The 25th Anniversary of the Telecommunications Act of 1996

The 1990s were the decade that made the Internet. And the law that ushered in the greatest change was the landmark Telecommunications Act of 1996, Public Law 104–104 (TA96). In February of 1996, TA96 passed in both the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate by overwhelming margins, despite being one of the most heavily lobbied pieces of legislation Congress had yet seen, with the future of some of the country’s largest industries in play and billions of dollars in market share at stake. The most fundamental change mandated by the 1996 Act was to de-monopolize local telecommunications markets and open them up to competition. The law broke down monopoly silos of local and long distance telephone service, cable service, and unleashed massive investment in digital technologies and broadband deployment. It connected America’s K-12 schools and public libraries to the Internet. It also contained language on the liability of online intermediaries in “Section 230.”

[Colin Crowell is Vice President of Global Public Policy and Philanthropy at Twitter. Prior to Twitter, Crowell worked for over two decades for then-Congressman, now Senator Ed Markey (D-MA).]