US judge upholds net neutrality abolition and state own rules
The judge has ruled in a case between Mozilla and the FCC that the curtailment of the US net neutrality rules that was implemented at the end of 2017 can be maintained. At the same time, the judges have also ruled that the FCC cannot torpedo divergent state laws.
The United States Court of Appeals District of Columbia Circuit has left the so-called Restoring Internet Freedom Order largely intact in its ruling . In practice, that means that most of Mozilla’s arguments put forward have been rejected. FCC Republican Chairman Ajit Pai called the ruling a major consumer victory that he said would overturn a 1930s style of Internet regulation. According to him , today in the US there is an open and free internet. Pai states that since the Restoring Internet Freedom Order, consumers have received 40 percent faster Internet speeds and millions of additional Americans have gained access to high-speed Internet.
The Republican majority of regulator FCC changed net neutrality rules in December 2017 through the aforementioned Restoring Internet Freedom Order. As a result, the strict rules were abolished, as a result of which certain guarantees regarding services, network access and competition have disappeared. For example, the new rules allow providers to make deals with service providers to prioritize them, which is a potential new source of revenue. The new rules were in June last year finally effective .
Mozilla was not happy about this and filed a lawsuit early last year . The company believes that the new regime could mean the end of the internet and that it will only benefit large ISPs. Mozilla also believes the FCC’s decision violates federal law.
The company behind the Firefox browser hasn’t gotten the FCC’s repeal decision off the table, but it has accomplished something else. There are quite a few US states that have their own state rules and laws in place to ensure net neutrality or parts thereof in their state. The FCC’s decision contains a section that effectively prohibits states from doing so, but the FCC must remove that element. According to the three judges, the FCC does not have the right to categorically prevent all 50 states from making their own rules about interstate communications. The FCC also has to amend parts of the Restoring Internet Freedom Order because, for example, it has not investigated what the changed rules mean for public safety.