The department said the merger would reduce competition and lead to higher consumer prices.

AT&T vowed to fight the move, calling it a radical departure from US competition practice.

US President Donald Trump objected to the deal during his campaign last year, fuelling the controversy.

AT&T chief executive Randall Stephenson said he thought the acquisition had been on a good path “until recently”.

He referred to concerns about possible political influence as the “elephant in the room”. President Trump is a vocal critic of CNN which is owned by Time Warner.

Mr Stephenson said: “There’s been a lot of reporting and speculation whether this is all about CNN. And frankly I don’t know. Nobody should be surprised the question keeps coming up.”

‘Higher bills’

In its lawsuit, the Department of Justice claimed that the deal – valued at more than $85bn when it was announced last year – would harm American consumers.

Assistant attorney general Makan Delrahim of the Department of Justice’s antitrust division, said: “It would mean higher monthly television bills and fewer of the new, emerging innovative options that consumers are beginning to enjoy.”

He said the combination would hurt the emergence of new online television options and give AT&T the power to force rival pay TV companies to pay “hundreds of millions of dollars more” for Time Warner content.

The department has also denied political interference.

The decision to take legal action sets up a high-profile fight over US anti-trust law, which has rarely been tested in cases involving companies that do not directly compete.

‘Concentration of power’

George Hay, a professor of law and economics at Cornell, said there was “no question” the merger’s potential competitive impact merited serious review.

However, he said the lawsuit was noteworthy given the president’s comments during the presidential campaign.

“There would be nothing unusual if you didn’t have all of this political background,” he said.

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Source: BBC

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The sites will display a variety of messages, or simulate the potential effects of losing the basic principle of all internet traffic being treated equally.

The US communications regulator earlier this year voted to remove an Obama-era rule that would prevent the prioritisation – or “throttling” – of data, as well as other measures campaigners consider to be detrimental to the internet.

Opponents to net neutrality say it stifles innovation and discourages investment in telecoms infrastructure.

Among the companies protesting, the headliners include Google, Facebook, Amazon, Reddit, AirBnB, Twitter and Snapchat.

Crowdfunding site Kickstarter will be involved, as will craft-selling site Etsy and dating app OkCupid. PornHub, one of the world’s most visited sites, will also be taking part.

“Internet service providers could create special fast lanes for content providers willing to pay more,” said Corey Price, vice president of PornHub.

“That means slow streaming, which, especially in regards to online porn, is quite problematic as you can imagine.”

Campaigners told the BBC around 80,000 websites and services in all are taking part in the co-ordinated action that is designed to draw attention to a public consultation about the proposed rule reversal.

“What we want the FCC to hear, and we want members of Congress to hear, is that net neutrality is wildly popular, which it is, and we want them to stop trying to murder it,” said Sean Vitka, a lawyer for pro-net neutrality groups Demand Progress and Fight for the Future.

“It stops large companies, like internet service providers, from controlling who wins or loses on the internet. There’d be nothing to stop your ISP stopping the next Facebook, the next Google, from accessing customer’s equally.

“If a new company can’t access companies on the same terms as the incumbent’s they’re not going to have the chance to thrive.”

This kind of protest technique has been effective in the past.

When numerous firms went “dark” in opposition to the Stop Online Piracy Act, which they argued was a threat to free speech, it led to the bill being withdrawn.

But protest groups face a tougher battle in convincing the Republican-controlled FCC headed by new commissioner Ajit Pai.

Earlier this year the department described President Obama’s rule as risking “online investment and innovation, threatening the very open internet it purported to preserve”.

It added: “Requiring ISPs to divert resources to comply with unnecessary and broad new regulatory requirements threatens to take away from their ability to make investments that benefit consumers.”

Promoting investment in infrastructure is the strongest of the anti-net neutrality arguments, with major telecoms companies arguing that the Googles and Facebooks of the world would not be able to run were it not for the high-speed internet connections offered by internet service providers.

Campaigners have countered this by suggesting it is the lure of enticing premium services like Netflix that tempt users into paying more for better internet access.

AT&T role

A more curious position came from mobile carrier AT&T which said it was supporting the protest – despite in the past being a vocal opponent of net neutrality.

“We agree that no company should be allowed to block content or throttle the download speeds of content in a discriminatory manner,” the firm said.

“So, we are joining this effort because it’s consistent with AT&T’s proud history of championing our customers’ right to an open internet and access to the internet content, applications, and devices of their choosing.”

Campaign groups gave the company little credit, pointing out that it has sought to put in place data prioritisation, which would allow web companies to pay AT&T in order to get priority – i.e. quicker – access to their users.

“AT&T are lying when they say they support net neutrality, while actively opposing it,” said Evan Greer, director of Fight for the Future, in an interview with tech news site Ars Technica.

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Source: BBC

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The Federal Communications Commission said Wednesday that T-Mobile had a policy to slow down the speeds of customers who were the heaviest data users. But the agency said the company didn’t let customers know what the data-use threshold was for triggering the lower speed.

The FCC said T-Mobile started doing a better job with disclosures in June 2015. The carrier now says in small print on its website that slower speeds may result for customers using more than 26 gigabytes a month if the network is congested.

Asked for comment, T-Mobile referred to CEO John Legere’s tweet that it was a “good settlement with the FCC” and that the company “believes more info is best for customers.”

Spokeswoman Stacey DiNuzzo said the changes that were made in June of last year were deemed sufficient and no more are necessary to comply with the settlement’s conditions. FCC spokesman Will Wiquist declined to comment on where T-Mobile stands.

This isn’t the first time the agency has gone after the limits of unlimited plans. It fined AT&T $100 million last year for misleading customers on the mechanics of its unlimited plans — the carrier had been slowing speeds significantly after users hit a certain data threshold, even if there was no bottleneck. AT&T has contested the fine.

Today, AT&T says on its website (also in small print) that it slows down heavy users’ data speeds after 22 GB are used in a month if there is network congestion.

In its settlement with the FCC, T-Mobile will pay a $7.5 million penalty while $35.5 million will go to customers in the form of discounts or data upgrades. And $5 million will go toward expanding access to the internet for poorer children. The Bellevue, Washington, company will provide free internet service on devices for children in low-income school districts. The children can take the devices home to help them do their homework.

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Source: Yahoo

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