After four years of advocacy and lobbying to enshrine net neutrality principles in law in Europe, we can now examine the first full year of enforcement of the new rules. We will compare the enforcment of net neutrality in the individual EU member states, showcase a few of the more creative net neutrality violations and demonstrate what civil society can do to keep the Internet neutral. Enforcing net neutrality also requires network measurement tools that can detect discrimination; we will discuss what progress Europe has made in this regard.
Net neutrality is the principle that all data transfers on the internet should be treated equally. It gives users the right to choose the content and services they wish to see and use online and prevents ISPs from acting as gatekeepers. Net neutrality also guarantees equal access to the global Internet to all ideas, innovations and opinions without centralised control.
Since August 2016, the EU has had a regulatory regime protecting net neutrality that now has to be enforced by the national telecoms' regulatory authorities. Unfortunately, we observe very different results in different EU member states with Germany presenting a particularly negative example. In this context, our NGO epicenter.works has focused its enforcement work on a product of Deutsche Telekom called "StreamOn". We will showcase our work on that product analysing the offer, raising awareness, submitting complaints with the regulator, and speaking at the annual general meeting of Deutsche Telekom AG.
This presentation is intended for everyone interested in net neutrality and particularly for those that want to become active in safeguarding it.