Rostelecom calls on giving in Russian networks priority to the traffic of those telecom companies that paid for it

At the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum ( SPIEF-2018 ), there was a proposal to cancel the principle of network neutrality. According to this principle, access to all network resources should be carried out without restrictions, provided that they contain legal content. The relevant proposal was made by the president of Rostelecom, Mikhail Oseevsky, as reported by RBC.

He believes that priority in Russian networks should be given to the traffic of those companies that paid for it. In most cases, Russian companies “pay for traffic” with their investments in the development of network infrastructure. At the same time, Google, Facebook and other foreign corporations use Russian networks, but do not pay anything for their operation.

“I think this situation is abnormal. I would suggest opening the discussion in what ways, primarily economic, we need to improve the situation, ”said Oseevsky.
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He believes that operators should be given an opportunity to regulate traffic depending on its priority and in full compliance with the interests of the state and society. According to Oseyevsky, the fulfillment of the requirements of the “Spring Law” is even more relevant: “... a significant amount of traffic that we will have to store falls on the video that users will download”. That is, just for the video, the head of the national telecom operator offers to pay to foreign companies.

As for the “Spring Law,” as early as July 1 of this year, telecom operators are obliged to keep records of conversations and SMS correspondence of their customers for six months. From October 1 of the same year, providers and Internet companies will be required to begin storing user traffic in the last 30 days.

Perhaps, over time, the law will be somehow relaxed, at least for Internet companies, which RBC also reports. “The main traffic comes to large foreign companies, which are unlikely to comply with the provisions of the law. Operators can store information for them, but Internet companies will have to pay for this service, ”the publication cites an anonymous source.

Some representatives of the largest telecom operators in the Russian Federation agree with the opinion of the head of Rostelecom. In particular, Executive Vice President for Strategy and Business Development at VimpelCom (Beeline brand) Alexander Popovsky believes that the “Spring Law” has to some extent exacerbated the problem of network neutrality. He says that at present operators will be obliged not only to invest in the development of networks for transmitting traffic from various companies, but also to provide funds for creating storage systems for this traffic. Naturally, it is a question of own means of the companies.

Earlier, Habr.com has already published information that MTS has estimated its own expenses for the implementation of the “Law of Spring” at 60 billion rubles in the next five years, and at Vimpelcom - at 45 billion rubles.

It is worth noting that the idea of ​​abandoning the principle of net neutrality is not new in Russia - it was previously discussed by members of the Media Communication Union, which includes representatives of major telecom operators and media holdings. Currently, according to the head of the ISS, Pavel Stepanov, a concept of medium-term regulation of the media communication industry is being developed. “According to our idea, the development of a concept agreed between business and the state is of key importance. Forming the text of a law or a code on its basis is already a technical task, ”he said.

According to other representatives of the telecommunications sector in Russia, domestic companies can be encouraged in other ways, and not by prioritizing traffic. “It is right to encourage domestic players, but in addition to network priorities there are other measures, for example, tax preferences,” says TMT Consulting CEO Konstantin Ankilov.

Moreover, lawyers from Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (Russia) LLP believe that, under certain conditions, traffic prioritization may well have signs of discrimination. And this, in turn, may be the reason for the antitrust investigation by the federal regulator.