Lauren Frayer

The Internet service providers most loudly insisting they support network neutrality - Comcast and Verizon, for example - are the same companies who’ve been behind the most significant legal and political opposition to any net neutrality rules, and the same companies that have been caught time and again pushing the bounds of permissible behavior, or outright violating net neutrality principles. So, let’s give them a quick fact-check and separate the truth from the “fake news,” at least where ISP positions on net neutrality are concerned.

[Commentary] In an ever-connected world, the internet has taken on a fundamental role. While internet access is not quite as essential as clean drinking water, it is starting to get close. Low-quality access often creates a substantial economic and social disadvantage.

As Mozilla uncovered through recent research in Kenya, those with low-quality access more frequently fall prey to fake news and phishing than people with better access and more digital skills. They are limited to being content consumers, rather than creators. And, they are more likely to trade personal data for “free” products. Worse, the poorly-connected are already society’s most vulnerable: Low-income individuals with no higher education background. While big tech companies will continue to be a part of the access equation, continued community and government investment in better-quality access is essential. In fact, we should be growing investment in this area.

[Mark Surman is the executive director of Mozilla]

[Commentary] When the Federal Communications Commission made its decision two years ago to regulate the internet as a public utility, the harm came to small towns and rural communities almost immediately. Internet companies nationwide slowed or stopped plans to invest in improving and expanding their services due to new legal and compliance costs. For rural America, those regulations presented yet another hurdle to gaining access to modern broadband services that urban areas have enjoyed for years.

Recently, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai announced his plan to correct that mistake. Pai’s plan has sparked an unusual amount of handwringing by some people with misguided ideas on how to ensure the internet economy continues to thrive.

[Betsy Huber is president of National Grange.]

House Oversight Subcommittee on Information Technology Ranking Member Robin Kelly (D-IL) is introducing a new bill aimed at bridging the digital divide by requiring all future government websites to be mobile friendly. The bill is aimed at making government policy more accessible to lower-income individuals, particularly in inner cities that can’t afford broadband access on their computers and often access the web through their mobile phones.

“In 2017, it’s unreasonable that one in ten Americans cannot effectively connect with their government because they only use mobile devices,” Rep Kelly said. “Deep urban and remote rural communities are the most affected by our government’s failure to provide mobile-accessible websites. Without broadband coverage, these Americans are tied to the mobile-only Internet.”

[Commentary] From the Boston Tea Party to the printing of Common Sense, the ability to dissent—and to do it anonymously—was central to the founding of the United States. Anonymity was no luxury: It was a crime to advocate separation from the British Crown. It was a crime to dump British tea into Boston harbor. This trend persists. Our history is replete with moments when it was a “crime” to do the right thing, and legal to inflict injustice.

The latest crime-fighting tools, however, may eliminate people’s ability to be anonymous. Historically, surveillance technology has tracked our technology: our cars, our computers, our phones. Face recognition technology tracks our bodies. And unlike fingerprinting or DNA analysis, face recognition is designed to identify us from far away and in secret.

[Alvaro Bedoya is the founding executive director of the Center on Privacy & Technology at Georgetown Law. ]

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) denied the validity of a memo circulating on social media that claims that Fox News will be the only news channel allowed on televisions for one of the agency's units. “There was no directive or memorandum from the Administration that went out to employees about broadcast news channels displaying on monitors in common areas throughout the FDA’s White Oak campus,” an FDA spokeswoman said. The memo, which was apparently sent to employees at the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, says that administration officials have "requested that all monitors, under our control, on the White Oak Campus, display FOX news."

The US Congress passed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2017, which provides $445 million for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's (CPB) FY 2019 advance appropriation, $50 million for upgrading and replacing the public broadcasting interconnection system and $25.741 million for the Department of Education’s Ready To Learn program. The legislation reaffirms that federal funding for public media is an investment that continues to deliver proven value and service to all Americans.

On behalf of the millions of Americans who consume and connect with public media every day, CPB would like to thank Congress for its continued strong support. The federal appropriation provides the foundation of this unique public-private partnership, essential funding for the nearly 1,500 locally owned and operated public television and radio stations across the country. Federal funding ensures that public media serves rural, small town and urban communities alike, and makes possible stations’ service in early childhood education, public safety, connecting citizens to our history, and promoting civil discussions.

[Commentary] In many ways, network neutrality is a secondary problem. Until we confront core injustices stemming from unregulated monopoly power—which may worsen given the likelihood of massive media mergers—we can’t address issues like slow broadband speeds, outrageously high prices, digital red-lining, and the woeful lack of competition in Internet service markets.

Killing net neutrality is a top-down corporate power grab. There’s absolutely no need to repeal it. The protection has tremendous public support. As the Federal Communications Commission serves a narrow corporate agenda, we must find a way to recapture it for the people. The Internet is too valuable to leave to the mercy of monopolies. The battle for net neutrality continues. It’s a battle we can and must win.

[Victor Pickard is an Associate Professor of Communication at the Annenberg School for Communication.]

[Commentary] Don’t believe the arguments pushed by ‘network neutrality’ activists: The government does more harm than good by interfering in the World Wide Web. Any student of Federal Communications Commission history knows roughly how this story will end if the rules are not repealed. The dominant Web and Internet providers will muddle through, perhaps more profitable but also more sclerotic and risk-averse. Their armies of attorneys, many of whom used to work at the FCC, will closely read the thousands of pages of orders, declaratory rulings, and press releases to anticipate shifting legal winds. Smaller providers and mom-and-pop tech startups, focused on customers and services rather than compliance, will be left in the dark.

[Brent Skorup is an attorney and a research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University]

In his address on April 26, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai cited Free State Foundation research estimating that the Open Internet Order "has already cost our country $5.1 billion in broadband capital investment."

Just two years after the FCC adopted the Open Internet Order, I estimate that broadband providers significantly slowed investment, despite the claims by the FCC that the opposite would occur. Taking into account the latest USTelecom investment data, I now estimate that foregone investment in 2015 and 2016 was about $5.6 billion, an amount providers likely would have invested in a business climate without Title II public utility regulation.