John Stankey
Stephen Desaulniers | CNBC
AT&T will no longer exempt its HBO Max streaming service audience from data limits after a federal court upheld California’s network neutrality law, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.
The company informed customers that it would no longer offer “Data Free TV” in its video applications as of March 25, according to a copy of the statement obtained by CNBC. This means that customers must be connected to Wi-Fi to prevent their streaming from being counted against their total data limits. The change will extend beyond California, since, said AT&T, “the Internet does not recognize state boundaries”.
The announcement highlights a central concern of the industry with the actions of the State that impact the internet sector. Much like digital privacy laws, which currently exist in only a few states, the technology industry fears that a patchwork of state laws will make its operation more difficult, especially for smaller companies.
“A state-to-state approach to ‘net neutrality’ is impractical,” said AT&T in a statement announcing the change of the data limit. “A patchwork of state regulations, many of them overly restrictive, creates obstacles to creative and pro-consumer solutions.”
Network neutrality is the idea that Internet service providers should act neutrally in relation to the content they host and refrain from accelerating or limiting the speed of delivery of certain websites or services. Under California law, which a federal judge said last month could be legally enforced, AT&T said it is not allowed to “sponsor” data from customers who also use its wireless services.
The California network neutrality law came in the wake of the Trump administration’s decision to undo an Obama-era network neutrality rule in the Federal Communications Commission. The old rule installed the principle of net neutrality by reinterpreting Title II of the Communications Act of 1934, so that Internet service providers were considered common carriers subject to greater regulation.
AT&T said it “has long been committed to the principles of an open Internet” and urged Congress to enact federal laws to make Americans’ access to the Internet easier and more accessible “, while providing clear net neutrality rules , consistent and permanent for everyone.
Steve Kopack of -CNBC contributed to this report.
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