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The biometric identity project in India called Aadhaar was established with the purported intent of giving every resident of India a unique ID to ensure that social security measures and other welfare mechanisms would reach the last mile. The collection of biometrics (fingerprints, eye scans and photographs), it was emphasised, was to ensure that no duplicates were created and each ID would be unique, and thus was built the world's largest data management project. However, since then, there have been several problems of duplication, implementation issues, failure of infrastructure, security breaches and privacy issues. Buttressing the digital identity project have been several moves to push digitalisation in other spheres as well. The article intends to study this digitalisation of individual identity in India and posit that there are several pockets of resistance that challenge this framing of the digitalised citizen as a data subject and the reduction of individual identity into biometrics alone. There are two people's movements that show how this digital turn towards a technological understanding of citizenship is being challenged: the widespread peaceful protests of 2019–2020 against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), and the 2015–2016 Save the Internet campaign for net neutrality. This author hopes to show that both online and offline, the ideas of what it means to be a citizen of India remain in flux, challenging the notion of a passive data subject and positing a political, rights-bearing citizen in opposition to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes whether repealing net neutrality (NN) improves or decreases the capacity of a regulator to make internet service providers (ISPs) extend broadband coverage through universal service obligations (USOs). We model a two-sided market where a monopolistic ISP links content providers (CPs) to end users with a broadband network of a given bandwidth. A regulator determines whether to subject the ISP to NN or to allow it to supply paid priority (P) services to CPs. She can also impose a broadband USO to the ISP: She can mandate the broadband market coverage. We show that the greater is the network bandwidth, the more likely is the repeal of NN to increase ISP profits and social welfare. Regulation can still be necessary, however, as there are bandwidth ranges for which the ISP would benefit from a repeal of NN while such a repeal is detrimental to society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To boost the roll-out of the next generation telecommunications infrastructure, EU policy makers have advanced a proposal mandating some large online platforms to compensate network operators with a usage fee. Framed as a matter of large market players paying their fair share of contribution to telecommunications networks, the proposal would represent another unnecessary and harmful regulatory intervention. Indeed, the paper aims to demonstrate that the fair share debate is the poison fruit of a previous intrusive government initiative, that is, the net neutrality regulation. Furthermore, like net neutrality anti-discrimination rules, a fair share Big Tech tax would be a solution that wouldn't work for a problem that doesn't exist. Instead of continuing to interfere in market dynamics and private negotiations without any solid evidence of market failures, the EU should learn from past mistakes and acknowledge the limited scope for regulation in these dynamic markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The document examines challenges and innovations in telecommunications law, focusing on the European context. It highlights the importance of asymmetric regulation and ex ante identification of enterprises with substantial market power. The 2018 European Electronic Communications Code introduces pivotal changes, including co-investment agreements (Art. 76), aiming to foster cost and risk sharing among operators, benefiting smaller enterprises. Such agreements respond to the need for sustainable competition. Art. 72 introduces a new obligation: access to civil engineering infrastructures. This obligation can extend beyond the traditional market if necessary and proportionate to achieve competition and unhindered access objectives. The document emphasizes the regulations' efforts to balance the interests of economic operators and consumers, promoting competition and innovation in the telecommunications sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discussions over paid peering and usage fees have become a global phenomenon, with ISPs insisting content providers pay for the substantial downstream traffic they generate, while content providers argue for settlement-free agreements, citing that consumers already pay ISPs for content delivery and content providers reduce costs for ISPs by delivering traffic close to customers. This contention is echoed in debates around net neutrality and related policies across the United States, Europe, and South Korea, prompting regulators to consider whether to regulate peering prices and/or impose usage fees. This question gains significance in the United States in light of the recent Federal Communications Commission (FCC) decision to consider the reinstatement of net neutrality rules. Our study examines whether the peering price set by the market aligns with the socially optimal peering price. We first analyze the cost-based peering price, which reflects the ISP’s incremental costs for direct content delivery versus via transit providers. We discover that this price can effectively be zero with sufficient content localization, yet remains above zero without it, influenced by the number of interconnection points. We then evaluate the profit-maximizing peering price using a two-sided market model, finding that increased content localization decreases this price. These prices establish a range if the peering price is unregulated, from the cost-based peering price (at the low end) to the profit-maximizing peering price (at the high end). Regulatory oversight of peering prices may be warranted when there is a substantial difference between cost-based and profit-maximizing prices. Finally, our study informs the debate on potential regulatory interventions about peering prices or usage fees. We compare unregulated market outcomes with those under regulatory measures aimed at maximizing consumer surplus or social welfare. Through our analysis, we identify optimal peering prices within our determined range, considering the influence of content localization and interconnection points on these prices.

