Copyright Law

Israeli ISPs Could Face Lawsuit Over P2P Interference

By Jared Moya

MK Meir Sheetrit, chair of the Knesset’s Science & Technology Committee says interfering with connections speeds means ISPs are illegally robbing consumers of the “true surfing speed” for which they pay, and that it means that “there is room to examine a class action lawsuit.“

A “first of its kind” study conducted by Ynet, an Israeli news website, with assistance from a consortium of unnamed web surfers and bloggers recently concluded that “there is direct and deliberate interference in P2P traffic by at least 2 out of the 3 major (Israeli) ISPs and that this interference exists by both P2P caching and P2P blocking.”

Now MK Meir Sheetrit, chair of the Knesset’s (Israeli legislature) Science & Technology Committee, says that the research shows once again that ISPs are not delivering promised connection speeds to consumers for which they pay each month.

“The investigation proved once again, the Internet companies do not meet the browsing speeds
they have promised the public,” he says in a follow up report by Ynet. “I believe, these companies do not provide the goods on which consumers pay, and in fact lie to the public, taking sums of money illegally, and there is room to examine a class action lawsuit. I repeat the Communications Ministry to establish a committee, review in depth the issue of the true surfing speed, Ministry of Communications will act in order not to charge money illegally from the public. In addition, chairman of the Science and Technology Committee, I intend to initiate additional committee meetings on Internet use.”

It’s the same argument that many others have made before, that if a consumer is promised a specified connection speed for a given monthly fee then the ISP shouldn’t be able to interfere with or throttle that contractual connection speed unless done solely for rare instances of network traffic management. If they deliver half the speed on a regular basis by interfering with P2P traffic then they are for all intents and purposes stealing bandwidth promised to and paid for by the customer.

Israeli Cyberlaw attorney Jonathan Klinger points out that clause 29 to the Israeli Telecommunication Act “specifies that interfering or blocking of electronic communication over a public network is a criminal ofence” and that “even without any net-neutrality regulation…Israel has the appropriate regulation to interfere with attempts to prioritize network packets and to withhold other packets.”

Furthermore, he says that Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) of P2P traffic may even constitute illegal wiretapping under the Israeli Wiretapping Act since it is ?Listening to another person?s conversation, interception or copying of another person?s conversation, and all with an apparatus.”

It may also be illegal under the country’s Computer Act under which Israeli Courts have “continuously ruled that inspecting one?s traffic and personal files consists as a crime.”

Either way, the real problem is that consumers are being ripped off. ISPs are promising consumers a specific connection speed for a given monthly fee. By not providing the speed promised ISPs are arguably stealing from consumers and should be the focus of a class action lawsuit as MK Sheetrit says.

Stay tuned.

jared@zeropaid.com

Full post as published by ZeroPaid on December 14, 2009 (boomark / email).