Net Neutrality is Critical for Europe's Future

[Commentary] Maintaining network neutrality is critical for the future of the Web and the future of human rights, innovation and progress in Europe. Yet, some companies and governments are arguing that we should depart from the principle of net neutrality.

Until now, we’ve largely got along ok without explicit laws to protect net neutrality, but as the Internet evolves, the situation has changed. If we want to maintain and enhance the Internet as an engine for growth, we must ensure that companies providing access should not be able to block, throttle, or otherwise restrict legal content and services of their users online, be it for commercial or political motivation. Of course, it is not just about blocking and throttling. It is also about stopping 'positive discrimination', such as when one internet operator favours one particular service over another. If we don’t explicitly outlaw this, we hand immense power to telcos and online service operators. In effect, they can become gatekeepers - able to handpick winners and the losers in the market and to favour their own sites, services and platforms over those of others. Binding net neutrality rules under consideration by the European Union (part of an omnibus proposal called the Telecoms Single Market Regulation) would do exactly that. The European Parliament made a clear and strong statement for net neutrality in their version of the legislation in Spring of 2014. Now it’s in the hands of the Council of the European Union to determine their position.

[Sir Tim Berners-Lee is the Founding Director of the World Wide Web Foundation]