FCC Fields First Formal Complaint Under Its 2010 Net Neutrality Rules
A VoIP provider in Florida filed the first formal complaint at the FCC over what the company claims is a violation of the commission’s 2010 net neutrality rules, which took effect late last year. The complaint was filed by L2Networks against the Albany Water Gas & Light Commission, a municipally owned utility in Georgia.
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Recently, the muni filed a complaint alleging that L2N had stolen service in Dougherty County, Ga., according to a press release by L2N. The muni said L2N should have compensated it for use of its fiber network for delivering VoIP services offered by L2N, L2N said. The impact of the complaint “if successful, has the potential to immediately create an irreversible ripple effect along with the creation of various legal challenges across nearly every national content and application provider like Netflix, Vonage, Packet8, Facebook, Google, Amazon and other entities that provide application based services across ’the internet,'” L2N said.
Ronald Skates, director of telecommunications for the city, named in the complaint, did not respond to a request for comment. The FCC also had no comment. “We are deeply concerned that the alleged claim could potentially change the landscape of the national Internet marketplace as residential and commercial consumers see it today,” an L2N spokesman said. “The FCC’s report and order … was designed specifically to prevent these types of activities; however the manipulative use of the criminal legal system to create an anti-competitive environment and otherwise remove the local competition, is ‘far reaching’ at best."
Free State Foundation President Randolph May, an opponent of the net neutrality rules, said he’s not surprised by the complaint. “Welcome to what is likely to become the wild, wacky world of net neutrality regulation,” May said. “This sounds like a matter better resolved in court under contract or perhaps tort law principles, probably in state court or at the state PSC. But now it is easy for any broadband user that has a grievance to conjure up a claimed net neutrality violation and make a federal case out of it."
Net neutrality supporters were largely withholding comment as they looked more closely at the complaint. “We are interested by the development, but still gathering information about the case and the complaint at this time,” said Free Press Policy Director Matt Wood. “Based on preliminary reports, it certainly sounds as though there may be other disputes between these two parties, as well as other issues in play here besides the FCC’s Open Internet rules."