Verizon, FCC Spar Over Neutrality Rules

Verizon filed new court papers arguing that the Federal Communications Commission still lacks authority to impose Net neutrality rules, despite a recent Supreme Court decision that appears to bolster the agency's ability to enact regulations.

“The core issue in this case is whether any substantive provision of the Communications Act authorizes the FCC’s sweeping regulation of the Internet,” Verizon argues in its latest legal papers, filed this week with a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. “The agency’s inability to identify any specific authority for these rules ... is fatal.”

The telecom is challenging the FCC's open Internet rules, which prohibit all broadband providers from blocking or degrading competing apps or services. The rules, which went into effect in 2011, also prohibit wireline providers -- but not wireless ones -- from engaging in unreasonable discrimination.

Verizon argues in its appeal that the FCC doesn't have the authority to regulate broadband because it's considered an “information” service, as opposed to a telecommunications service. The company points to a prior ruling by the appellate court in a case involving Comcast. In that matter, the court ruled that the FCC lacked authority to sanction Comcast for throttling peer-to-peer traffic.

But last month, the Supreme Court issued a ruling that seems to support the FCC.

In that case, the court ruled that judges should defer to an agency's view of its authority -- at least in some situations. An analyst with Stifel, Nicolaus & Company said at the time that the ruling seemed to boost the FCC's argument, according to a report in The New York Times. But the analyst added a caveat that the Net neutrality dispute differs factually from the case the Supreme Court recently decided.

The FCC recently filed papers with the federal appeals court calling attention to the recent Supreme Court case, arguing that the decision weighs in favor of upholding the rules.

But Verizon takes a different view. In papers filed this week, the telecom says that the recent Supreme Court decision only supports the proposition that agencies can make “reasonable” interpretations of their authority. Verizon says that the FCC's interpretation of its authority is unreasonable, given “Congress’s express desire that the Internet remain unregulated and explicit prohibitions on common-carrier regulation of information services.”

 

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