CNET: Congressional Democrats Ready Net Neutrality Bill. “Democrats on Capitol Hill are crafting legislation that could restore net neutrality and the Federal Communications Commission’s authority to regulate broadband, according to a report published Monday by The Washington Post.”
CNET: Net neutrality will make a comeback in 2022. “A new chapter in the ongoing saga of net neutrality and who governs the internet will take shape over the next year thanks to another shift in power at the Federal Communications Commission. With new appointees from President Joe Biden firming up a Democratic majority at the agency, reinstating Obama-era net neutrality rules thrown out under the Trump administration will be a top priority for the agency.”
ZDNet: New York Attorney General declares top ISPs committed net neutrality fraud. “When then-President Donald Trump’s Federal Communications Commission (FCC) tried to destroy net neutrality in 2017, everyone knew that millions of comments in favor of breaking net neutrality were bogus. As then-New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said at the time, two million net neutrality comments were fake.”
Mozilla Blog: Reinstating net neutrality in the US. “For almost a decade, Mozilla has defended user access to the internet, in the US and around the world. Our work to preserve net neutrality has been a critical part of that effort, including our lawsuit against the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to keep these protections in place for users in the US. With the recent appointment of Acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel to lead the agency, there will be a new opportunity to establish net neutrality rules at the federal level in the near future, ensuring that families and businesses across the country can enjoy these fundamental rights.”
The Verge: Democrats are gearing up to fight for net neutrality. “A new bill to bring back net neutrality is on its way, supported by one of the open internet’s most fervent advocates. At an advocacy event last month, Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) announced that he would be introducing a measure in the next few ‘weeks’ that would engrave the no throttling, block, or paid fast lanes rules into law.”
New York Times: The long, painful path of net neutrality. “California this week was cleared to enforce its own net neutrality regulation, which (of course) had been challenged in court. This is now a distraction for our elected leaders and corporations when there are more pressing issues. I talked to my colleague Cecilia Kang about the origins of the war over net neutrality (barbershop music!) and what’s at stake.”
Techdirt: DOJ Continues Its Quest To Kill Net Neutrality (And Consumer Protection In General) In California. “After the FCC effectively neutered itself at telecom lobbyist behest, numerous states jumped in to fill the consumer protection void. As a result, California, in 2018, passed some net neutrality rules that largely mirrored the FCC’s discarded consumer protections. Laughing at the concept of state rights, Bill Barr’s DOJ immediately got to work protecting U.S. telecom monopolies and filed suit in a bid to vacate the rules.”
Gizmodo: Judge Orders FCC to Hand Over IP Addresses Linked to Fake Net Neutrality Comments. “A Manhattan federal judge has ruled the Federal Communications Commission must provide two reporters access to server logs that may provide new insight into the allegations of fraud stemming from agency’s 2017 net neutrality rollback.”
CNET: Activists challenge 2020 candidates to sign net neutrality pledge. “Net neutrality proponents say it’s not just enough for 2020 Democratic presidential candidates to say they are in favor of restoring Obama-era open internet rules. They want them to sign a pledge, which includes forgoing campaign contributions from the broadband industry and its lobbyists.”
Yahoo Finance: The FCC said repealing net-neutrality rules would help consumers: It hasn’t. “FCC chairman Ajit Pai repeatedly emphasized that eliminating the rules would help smaller ISPs in particular bring competition to the market. ‘They told us that these rules prevented them from extending their service because they had to spend money on lawyers and accountants,’ he said in a June 2018 statement. A year later, the bargain looks unfulfilled. Evidence remains scant of ISPs saving money from this regulatory rollback, or working to give consumers faster or better broadband options. But they also don’t seem to be using their new power, much less abusing it.”
Ars Technica: 47 Democrats cave on net neutrality after GOP calls bill “dead on arrival”. “Forty-seven Democratic members of Congress are calling for a net neutrality compromise with Republicans, who have refused to support a full restoration of the net neutrality rules repealed by the Ajit Pai-led Federal Communications Commission.”
ZDNet: Can the internet be saved?. “The good news is that the House of Representatives passed the Save the Internet Act by a vote of 232-190. The bad news is while Republicans said they too want to to protect net neutrality, only one Republican voted for the bill. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and President Donald Trump have already refused to support the act.”
Techdirt: Much Of The Broadband Growth Ajit Pai Credits To Killing Net Neutrality Was Actually Due To A Clerical Error. “So a few weeks ago we noted how the Ajit Pai FCC has been trying to pretend that some modest recent broadband growth is directly thanks to its unpopular policies — like killing net neutrality. Except a closer look at the report shows the data they used was only accurate up to the tail end of 2017, when net neutrality wasn’t even formally repealed until June of 2018 (read: the growth couldn’t have been due to killing net neutrality yet, because it hadn’t technically happened yet).”
Gizmodo: How an Investigation of Fake FCC Comments Snared a Prominent D.C. Media Firm . “Millions of records that the FCC’s top lawyer once fought to hold back from state law enforcement officials now serve as key evidence in a year-long probe into cases of Americans being impersonated during the agency’s latest net neutrality proceeding. Analysis of the data would lead investigators last fall to consider, as one of many potential sources of fraud, the owner of an influential Washington, D.C., newspaper, whose advocacy business may have served as a pipeline for one of the most notorious of all fake comments.”
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BuzzFeed News: Political Operatives Are Faking Voter Outrage With Millions Of Made-Up Comments To Benefit The Rich And Powerful
BuzzFeed News: Political Operatives Are Faking Voter Outrage With Millions Of Made-Up Comments To Benefit The Rich And Powerful. “A BuzzFeed News investigation — based on an analysis of millions of comments, along with court records, business filings, and interviews with dozens of people — offers a window into how a crucial democratic process was skewed by one of the most prolific uses of political impersonation in US history. In a key part of the puzzle, two little-known firms, Media Bridge and LCX Digital, working on behalf of industry group Broadband for America, misappropriated names and personal information as part of a bid to submit more than 1.5 million statements favorable to their cause.”