FCC’s likely classification of cable modem as information service...
FCC’s likely classification of cable modem as information service not only “misconstrues” Congress’s intent in Telecom Act but also threatens to create “regulatory black hole” for high-speed services, public interest groups said. Such classification would encumber both local and…
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federal govts. from protecting public interest concerns in increasingly centralized industry, said Consumer Federation of America (CFA) and Center for Digital Democracy (CDD). Designation as information service would absolve broadband cable from obligations typically applied to telecom services, they said. “The [projected] FCC decision is fatally flawed and will not provide a workable framework for promoting the deployment of advanced telecommunications capabilities,” CFA Research Dir. Mark Cooper said. Agency’s policy would “undermine” open communications environment that applications developers and content suppliers needed to drive innovation, he said. FCC’s proposed decision betrays “dangerous imbalance” in agency approach to broadband policymaking, said Mark Wahl, CDD broadband project dir. “By pandering to the interests of network owners alone, the Commission is abandoning the public interest safeguards that make the Internet a valuable communications medium,” he said.