AT&T's hidden agenda...AT&T doesn't like a decision by the FCC in America, so it is trying to sneak in changes to European law that will compromise net neutrality. It wants  to prevent European regulators from regulating fairly on peer-to-peer filesharing traffic. It is also trying to sell its global Internet services to the content industries.

The AT&T amendments being promoted around the European Parliament have a hidden American agenda. It concerns a ruling made by the American regulator, the Federal Communications  Commission (FCC) against the network operator Comcast, in August last year. The effect of the  ruling is that ISPs cannot filter peer-to-peer traffic, or indeed, they can't pick on any specific type of traffic and filter or slow it down or ‘restrict' it.

AT&T, and its partner Verizon, wants to prevent a similar regulatory decision happening in Europe. So it is trying to get the law changed.  And it has targeted the Telecoms Package, currently about to enter the Second Reading in the European Parliament.  It wants  changes to Article 22(3) of the Universal Services directive, and associated Recitals, as I have previously reported. The impact of these changes would not only be negative for net neutrality. They would mean that European national  regulators would not have the power to intervene in cases where peer-to-peer traffic is being throttled or restricted, or where any type of content or service was blocked. Nor would the pan-European regulatory body or the Commission have any power.

The FCC ruling was made

An event on 26th February positions AT&T and Google lobbyists taking the lead in a Brussels seminar on net neutrality.

The event is timed to coincide with the Second Reading of the Telecoms Package, where amendments promoted by AT&T, opposed to net neutrality, are under consideration in the Universal Services directive (Harbour report). Google is also reported to be touting amendments around the European Parliament. The Google amendments are understood to be purveyed under the title of 'net neutrality' but they may or may not be good for citizens' interests.

The event is organised by the European Newspaper Publishers Association (ENPA) and the European Federation of Magazine Publishers (FAEP), two voices so far unheard in the whole Telecoms Package debate . The two groups represent national, regional and local newspaper and magazine publishers around Europe. It is curious why they want to get involved now.

ENPA opposed the copyright amendments in the Telecoms Package. On its website, it says: "we would resist

Net neutrality has to be guaranteed, says EU Commissioner Viviane Reding. It's a 180 degree turn from her graduated-response-supporting position a year ago. And it gives her a new challenge to deal with the AT&T  amendments to the Telecoms Package  which attack net neutrality.

"I believe that we are at the start of a new phase of internet driven innovation and growth...We will only reap the full  benefits if we  safeguard the openness of the Intenet...take advantage of the  win-win of open interfaces...net neutrality has to be guaranteed ..." 

Not the words of a technology entrepreneur, as you might expect,  but Information Society Commissioner Viviane Reding, speaking last week at a conference on the future of the Internet . She called for investment in the Internet infrastructure and commitment to openness, in order  to

European civil liberties groups are calling on MEPs to reject a Telecoms Package amendment that, if passed in its present form, could permit network operators to collect and mine users Internet and email data.

European Digital Rights (EDRi), France's La Quadrature du Net, and Germany's AK Vorrat have jointly  issued a  warning  about  Amendment 181 in the e-Privacy directive of the e-Privacy directive. They say it is so badly worded that it potentially allows operators to collect an unlimited amount of personal data related to our communications usage, including email traffic records and web surfing data. Vast 'pools' of data could be  stored for an unlimited amount of time, which goes much further than  the existing EU law in the Data Retention directive. 

The problems lie in both the European Parliament and the Council versions of the amendment.  The European Parliament version provides some protection for end-users but also could be interpreted as allowing the data to be passed to a third party.

 The Council version removes all data protection requirements whilst limiting the scope to security purposes.

 They are joined by the European

Report from Brussels

Pushed by an AT&T lobbyist, some revised amendments to the Telecoms Package could usher in filtering, and have rocketed net neutrality from a non-issue to one of the hottest under discussion in the Telecoms Package trialogues.

A raft of new "compromise" amendments to the Telecoms Package is circulating in Brussels. On the surface, they state that telcos, network operators and ISPs should be able to "address unjustified degradation of service", and impose "reasonable usage restrictions, and price differentiation" without any regulatory interference. The sub-agenda however, is that these legal texts could enable network operators to shrug off accountability for filtering, throttling and degrading user traffic, including access to content. With obvious implications for the neutrality of the network.

I first reported on these amendments at the end of last year, when three amendments were proposed - two Recitals addressing 'network management' and 'degradation of service', and a revision to Article 22(3) of the Universal Services directive. Since then however, a new Recital and an amendment to Article 21 have been added, which re-introduce the concept that users should be informed of 'restrictions on access to content and services'. This language shifts the onus back from the network operator to the user. It had been deleted by the Council.

The main driving force behind the amendments is the Brussels lobbyist for the American telecoms operator AT&T, who has been actively promoting his amendments inside and outside of the European Parliament. I have spoken to at least half a dozen people on this topic, who have all given me the same name. It's also my understanding however, that the issue of net neutrality is the subject of a document being circulated by other lobbyists working for