Comcast Is Trying To Ban States From Protecting Broadband & TV Consumers

Legal Issues

from the this-will-surely-end-well dept

We’ve repeatedly tried to make it clear that while everybody tends to focus on the death of net neutrality itself, the Pai FCC’s “Restoring Internet Freedom” order killing net neutrality had a far broader impact than just killing net neutrality rules. As part of the repeal, Comcast, Verizon and AT&T also convinced FCC boss Ajit Pai to effectively neuter FCC authority over ISPs entirely, making it harder for the agency to hold giant ISPs accountable on a wide variety of issues ranging from privacy to transparency (the recent fire fighter kerfuffle being a prime example).

The order also attempts to ban individual states from holding giant ISPs accountable as well, though early ISP efforts to take advantage of this legal language haven’t gone very well. In an effort to double down on weakening state oversight of natural telecom monopolies, Comcast lobbyists at the NCTA (the cable industry’s biggest lobbying and policy organization) have also started petitioning the FTC, urging it to similarly “pre-empt” (read: ban or ignore) state-level efforts to protect consumers:

“The FTC should ensure that the Internet is subject to uniform, consistent federal regulations, including by issuing guidance explicitly setting forth that inconsistent state and local requirements are preempted,” the NCTA wrote.

The FCC is already trying to preempt state net neutrality laws at the urging of industry groups, and courts might ultimately have to decide whether federal agencies can preempt such rules.

“The FTC should endorse and reinforce the FCC’s ruling by issuing guidance to state attorneys general and consumer protection authorities reaffirming that they are bound by FCC and FTC precedent in this arena,” NCTA argued.”

The shorter version: the FCC’s Restoring Internet Freedom order effectively cripples the FCC’s ability to protect consumers, then shovels any remaining enforcement authority over to the FTC, which is ill-equipped to actually police the telecom market. Predicting that states would then try to jump in and fill the oversight accountability vacuum (which is precisely what started happening on both net neutrality and privacy), ISPs have also been urging both the FCC and the FTC to ban states from doing so.

This is all being done under the pretense that blind deregulation of the telecom sector magically results in greater industry investment and broader deployment. But as we’ve explained countless times, that’s not how the U.S. telecom sector works. With neither competition nor reasonable government oversight to constrain it, natural monopolies like Comcast are simply free to double down on all their worst behaviors. To ignore this historical fact, one is required to pretend that the broadband industry is actually competitive, something Comcast again leans on in its filing with the FTC:

“ISPs claim they face so much competition that market forces will prevent bad behavior. Cable TV faces competition from online video services like Netflix, YouTube, and Amazon, NCTA noted. But notably, the NCTA filing includes a graphic listing “competitors” that doesn’t include any broadband providers.”

None of this logic is new. It was the same argument used by former FCC head Mike Powell (now the top lobbyist of the cable industry), who happily deregulated the broadband sector in the early aughts promising a cornucopia of investment and competition (consumers instead got a bigger Comcast monopoly, skyrocketing prices, usage caps, and virtually no competition at faster speeds). Oddly, giving giant telecom monopolies the precise regulatory landscape they want (no oversight, no concern about monopoly power) doesn’t end well for consumers, innovation, or competition.

That this is still debated speaks to how lost in the woods on these issues we’ve become. And like Charlie Brown and his football, we never seem to learn, so nothing changes. And our reward for this collective gullibility is expensive broadband, comically-terrible customer service, and a bigger, meaner Comcast.

Filed Under: broadband, consumer protection, fcc, pre-emption, privacy, states, tv
Companies: comcast