Ajit Pai does ISPs’ bidding, pushes for tighter rules on Google and Facebook
Enlarge / FCC Chairman Ajit Pai at The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research on May 5, 2017 in Washington, DC. (credit: Getty Images | Chip Somodevilla)
As chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Ajit Pai has focused on one goal above all others: eliminating rules previous administrations imposed on broadband providers such as Comcast, Charter, AT&T, and Verizon.
It turns out Pai is also in lockstep with the broadband industry on another project-convincing Congress to impose new regulations on Google, Facebook, and Twitter as ISPs try to compete against tech giants for advertising dollars.
Last week, telco lobby group USTelecom accidentally emailed internal documents containing draft talking points to Techdirt founder Mike Masnick. As Masnick detailed in a thorough summary and analysis, USTelecom claims that ISPs "have embraced strong consumer privacy policies" but that websites pose a grave privacy threat to consumers and should therefore face new regulations. USTelecom also argued that "net neutrality" rules should apply to the practices of websites, not just to ISPs.
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