UN doesn’t want to take over Internet, does want to help telcos profit

In a speech on Wednesday, the head of the International Telecommunications Union, an agency of the United Nations, explicitly denied that the group is interested in taking over the Internet. But this speech makes clear that the body is quite interested in helping domestic telecommunications operators make boatloads of cash by controlling the flow of content to individual countries.

The ITU is set to host the December 2012 World Conference on International Telecommunications in Dubai (or, the WCIT-12, for short). Here, a new set of International Telecommunications Regulations (ITRs) is set to be negotiated. These haven’t been revised since 1988. In fact, the existing ones have all kinds of references to outdated gear (telexes!). Many news outlets and members of the American government have sounded the alarm that the UN, via the ITU, is going to “take over the Internet,” and that the United States should essentially oppose this move.

In remarks Wednesday at ITU headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, Secretary General Hamadoun Touré said the ITU recognizes all of its member states impose various types of restrictions on freedom of speech. The list includes copyright violations, pornography, defamation and political speech, among others.

“Such restrictions are permitted by article 34 of the ITU’s Constitution, which provides that Member States reserve the right to cut off, in accordance with their national law, any private telecommunications which may appear dangerous to the security of the State, or contrary to its laws, to public order or to decency,” he added.

“I do not see how WCIT could set barriers to the free flow of information,” Touré concluded.

In other words, countries can essentially do whatever they want online—and they already do. (We’re looking at you, North Korea, China, Russia, Iran, and Syria!)

Show me the money

But based on Touré’s speech, the ITU seems to confirm what many global Internet policy watchers had long suspected: this really is about money.

“As the industry has pointed out, data volumes are increasing much faster than the infrastructure needed to carry it, and there is currently a risk of an infrastructure investment shortfall. The revised [International Telecommunications Regulations, to be discussed at the December WCIT meeting in Dubai] should therefore help to encourage broadband roll-out and investment. They should emphasize the importance of liberalization and privatization, and should recognize the role of the private sector and market-based solutions. At the same time as data volumes are increasing, unit prices are declining, so total revenues for telecommunications operators are potentially at risk. As a result, some have said that there is a need to address the current disconnect between sources of revenue and sources of costs, and to decide upon the most appropriate way to do so.”

In other words, because revenues (read: profits) are “at risk,” there needs to be a new set of international regulations that will help shore up big telcos.

“The most important battleground in the WCIT is not censorship or security, but interconnection and the flows of funds among carriers attendant upon interconnection agreements,” wrote Milton Mueller, a professor of information studies at Syracuse University, in a blog post earlier this month. “If you want national regulatory authorities to have more collective control over ISPs generally, and American ISPs and Internet services specifically, you should support the WCIT effort.”

Plus ça change…

How would private sector telecommunications firms shore up their profits? One way is to start charging content providers (read: Hulu, Netflix, HBO, RIAA, MPAA, and everyone else who provides Big Content). Sound ridiculous?

Earlier this month, the site WCITLeaks published a contribution by the European Telecommunications Network Operators (read: major European ISPs like KPN, France Telecom, Deutsche Telecom, Telefonica, and many others). It’s the document to be discussed at the WCIT Working Group, currently meeting this week in Geneva.