Will Ads Become Next Network Neutrality Battle?

[Commentary] Executives at an Israeli tech startup believe that some wireless carriers around the world are prepared to use the company’s technology to open a new front against Internet firms.

The fresh battleground? The billions of dollars in revenue generated by advertising on content and services delivered over wireless networks. Since the wireless infrastructure is owned by the carriers, Ron Porat and Roi Carthy of Shine Technologies say, the telecom companies want and deserve a cut. It’s an audacious idea. Some Web giants already pay Internet service providers such as Verizon and Comcast to deliver their traffic to end users faster, an arrangement called peering. To make this work, Internet companies pay by the amount of speed provided. Shine is offering wireless carriers something different: In the world made possible by Shine, one kind of content – advertising -- would be treated differently than other kinds of data. AdSight would allow wireless carriers to monitor what ads are being delivered through their networks, and from whom, all the way down to the level of individual ad impressions. The same technology would also allow the carriers to selectively block ads from any source on Web pages, in videos, even in apps.