Phone Carriers Call for EU Rules to Hit Facebook and Google

Vodafone and Telefonica used a technology conference in Spain to call for the European Union to focus less on new rules for phone companies and more on Facebook and Google to reduce their dominance.

The carriers are battling so-called network neutrality proposals, championed by Internet companies, that they say will hurt business and discourage new products such as driverless cars. The proposals are meant to prevent carriers from blocking access to some websites or slowing Web traffic. “Network neutrality was invented by those who don’t want neutrality,” Telefonica Chief Executive Officer Cesar Alierta said. “All we request is a level playing field for the whole sector, not only for telcos.” Internet companies have become too dominant, giving them the power to control what applications are developed and used by consumers, the carriers said. “They’re so obsessed with us not having a market share of 40 percent in countries like Ireland, countries with 3 million inhabitants, but they’re not concerned about a well-known company having 90 percent of the market in search engines,” Alierta said.