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Net Neutrality – Debate Begins in Romania
06.06.2012
On Tuesday, 5 June 2012, within the public debate themed Net neutrality and the Quest for Sustainable Internet, organised by ANCOM and ApTI, representatives of the communications companies, regulatory authorities, consumers and entities protecting the civil rights analysed the challenges and issues raised by the common desideratum of maintaining the Internet neutral, under the conditions of an unprecedented growth of the traffic between the networks.
The net neutrality principle, according to which the Internet access networks should treat equally every type of content, all sites, platforms and applications available, faces a number of counterarguments in the matter of the need to manage the traffic in order to ensure the network efficiency and sustainability.
“The net neutrality principle was enacted only in the Netherlands. The law adopted in this country regulated in fact the conditions which justify the intervention in order to prioritize the traffic, thus preventing that these conditions become abusive. Nevertheless, in the context in which the studies show that the traffic between the Internet networks will grow by five times in the next five years, the following question may not be ignored neither in Romania nor in Europe: which is the best way to further ensure free and equal access to Internet? We wanted to find out more precisely what is the situation in Romania on this matter, while analysing practices from other European countries, as well as points of view as various as possible which would enable us to have an objective approach in the future”, the president of ANCOM, Mr. Catalin Marinescu, said in his opening speech.
The event incited an exchange of opinions on the implications which net neutrality has in relation to the users’ rights and to the fundamental human rights, such as freedom of expression and privacy. Concrete regulatory methods and effective traffic management practices were also brought into discussion. One of the main conclusions of the debate was that, at this time, although reasons of concern occasionally appear, a regulation of the net neutrality at European level is not justified and that a country-by-country intervention, proportionate to the situations identified in each national market, is more appropriate. Transparency was seen as the primordial remedy to the issues pertaining to net neutrality, bearing in mind that this remedy needs to be correctly implemented in a competitive environment in order to enable the users to change their provider if the latter enforces restrictions.
Attending the event, the Minister of Communications and Information Society, Mr. Dan Nica, expressed his determination to use all the instruments available to the government in order to stimulate the increase of the Internet access in Romania, saying that the objective of all the decision makers should be that of ensuring free access to any site, under secure conditions, at high speeds and competitive prices. Mr. Nica also announced on this occasion the intention of the ministry he is heading to launch new e-government services, among which a VAT reimbursement electronic system.
“Today’s debate allowed us to distinguish three major opinions belonging to each of the three key groups interested in the net neutrality topic: the content providers support the net neutrality without reserves and depend on the network in order to carry out their activity and provide their services to the consumers, the users’ representatives support the full neutrality of networks and require its firm regulation, whereas the Internet service providers do not oppose to the net neutrality principle, but face objective needs in the context of the increased pressure on the networks they operate”, the president of ANCOM, Mr. Catalin Marinescu, concluded and invited the participants to continue the debate within a working group dedicated to this matter, coordinated by ANCOM.
The presentations held during the event are available for consultation on the ANCOM website, here.
