Free Press Petitions for Review of FCC Open Internet Order
by The Internet Distinction on Sep.28, 2011, under Uncategorized
(Original at PC World)
By Grant Gross, IDG News
[. . .]
Free Press filed the lawsuit Wednesday in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston, just days after the FCC published the rules in the Federal Register, the last step before they go into effect.
The regulations, sometimes called open Internet rules, bar wireline broadband providers from “unreasonable discrimination” against Web traffic, but don’t have the same prohibition for mobile broadband providers. The rules prohibit mobile providers from blocking voice and other applications that compete with their services, but don’t prohibit them from blocking other applications.
[. . .]
The FCC will likely see more challenges from companies on the other side of the net neutrality debate from Free Press.
Earlier this year, Verizon Communications and MetroPCS filed challenges to the rules, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rejected the lawsuits because the companies filed before the rules were published in the Federal Register. Verizon, which has said it plans to refile a lawsuit, has argued that the FCC does not have the authority to regulate broadband.
