The U.S. is promising fast, safe and reliable internet for all

The First Year of Net Neutrality: What Happened After the Trump Deregulatory Blitz and Why Did ISPs Get Their Own Internet?

The FCC voted to assert its power to regulate the activities of the broadband industry in the United States. In a 3-2 vote, the agency reinstated net neutrality rules that had been abandoned during the height of the Trump administration’s deregulatory blitz.

The FCC is promising to make sure that internet access is not being made available to the public in an unfair manner. The government wants to make providers more accountable for disruptions, have more robust network security, and protect fast speeds.

Some of the rules put up under him are different from the ones before them. Past FCC orders pursing net neutrality have been repeatedly challenged in court, giving the agency today a fair idea of which policies will be defensible in the onslaught of lawsuits definitely to come.

Still, there were changes. Some internet service providers (ISPs) implemented zero-rating plans and were caught slowing down consumer internet speeds, she notes.

For the past six years, she says, “a lot of public scrutiny on the ISPs and then the attempts to bring back net neutrality in Congress basically kept the ISPs on their best behavior.”

What ended up happening in the years after the rollback went into effect in 2018 was so discreet that most people unlikely noticed its effects, says Stanford Law professor Barbara van Schewick, who directs the school’s Center for Internet and Society and supports net neutrality.

Also referred to as an “open internet,” net neutrality aims to level the digital marketplace, prohibiting internet service providers (ISPs) like Comcast and AT&T from running fast lanes and slow lanes — speeding up or slowing down internet speeds — for online services like Netflix and Spotify.

The chair of the FCC said ahead of the vote that all consumers deserved fast, open and fair internet access. “This is correct.”

The telecoms industry will have to contend with the rules for the first time. The rules are always going to be changed by a future administration.