FCC's Genachowski may reneg on neutrality promise

FCC chairman Julius Genachowski may turn on promises to enforce net neutrality in the US, insiders supposedly claimed on Monday. The contacts said the chief may now prefer to leave Internet access in its relatively deregulated state and avoid reclassifying broadband in a way that would 'burden' carriers and scare them away from building out their networks. He would mostly focus on changing administrative policies to give the FCC authority over at least some Internet service.

The change of heart alleged by the Washington Post would follow after a federal court shot down initial attempts to require net neutrality using only its existing mandate, which centered on a statement from former FCC chair Kevin Martin rather than an official rule. It's been hinted in the past that reclassification was on the table to require "common carriage."

Neither Genachowski nor other FCC officials have commented on the rumor, which is characterized as tentative since neither Genachowski nor others have committed to this strategy.

A decision in this direction would please carriers that have pushed for as little regulation as possible but would anger many telecom industry critics and current Genachowski supporters, either of which has hoped that he would implement more meaningful changes. Typical arguments have noted that, without common carriage rules, Internet providers have not only faced little competition from newcomers without their own networks but have sometimes been seen filtering or banning specific apps.

Comcast has abided by certain net neutrality principles in honoring its agreement with the FCC even after it was rendered invalid, but the lack of enforceable neutrality rules is often blamed for the cable provider's original decision to throttle and frequently block BitTorrent until it was caught in act after repeated public denials.

By Electronista Staff