For almost two decades, the debate on net neutrality influences the governance of the Internet infrastructure operated by Internet service providers (ISPs) and has spurred an enormous body of academic literature. However, new business models such as zero-rating, rapid technological progress, changing consumer behavior and political transformations constantly challenge our understanding of net neutrality. Despite the breadth and depth of knowledge on this topic, a conceptualization and synthesis of almost two decades of interdisciplinary literature is missing. This paper provides a comprehensive state of knowledge review based on a framework of net neutrality that captures the chronology of the debate as well as individual, organizational, and societal level concepts, which allows us to disentangle the nature, effects, and implications of different business practices of ISPs in order to extract new insights. Finally, we develop a research agenda on net neutrality in telecommunications and on neutrality in the wider Internet ecosystem addressing the challenges with respect to digital platforms and data gatekeepers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the fifth episode of Last Week Tonight,John Oliver satirized an FCC proposal to alter net neutrality leading to a surge in public comments, a groundswell of media attention, and the proposal's defeat. In 2017, the FCC considered the proposal again and, despite Oliver's redoubled efforts, voted against net neutrality. These engagements illustrate how satire like Oliver's leverages the inventional resources of networked rhetoric to captivate audiences and direct shared sentiments toward activism by drawing attention to, creating, and extending moments for activism, revealing and engaging adversaries, and challenging discursive barriers that can foster engagement with public policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The implementation of traffic differentiation measures by internet service providers (ISPs) has raised concerns regarding net neutrality, potentially leading to discriminatory practices that challenge existing regulatory frameworks. The complexity of this issue intensifies with the advent of 5G networks as they dynamically assemble elements of the physical infrastructure to create logically segregated domains customised to accommodate usage scenarios with specific requirements, resulting in the categorisation of users, applications, and services into distinct groups which possess the capacity to disrupt the non-discriminatory treatment of data flows. Within this context, a pivotal question arises: how can regulatory authorities effectively evaluate traffic differentiation in 5G networks? In response, this paper proposes an innovative application of the standardised network data analytics function (NWDAF) to facilitate the assessment of internet traffic differentiation. We introduce this novel concept and demonstrate its implementation through a proof-of-concept prototype. By leveraging the NWDAF, regulators may obtain direct and automatic access to performance metrics of 5G networks, enabling the analysis of the traffic management mechanisms employed by ISPs.

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The article covers the history of AT&T, from the emergence, in the 19th century, from the private monopoly to its collapse in the 20th century, and the restructuring to maintain its dominance in the 21st. In the latter, the trajectory culminates in the merger with WarnerMedia, to face competition with audiovisual streaming services. The article uses the theoretical contribution of the Political Economy of Communication (EPC), in addition to the framework on Network Neutrality, to understand the undoing of this merger, followed by the joining of WarnerMedia with Discovery. It ends with experiences regulating streaming services and challenges to reduce regulatory asymmetries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Has net neutrality been institutionalized as a fundamental right in the digital constitution? Empirical evidence shows that statutory embedding of net neutrality has recently been taking shape in certain jurisdictions. The unfolding of constitutional structures and processes--the next step to be expected according to the theory of societal constitutionalism--is still pending. What would the scope of protection of net neutrality be if institutionalized as a fundamental right? To answer this normative question, two theoretically challenging issues must be addressed as a preliminary: First, what should be the adequate conceptualization of the relationship between the social and the technological? The perspective adopted by this paper is a combination between science and technology studies scholarship and legal sociology literature. Second, as net neutrality involves relationships between private parties, the question is how fundamental rights should be conceived beyond state-centrism. Methodologically, the sociological reflection of fundamental rights as institutions of society will serve as a benchmark for evaluating future developments of constitutional legal doctrine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Network neutrality regulations are intended to preserve the Internet as a non-discriminatory, public network and an open platform for innovation. Whereas the U.S. reversed its regulations in 2017, returning to a less strict regime, the EU has maintained its course and recently revised implementation guidelines for its strict and rather interventionist net neutrality regulations. To this day, there exist only a few empirical investigations on the impact of network neutrality regulations, based on rather broad measures of investment activities for individual countries. Our paper provides the first estimation results on the causal impact of net neutrality regulations on new high-speed (fiber-optic cable-based) infrastructure investment by Internet service providers. We use a comprehensive and most recent OECD panel data set for 32 countries for the period from 2000 to 2021 covering the entire high-speed broadband network deployment period. We employ various panel estimation techniques, including instrumental variables estimation. Our empirical analysis is based on theoretical underpinnings derived from a simplified model in a two-sided market framework. We find empirical evidence that net neutrality regulations exert a significant and strong negative impact on fiber investments. Our results suggest that, while we cannot provide evidence on the overall welfare consequences of net neutrality, imposing strict net neutrality regulations clearly slow down the deployment of new fiber-based broadband connections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the changes in the regulatory analysis of zero-rating by national regulatory authorities in almost seven years of implementation of the European Union's Regulation on Open Internet Access. The European Court of Justice issued three landmark judgments in cases C‑34/20 Telekom Deutschland (throttling), C‑5/20 Vodafone (tethering) and C‑854/19 Vodafone (roaming). The Court ruled that 'zero-tariff options', a form of zero-rating, violate the general obligation of providers of internet access services to treat traffic equally and without discrimination. The Court determined that these options fail to follow the stipulations of Article 3(3) of the Regulation on Open Internet Access. Prior to the judgments, the Open Internet Guidelines drafted by the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC) recommended that national regulatory authorities should analyse zero-rating under Article 3(2) of the Regulation. BEREC recommended that they conduct a multi-factor analysis of the effects of zero-rating on the market. After the judgments, BEREC published updated guidelines stating that zero-rating as such is prohibited under Article 3(3), unless the zero-rating does not differentiate between applications based on user traffic. The authors argue that the judgments of the Court in conjunction with the updated Open Internet Guidelines provide NRAs and market actors with more legal certainty regarding the legality of zero-rating under the Regulation on Open Internet Access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]