CRTC rules on Traffic Management Practices

Wed Oct 21 16:03:21 UTC 2009

Holy Hannah!

ISP actions affecting content
According to the Telecommunications Act, a telecommunications company must 
obtain the Commission’s prior approval to “control the content or influence 
the meaning or purpose of telecommunications” carried over its network. The 
Commission does not consider such disruptive actions to be proper Internet 
traffic management practices, and they will always require prior approval.
An ISP would therefore need to seek the Commission’s approval before it 
implemented a practice that would:
block the delivery of content to an end-user, or
slow down time-sensitive traffic, such as videoconferencing or Internet 
telephone (Voice over Internet Protocol) services, to the extent that the 
content is degraded.
When faced with these requests, the Commission will only grant its approval in 
the most exceptional cases.

The email marketing lobby already got the legislation watered down on the spam 
front, but does this in essence say that ISP's are no longer allowed to block 
email content, viruses et al?

On October 21, 2009, Jeff Gallagher wrote:
> For those following the regulatory / net neutrality debate, the Canadian
> Radio and Telecommunications Commission released this morning  a decision
> requiring additional transparency with respect to the traffic management
> practices of Canadian service providers.
> 
> News Release:
> http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/NEWS/RELEASES/2009/r091021.htm
> 
> Policy Details:
> http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2009/2009-657.htm
> 
> 
> Jeff Gallagher   
> Network Engineering
> jeff.gallagher at bellaliant.ca
> 

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