European Commission plans to safeguard net neutrality in...
European Commission plans to safeguard net neutrality in its “Connected Continent” measure are “devoid of substance” because they give ISPs almost unlimited rights to manage traffic, said the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) in an opinion Friday (http://bit.ly/HQijm7). The proposed…
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regulation for a single European e-communications market includes the principle of free access to and distribution of content, applications and services by end-users, but paves the way for providers to use traffic management measures that scan and discriminate among different types of content, it said. Those provisions significantly limit net neutrality and interfere with privacy and data protection rights, it said. End-users need to be sure that their rights are respected when they use e-communications services, and that any interference with privacy and data protection guarantees are proportionate and necessary for a clearly specific, legitimate purpose, the EDPS said. The EC proposal allows traffic management for, among other reasons, “implementing a legislative provision” and “preventing and impeding serious crimes,” grounds that “appear overly broad and have a considerable potential to trigger a wide-scale, preventive monitoring of communications content,” it said. The EDPS recommended that: (1) Those two grounds for using network traffic management be stricken from the measure. (2) The regulation provide clear information on communications inspection techniques that are allowed in the context of traffic management, and state that when such management is permitted, it be based on the sole analysis of Internet Protocol headers, not on deep packet inspection. (3) Providers be required to tell users they might use traffic management, the techniques used, and the effect of such techniques on privacy and data protection rights. (4) National telecom regulators supervising the application of traffic management measures be able to cooperate with national data protection agencies.