AT&T urges the FCC not to reclassify broadband Internet access

In the ongoing Net Neutrality debate, AT&T has chimed in claiming that a proposed change simply won’t help. The company is specifically speaking about reclassification of broadband Internet as a telecommunications service. They claim that making broad, sweeping changes don’t actually help anyone, especially the consumer. The change would make broadband providers subject to the same rules that govern the telecommunications industry, largely unchanged since the mid-1930s.

AT&T today urged the Federal Communications Commission to avoid reclassifying broadband Internet access as a telecommunications service, which is something network neutrality advocates are asking the FCC to do. Reclassification would open broadband providers up to common carrier rules under Title II of the Communications Act, similar to regulations that have covered our phone system since 1934. Recent calls for reclassification of broadband stem from a federal appeals court ruling that the FCC could not impose strict network neutrality rules, such as prohibitions against blocking Web services and Internet fast lanes, without first declaring the providers to be common carriers.