EU telcos seek regulatory breaks to counter disadvantages vs Big Tech
For a long time, the major EU telcos put pressure on politicians to introduce big tech cost sharing. Now they are calling for a "level playing field".
(Image: Gajus/Shutterstock.com)
In the lobbying battle with big tech companies, the major EU network operators have changed horses. For years, they demanded an infrastructure levy in the form of a data toll for large platform operators such as Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Netflix to help finance network expansion. Although the EU Commission and the member states have repeatedly taken up the idea, the telcos have not really been able to make any headway with their call under the motto "fair share". They are therefore now calling for a "level playing field" and a commitment to a "leaner and simpler political framework", i.e. regulatory vacations for themselves and more requirements for the competition from content providers from the USA.
The European Telecommunications Network Operators' Association (ETNO), whose members include Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Telefónica and KPN, is calling on the future EU Commission to "act quickly" and fundamentally adapt telecommunications and competition policy for a better ecosystem around networks. The ETNO emphasizes this in a statement published on Wednesday on the EU Commission's White Paper on building Europe's digital infrastructure of tomorrow.
"Internet-based messaging and voice services are replacing traditional telecommunications services," explains the ETNO. Video streaming is competing with linear television and IPTV offerings from network operators. These are also being challenged on the connectivity market by large cloud providers (hyperscalers) or municipal providers such as public utilities. "Today, a remarkable 70 percent of global internet traffic flows through the proprietary backbone networks of large content and application providers," the association emphasizes. In 2021, it was less than 10 percent.
The ePrivacy Directive should go
"A balanced and harmonized level of consumer protection should apply throughout the EU," the association states as an example. Over-the-top (OTT) services, which are based on the internet, are on the verge of completely replacing conventional mobile voice and text services such as SMS. The regulation of such services should therefore be "subject to horizontal, EU-wide harmonized consumer protection". The ETNO also supports the Commission's intention to include cloud service providers in the regulatory environment. The ePrivacy Directive with specific requirements for data protection in electronic communications should be repealed and the proposal for a more far-reaching regulation withdrawn, it continues. These regulations are "extremely restrictive in terms of data management" and therefore represent a competitive disadvantage for those affected. Furthermore, instruments to combat fraud would be restricted.
"Specific requirements on contract duration and termination, restrictions on bundled offers and obligations to transmit emergency calls continue to represent regulatory discrepancies between us and Big Tech's communication services", an ETNO representative told the Euractiv portal. The Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) argues that EU telecoms operators have grown lately because consumers are using more online content and services from the major US platform operators. The fair share approach only appears in passing in the ETNO paper: According to it, a dispute resolution mechanism should be introduced so that Big Tech groups "appropriately remunerate valuable IP data transport services provided by network operators".
(anw)
