In Belarus, gathered to charge for the use of VoIP-services

Last week, Belarus’s Minister of Communications, Sergei Popkov, announced that a proposal is being prepared on his behalf for the government, the essence of which is to collect payments from VoIP services, including Skype or Viber. According to the minister, all these services use the country's network infrastructure for free, which should not be.

“We understand that on top of the network resources created by Beltelecom, cellular operators, there are Skype, Viber and other technologies whose operators do not invest a single cent in the development of technologies within the republic ... We will offer the government the tools to monetize these services so that the operators these services shared revenues for network development, ”the minister said.

Sergey Popkov added that VoIP-operators generate excessive traffic, and about 1% of users use the Internet gateway resource by 50%. Immediately after the interview, an opinion appeared on the Web that the minister was just joking. However, this is not a joke.
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“There is a feeling that Belarusian officials are competing in attempts to offer the most absurd idea of ​​filling the budget. Unfortunately, the idea is quite realizable. Similar ideas have appeared in many countries. Thus, in Russia, the initiators were themselves mobile operators. It was proposed to separately rate VoIP-traffic. This kind of implementation is also possible in Belarus, ”said Fyodor Pavlyuchenko, editor of the online publication Electroname.com.

According to online media tut.by , the likelihood that the need to pay taxes for VoIP-traffic will fall on the shoulders of the country's operators. It is clear that the operators will try to compensate for their expenses at the expense of users, and now they are likely to become those who really have to pay for the use of VoIP-services.

“It turns out that everyone will win. Operators will create a billing and recoup the costs, the Ministry of Communications will increase revenues, and pay for all consumers. By the way, according to a similar scheme, the telephone installation of the country was carried out at the expense of Internet users, ”Fyodor Pavlyuchenko commented on the situation.

As for the technical ability to implement such a project, it exists. “It’s certainly possible to technically realize the desire of the Ministry of Communications, although it’s not so easy because all the resources on the Internet have the final addressee and it’s enough to block access to this addressee,” says independent IT expert Igor Boskin.

By the way, not so long ago, the FAS Russia voiced a similar idea , expressing it in the sense that now work with any network services, including YouTube, Skype and others, is conducted at a single rate, which does not take into account “the difficulties and costs that go to providers to ensure uninterrupted and high-quality access to the resource. "