 550

Government documents, speeches, testimony

• U.S. House Record of the Roll Call Vote on the Markey Amendment
• Lessig's testimony to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, February 7, 2006
• Tim Wu & Lawrence Lessig Letter to the FCC
• Michael Powell Speech
• Net Neutrality: Let's Look Before We Leap: Remarks of Assistant Secretary of Commerce Nancy J. Victory to the Progress and Freedom Foundation Conference
• The FCC's Net Neutrality guidelines
• Net Neutrality: Background and Issues (pdf), Angele A. Gilroy, Congressional Report Service, May 16, 2006

News and magazine articles

• Don’t Neutralize Video Franchise Reform, by Phil Kerpen, National Review Online, April 19, 2006.
• "Groups push alternate net neutrality proposals" by Grant Gross, Computerworld, June 20, 2006
• "House Rejects Net Neutrality" by John Nichols, The Nation, June 9, 2006
• "Defeat for Net Neutrality Backers" by Tom Lasseter, BBC, June 9, 2006

Papers from political organizations

• A Comprehensive Study of the Effects of Net Neutrality on Consumer Choice, from Freedom Works (PDF)
• "Whose Property is it?" From the Center for Global Economic Growth
• Cato Institute Paper on Network Neutrality
• "Network Neutrality: A Broadband Wild West?", Sandvine.com (network equipment company) (PDF)
• "The Economics of Network Neutrality", Robert Hahn and Scott Wallsten, AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies] (PDF)

Television shows and videos

• The Daily Show's remarks on Net Neutrality
• The PBS newsmagazine NOW takes a closer look at the issue of Net Neutrality, including interviews, investigative reporting, and insight
• Net Neutrality short video (coanews)
• Short video explaining the how the house rejected Net Neutrality (coanews)
• Lessig addresses Network Neutrality in this video taken at Rochester Institute of Technology, March 24, 2006
• Rocketboom on net neutrality (quicktime)
• Debate between Mike McCurry of the telecom-backed Hands off the Internet and Paul Misener, Vice President for Global Public Policy at Amazon.com

Websites and articles supporting net neutrality

• SaveTheInternet.com - a pro-network neutrality coalition managed by Free Press, including the country's largest consumer advocacy groups -- such as Common Cause, the Consumers Union and Consumer Federation of America -- as well as grassroots groups from the left, right and center -- such as Moveon.org, Christian Coalition of America and US PIRG. In June 2006, the Coalition delivered more than 1,000,000 petition signatures to Congress. More than 5,000 bloggers have also joined as part of SavetheInternet.com's "net-roots" team.
• WeAreTheWeb.org - pro-network neutrality website featuring videos of Peter Pan, the Tron Guy, and Leslie Hall dancing and rapping about net neutrality to the song We Are the Internet.
• Preserve Neutral Internet Standards - a pro-network neutrality regulation group that seeks to promote a particular concept of the Internet platform.
• A Note to Google Users on Net Neutrality - Google CEO Eric Schmidt's open letter to Google users advocating regulation of the Internet.
• Easynews.com's recent bulletin on Net Neutrality - An easynews.com (usenet/ISP provider) newsletter detailing a pro-network neutrality regulation point of view.
• It's Our Net - a pro-neutrality regulation campaign financed by service mega-players Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, eBay and Amazon
• NYCwireless' Network Neutrality Broadband Challenge
• Save Net Neutrality A search marketing firm's opinions about Internet regulation.

Websites and articles opposing net neutrality

• Hands Off The Internet- An anti-regulation group funded by major telecommunications companies.
• Choose Your Cable- An anti-regulation group funded by major cable companies.
• DontRegulate.org - an anti-regulation cartoon funded by major telecommunications companies.
• InternetOfTheFuture.org - The follow up cartoon funded by major telecommunications companies.
• The Future Faster Net Neutrality Campaign - an anti-regulation coalition financed by the United States Telecom Association - a trade association which counts the largest telecommunications companies as paying members.

Commentary and blog articles

• Essay on net neutrality from comtechnews.net blog
• Net Neutrality and Information Security John Bambenek, SANS Internet Storm Center
• "Neutrality of the Net", Tim Berners-Lee
• "Network Neutrality" Wireless Community blog
• Network Neutrality James Seng, CircleID
• You've Already Paid $2,000 For A Fiber Connection You'll Never Get, techdirt.com
• Popular blogger from Ask a Ninja promotes his opinion, using the hot dog on a stick lady squeezing lemonade as an example of content
• Net neutrality and politics don't mix by George Ou. A detailed rebuttal of specific net neutrality concerns.
• Net Neutrality, Political Corruption & Corporate Power | Democracy Undone The Revealing Tale of a Senator & His Hidden Motives
• Net Neutrality is as silly as so-called Internet Governance Net Neutrality from the perspective of Internet security operations
• Why Senator Stevens is Right on Net Neutrality Surprising commentary from Gadi Evron supporting Senator Stevens' views on the Internet
• "The false dichotomy of net neutrality, and the Tariff Rebate Passthrough solution," by Curt Monash A compromise proposal that attempts to meet both the revenue needs of the telcos and the independence goals of the net neutrality advocates.
• How 'Saving The Net' may kill it, The Register, July 17th, 2006 An interview with internet and Wi-Fi design veteran Richard Bennet.
• Senator Stevens: Not as Dumb as He Sounds, by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., July 18th, 2006.

Lists of articles

• C|net Special Coverage of Net Neutrality @ CNET.com (updated regularly)
• List of anti-regulation articles and editorials from Mises Institute blog
• Center for Digital Democracy, The Assault on Network Neutrality
• The Net Neutrality Debate, voip-news.com An early article on the current network neutrality debate

Not yet classified

• Cybertelecom :: Network Neutrality
• A packet sequencing technology that allows for realtime traffic while maintaining net neutrality
• Congresspedia article on "network neutrality legislation" — campaign contributions and other information