IP Democracy: Net Neutrality Bill Introduced in Senate

As expected, net neutrality legislation has been introduced in the Senate. Senators Byron Dorgan (D-SD) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) have introduced a bill that appears to be identical to the one they championed during the last Congress.

The bill establishes a policy of national broadband non-discrimination and contains a series of requirements that broadband providers must meet, such as offering comparable levels of bandwidth to third-party providers that they offer to their own affiliated services. The bill further directs the FCC to set up a complaint procedure for enforcing the requirements.

Although net neutrality legislation has been expected given the Democratic shift in Congress (six Democrats and no Republicans joined as co-sponsors of the bill), how fast the Dorgan-Snowe bill got introduced is something of a surprise, as CNET’s Anne Broache notes. It’s possible that Congressional strategists decided to strike while the iron is hot, riding the momentum of AT&T’s agreement to abide by net neutrality requirements.

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on January 10, 2007 7:21 AM to IP Democracy