EU Lawmakers Slam 'Radical Proposal' To Let ISPs Demand New Fees From Websites

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Fifty-four members of the European Parliament (MEPs) are protesting what they call a "radical proposal" to require payments from online service providers to Internet service providers. Noting that Europe's 2015 "Open Internet Regulation ensures that citizens are free to use whichever apps and websites they wish," the MEPs said they have "deep concern about the European Commission's plans to change our net neutrality legislation in the upcoming Connectivity Infrastructure Act to be proposed in autumn, without having consulted the public, technology experts, academics, civil society, or expert regulatory agencies." No specific proposal has been released, but "statements to the press indicate that a new provision would require payments from online service providers to broadband providers -- ostensibly to fund the rollout of 5G and fiber to the home," the MEPs wrote in the letter yesterday (PDF) to the European Commission. The letter cited a May 2 Reuters article that said, "Tech giants such as Google, Meta, and Netflix may have to bear some of the cost of Europe's telecoms network, Europe's digital chief Margrethe Vestager said on Monday, following EU telecoms operators' complaints." The MEPs' list of references also includes two Ars Technica articles from 2012 when a similar proposal was being discussed. Vestager reportedly said at a news conference that "there are players who generate a lot of traffic that then enables their business but who have not been contributing actually to enable that traffic. They have not been contributing to enabling the investments in the rollout of connectivity... and we are in the process of getting a thorough understanding of how could that be enabled." [...] The MEPs' letter further argued that charging websites for access to broadband consumers would help ISPs abuse their monopolies: "Adopting a model that allows for or mandates access fees would be a disastrous return to the economic model for telephony, where telecommunications companies and countries leveraged their termination access monopolies to make communication expensive. Because phone companies had a monopoly over their customers, they could charge exorbitant prices to anyone seeking to call their customers. Broadband providers have the same monopoly over their customers. Allowing them to charge content providers for access could cause significant harm to the Internet economy." The MEPs also doubt such fees would improve broadband connectivity, saying that "factors such as permits or construction capacities can act as more severe barriers than lack of funding." They urged the European Commission to take its time and open an official consultation, saying, "There is no emergency that requires action in autumn 2022."

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