TelecomLive April-2020

Net Neutrality www.telecomlive.com 45 Telecom LIVE April 2020 MSB to make “non- discrimination of content a top prior- ity,” and boost public awareness levels about the benefits of net neutrality, besides balancing matters such as “accessibil- ity of services, consumer rights and expectations”. Back in August 2017, Trai had recommended a free and open Internet and had even suggested monetary penalties for violation of net neutrality rules, starting at Rs 50,000 per viola- tion per day but capped at Rs 50 lakh. Further, it had mooted an MSB comprising telcos, internet service providers, content providers, civil society organi- sations and con- sumer representatives to detect violations. In August 2018, though the DoT accepted the recommenda- tions but wanted to have addi- tional recommendations on nec- essary TMPs and composition, functions, role and responsibili- ties of the multi-stakeholder body. DoT also said that actual monitoring and enforcement of the rules would remain with it, and that the proposed MSB would play only an advisory role. In January this year, Trai started the consultation process on the reasonable internet traffic management practices that do not infringe on rules around the free Web or hurt the consumer. It also sought suggestions on a governance structure of a pro- posed MSB that would advise DoT on ways to monitor and apply net neutrality rules. same: a) TSPs/ISPs should submit a detailed record of all TMPs adopted and applied by them to the industry body in defined regular intervals, which should be prescribed by DoT. b) Industry body should review the record of TMPs submit- ted by TSPs/ISPs and prepare a 'Repository of Necessary TMPs' and submit the same to DoT for approval. c) Upon approval by DoT, industry body should publish this repository so that consumers can better understand the choices of various TSPs/ISPs and take an informed decision while selecting the internet / broadband package. d) DoT should also issue directions to TSPs/ISPs in case their TMPs are not reasonable and aligned along the principles of proportion- ality, transient and transpar- ency. e) Additionally, industry body should prepare a disclosure format for TSPs/ISPs to publish their TMP in public domain, which should be approved by DoT. TSPs/ISPs should adopt the approved disclosure format as it will bring uniformity and allow easier access and comparison between available internet service providers for the end user. The disclosure format should be reviewed at regular period, which should be defined by DoT, and modi- fied if need be. Q2. Whether impact of TMPs on consumer's experi- ence can be interpreted from its name and short descrip- tion about it or detailed technical description would be required to interpret it in objective and unambiguous manner? In case of detail Q1. What are the broad types of practices currently deployed by the Access Providers (APs) to manage traffic? Out of these prac- tices, which ones can be considered as reasonable from perspective of Net Neutrality? Whether list of Traffic Management Prac- tices (TMPs) can be prepared in advance or it would be required to update it from time to time? If later is yes, then what framework would be required to be established by Multi-Stakeholder Body (MSB) to keep it up to date? A1. In compliance with NN principles, TSPs/ISPs apply TMPs to handle only exceptional circumstance and not for any commercial considerations. In addition, TMPs are designed to respond to the QoS requirements of the categories of traffic to optimize the overall transmission quality and enhance the user- experience. TSPs/ISPs employ TMPs while ensuring that there is no discriminatory prioritiza- tion / throttling of any specific content, applications or services or specific categories thereof. Performance of broadband changes with change in technol- ogy deployed and performance of other stakeholders in the digital ecosystem such as content providers, applications, end user environment, etc. The elements of the network ecosystem which can impact the broadband experience of the end user are dynamic in nature. Hence the associated TMPs also need to change to keep pace with the changing ecosystem and must be periodically reviewed to modify the same accordingly. Industry bodies should play an active role in assisting DoT in carrying out its role in maintain- ing, are broadly in agreement with “Framework for compila- tion of Traffic Management Practices” although and suggest following modification to the Reliance Jio's response