Google To Monitor Broadband Connections
17th June 2008
The internet giant Google, has announced that their engineers are working, on a project, to make tools that will monitor broadband network connections, so that users can identify any discrimination by their internet service providers.
Google’s Senior Policy Director, Richard Whitt, says that this will help users to let their ISPs know when they are not happy with the service and if they feel that the service is being tampered with or they are being discriminated against.
According to Whitt, neutral networks are essential for continued innovations in application development. He feels consumers should join an arms race, for net neutrality, to prevent discrimination between content and applications and that users should not be charged extra for these facilities. He further adds that these forces are very strong as they have political connections and lots of money.
However it is not yet clear when these tools will be ready, or how they will function.
Last August, TorrentFreak had reported that Comcast was interfering illegally with their file transfers. The allegations were denied, of course, but the Associated Press showed that the allegations were true. The federal Communications Commission will investigate these charges, and last May a bill was re-introduced in Congress to rewrite U.S. Antitrust Laws in order to prevent discrimination or extra charges on lawful applications and content.
This is a victory of sorts for Google, who have maintained that such regulations are needed to check on Broadband providers.
It may be noted, however, that Google was not as enthusiastic about neutrality way back in 2005 when they believed that a non-neutral world would be good for them.
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