Stories from Abroad

Alphabet Inc’s X research division said that India’s Andhra Pradesh state government would buy its newly developed technology that has the potential to provide high-speed wireless internet to millions of people without laying cable.  Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the agreement, which begins next year, would see 2,000 boxes installed as far as 20 kilometers (12 miles) apart on posts and roofs to bring a fast internet connection to populated areas.

[Commentary] As the US continues to debate whether to embrace internet freedom, the world is doing so already, with many countries imposing even stronger rules than the ones the Federal Communications Commission did away with. Other countries are facing similar dilemmas about how to deal with today’s digital realities, and are slowly and individually contributing to a patchwork of laws that differ from country to country.

[Commentary]  To taste a future without network neutrality, try browsing the web in Beijing. China’s internet, provided through telecom giants aligned with the Communist Party, is a digital dystopia, filtered by the vast censorship apparatus known as China’s Great Firewall. Some sites load with soul-withering slowness, or not at all. Others appear instantly. Content vanishes without warning or explanation. The culprit is rarely knowable. A faulty Wi-Fi router? A neighborhood power failure? Commercial sabotage? A clampdown on political dissent?

With a mean global speed of 20.28 Mbps, mobile downloads increased 30.1% over the last 12 months and mobile uploads increased 38.9%. A global average of 40.11 Mbps makes fixed broadband downloads 97.8% faster than mobile and this speed increased 31.6% during the same period. Uploads over fixed broadband showed the smallest increase of 25.9%. 

[Commentary] As the chairman of both France’s regulatory agency for telecommunications and the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications, or BEREC, I believe it is my duty to share some evidence about net neutrality protections from Europe. Net neutrality rules are not deterring telecommunications and cable companies from investing in networks. Net neutrality is not about preserving internet as it is. It is about keeping doors open to reshuffle it again and again. Net neutrality is a worldwide responsibility for democracies.

The Federal Communications Commission is expected to vote on 12/14 to roll back the net neutrality rules in the United States. While the European Union has such rules in place, telecom providers have pushed the boundaries at times in Sweden, Germany, Portugal and elsewhere, offering a glimpse at the future American companies and consumers may face if protections are watered down. Europe adopted net neutrality rules aimed at ensuring that ISPs in the bloc’s 28 member states can’t pick the web’s winners and losers.

Technology companies are facing growing international obstacles affecting how their most valuable asset — data — flows across borders. New trade agreements and laws are affecting how companies share and store their troves of data around the world. For decades, trade talks centered around tangible goods such as oil, agriculture and cars.

[Commentary] Whereas Soviet intelligence operatives occasionally tried to plant false stories in Western media outlets, today the Kremlin subcontracts the task to proxies, who spread customized disinformation using fake accounts on social media. These proxies need not even reside in Russia since they can be contacted and compensated via the so-called Dark Web (a parallel, closed-off internet) wherever they live.

The Russian government declared the broadcasters Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty “foreign agents” on Dec 5, in retaliation for a similar action against Russian state-run news outlets in the United States. The Kremlin-financed television station RT America and its affiliated news agency, Sputnik, complied in Nov with an order from the Justice Department that they registered as foreign agents. This followed a report by American intelligence agencies in January that concluded that the Kremlin was using RT America as a tool “to undermine faith in the U.S.

Thank you to the International Institute of Communications (IIC) for the opportunity to be here for the last Telecommunications and Media Forum of the year.

For the past year, we have been very active as we modernize our rules and remove burdensome regulations that deter innovation and investment. Our goal is simple: to extend what I call “digital opportunity” to every American. In my view, every American who wants high-speed Internet access should be able to get it.