H.R. 5353 The Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2008

On February 12, 2008, Rep Ed Markey (D-MA), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunication and the Internet, introduced H.R. 5353, the Internet Freedom Preservation Act, a bill to establish broadband policy and direct the Federal Communications Commission to conduct a proceeding and public broadband summits to assess competition, consumer protection, and consumer choice issues relating to broadband Internet access services.

The legislation would create a four part national broadband policy:

• to maintain the freedom to use for lawful purposes broadband telecommunications networks, including the Internet, without unreasonable interference from or discrimination by network operators, as has been the policy and history of the Internet and the basis of user expectations since its inception;
• to ensure that the Internet remains a vital force in the United States economy, thereby enabling the Nation to preserve its global leadership in online commerce and technological innovation;
• to preserve and promote the open and interconnected nature of broadband networks that enable consumers to reach, and service providers to offer, lawful content, applications, and services of their choosing, using their selection of devices, as long as such devices do not harm the network; and
• to safeguard the open marketplace of ideas on the Internet by adopting and enforcing baseline protections to guard against unreasonable discriminatory favoritism for, or degradation of, content by network operators based upon its source, ownership, or destination on the Internet.'

The bill directs the Federal Communications Commission to launch a proceeding on broadband services and consumer rights assessing:

• whether broadband network providers adhere to the Commission's Broadband Policy Statement of August, 2005 (FCC 05-151), including whether, consistent with the needs of law enforcement, such providers refrain from blocking, thwarting, or unreasonably interfering with the ability of consumers to:
  • access, use, send, receive, or offer lawful content, applications, or services over broadband networks, including the Internet;
  • use lawful applications and services of their choice; and
  • attach or connect their choice of legal devices to use in conjunction with their broadband telecommunications or information services, provided such devices do not harm the network
• whether broadband network providers add charges for quality of service, or other similar additional fees or surcharges, to certain Internet applications and service providers, and whether such pricing conflicts with the US broadband policy stated above;
• whether broadband network providers offer to consumers parental control protection tools, services to combat unsolicited commercial electronic mail, and other similar consumer services, the manner in which such services are offered, and the extent to which such services are consistent with such policies of the United States;
• practices by which network providers manage or prioritize network traffic, including prioritization for emergency communications, and whether and in what instances such practices may be consistent with such policies of the United States;
• with respect to content, applications, and services
  • the historic economic benefits of an open platform;
  • the relationship between competition in the broadband Internet access market and an open platform; and
  • the policy choices and results of global competitors with respect to access competition and an open platform;
• whether the need for enforceable rules governing openness, consumer rights, and consumer protections or prohibiting unreasonable discrimination is lessened if a broadband network provider provides significantly high bandwidth speeds to consumers; and
• the potential of policies promoting openness in spectrum allocation, universal service programs, and video franchising to expand innovation through protection from unreasonable interference by network owners of an open marketplace for speech and commerce in content, applications, and services.

The bill also directs the FCC to conduct no less than 8 Public Broadband Summits within the next year in order to "bring together, among others, consumers, consumer advocates, small business owners, corporations, venture capitalists, State and local governments, academia, labor organizations, religious organizations, representatives of higher education, primary and secondary schools, public libraries, public safety, and the technology sector to assess competition, consumer protection, and consumer choice issues related to broadband Internet access services."

Three months after concluding the summits, the FCC is directed to report to Congress on the results of the proceeding and the summits. The FCC is asked to provide recommendations on how to promote competition, safeguard free speech, and ensure robust consumer protections and consumer choice relating to broadband Internet access services.