On Aug. 1, FCC commissioners concluded on a 3-2 vote that Comcast monitored the content of its customers' internet connections and selectively blocked peer-to-peer connections using the BitTorrent protocol. The commission found that Comcast violated so-called rules of net neutrality.
David Cohen, a Comcast vice president, said Comcast would comply with the order, even though Comcast maintains it never throttled traffic. Still, Cohen said the Philadelphia-based internet service provider was appealing (.pdf) to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit because the commission went too far.
“We filed this appeal in order to protect our legal rights and to challenge the basis on which the commission found that Comcast violated federal policy in the absence of pre-existing legally enforceable standards or rules," he said in a statement. “We continue to recognize that the Commission has jurisdiction over Internet service providers and may regulate them in appropriate circumstances and in accordance with appropriate procedures. However, we are compelled to appeal because we strongly believe that, in this particular case, the Commission's action was legally inappropriate and its findings were not justified by the record."
The commission's ruling was the first time the FCC waded into the net neutrality waters.
“Let's suppose they win. The commission would not have the authority to deal with them," said Art Brodsky, a spokesman for Public Knowledge, one of the groups whose complaints about Comcast stirred the FCC to action. “This is about setting ground rules for enforcement."
Cohen said Comcast was moving toward a “protocol-agnostic network congestion" platform by year's end. It also has capped monthly usage at 250 GB for residential users.
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