Regulating Traffic Management-An EU Perspective
By Emma Peart
Telecommunication can play a large part in intellectual property, and the European Union has given an acknowledgement of this today.
It has announced it will be looking at the online data traffic management practices of telecommunications operators. Information provided suggests that the investigation will focus on what information telecommunications operators give consumers about the way they manage internet traffic:“traffic management”. The European Union’s Commissioner for the digital agenda Ms. Neelie Kroes has specifically mentioned that there are concerns that some Internet providers are not transparent about the services they block or the downloading speeds they offer — thus keeping consumers from making informed choices for example.
With many telecoms companies selling television and other video services to customers, she also raised the concerns one operator through traffic management could be disrupting a competitor’s content by slowing down some data traffic or blocking certain software applications: “throttling”. This would of course be frowned upon as being anti-competitive, and is tied to the principle of what is described as “net neutrality”- that online services should be treated equally to foster competition and innovation. The investigation has perhaps come about due to new transparency rules on traffic management practices next month.
How will this effect commerce generally? lf the investigations, to be completed by National bodies, raise concerns there could be tighter measures introduced by the European Union which would be implemented across all member states, and thus be almost Europe-wide. It may also have an effect internationally if there are changes. In America, for example, they do not at present have as many internet service providers. The likelihood is that that number may increase, and that America may look to Europe on how to regulate the industry to cope. Even if not, they may consider any regulations that Europe take as a preventative measure for anti-competitive behaviour with the existing providers.
