USTelecom, NCTA: FCC Should Abandon Broadband Title II Reclassification

USTelecom and NCTA want the FCC to abandon its proposal to reclassify broadband as a Communications Act Title II telecom service, the organizations said in a joint letter posted Monday in docket 23-320 (see 2401180042). "Regulating usage-based billing is unnecessary and would only serve to eliminate options for consumers," they said. USTelecom and NCTA said regulation is "unnecessary" because there is "no evidence that network operators exercise market power in negotiating interconnection agreements." The proposed bill-and-keep model would also be "affirmatively harmful" to consumers because "forbidding ISPs from charging for interconnection would exert upward pressure on consumer broadband prices," they said.