Lindsay Stern

Public Knowledge filed comments and reply comments urging the Federal Communications Commission to increase its current broadband benchmark speed to at least 100 Mbps downstream based on evidence that American consumers already are using those speeds and many consumers are adopting even higher speeds. Since those comments were filed, more information has been released from the FCC and other third-party sources that support increasing the FCC's broadband benchmark speed from 25/3 Mbps.

Public Knowledge, Common Cause, New America’s Open Technology Institute, et al. met with Federal Communications Commission Wireline Competition Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics staff on January 16, 2020, to express concern regarding the methodology, analysis, and conclusions in the Fifteenth Broadband Deployment Report Notice of Inquiry. They disagreed with the FCC’s conclusions in its two prior broadband deployment reports that broadband is being deployed to all Americans in a timely fashion.

This December 2019 marks the two-year anniversary of the Federal Communications Commission’s vote to repeal the 2015 Open Internet Order and the agency’s net neutrality consumer protections.

The Federal Communications Commission is required by law to initiate a notice of inquiry and report annually on whether advanced telecommunications capability is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion. This annual broadband report is incredibly important because the findings and conclusions are designed to help Congress and the FCC develop policies that ensure all Americans have robust broadband access. Reports with inaccurate data on broadband availability can skew the findings and prevent unserved and underserved areas from gaining access to broadband.

Some proponents of the Dec 2017 repeal of network neutrality argue that a year after the decision, the internet is still functioning -- but that doesn’t mean the internet isn’t changing. Consumers may not have noticed broadband providers making network management adjustments, because they are purposefully small and gradual, but they are crucial steps in preventing an open internet. There have been several potential net neutrality violations since the repeal went into effect. If the repeal continues, the way consumers access the internet will gradually change.