New Report Pinpoints Challenges To Open, Sustainable Internet For All

While in 2015 nearly 3 billion internet users will be connected across the world, their experiences once they are online will vary considerably according to their country. To find ways to bring everyone up to the same speed and have the same user experience, worldwide remedies were discussed at the occasion of the launch of the Global Internet Report 2014 – “Open and Sustainable Access for All.”

At 9 June pre-event meeting of the UN-led “WSIS +10 High Level Event”, a session entitled “Understanding the challenges of delivering the Internet to everyone and for everyone” organised by the Internet Society (ISOC) and moderated by its Chief Economist Michael Kende brought various panellists to comment on Section 4 of their new report: “Challenges to the Open and Sustainable Internet”.

The WSIS +10 High Level is taking place from 10-13 June at International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva. The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) took place in two parts, 2003 (Geneva) and 2005 (Tunis, Tunisia).

“Creating a global network of networks based on a standard platform is a foundational success of the Internet,” the report says, however significant differences remain between countries in terms of internet access and usage.

Kende told Intellectual Property Watch, “We should not take what we have here for granted and we should not work only to get people online but to make their experience as good as ours.”

Among these differences is the penetration of internet users across countries, which dramatically varies. A country with relative low access, for instance, will probably have few online services, which will attract only few people, creating “a vicious cycle keeping people off for being interested in the internet,” he said.

Affordability remains a significant roadblock. “Huge differences in the cost relative to the income of the internet across countries” still exist, he said. Quality, surveillance and internet content availability are also mentioned as major issues with special attention to the location of the content in the report.

“Affordability is the Key”

According to Koko Boakye, policy manager at the Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI) affordability is the key, as first “it stops people from getting on” and second “it creates differences in the kind of user experience they have.”

In fact, people in less developed countries pay over 30 percent of average national income for a basic broadband connection, while in developed countries it is just 1.7 percent, he said.

In addition, a significant part of population in the developing countries do not even earn an average income. So surfing the Web “is not an option for them, Boakye said. “It uses too much their financial resources.”

Unaffordability can also undermine their experience once they get online. For instance, in most African countries pre-paid cards are used, which makes the market very price sensitive.

“If these people do not understand how much they are paying for a broadband connection and they are concerned on how much it costs, they won’t use internet,” he said.

More Public Investment

Samia Melhem, lead policy officer at the Transport and ICT Global Practice at the World Bank, advised debunking the myth around information and communication technology that “everything has to be covered by the private sector,” especially in big developing countries where the industry does not have any incentives for providing broadband access in remote areas.

“We need of a little bit of both,” she said, i.e., private and public investment.

Presently, the World Bank is spending US$ 2 million for broadband all over the world, with a focus on Africa, east and south Asia. Most of their projects are based on a public-private partnership model. In Kenya, for instance, since 2007, the World Bank’s initiative has allowed the drop in price of a broadband connection from $US 2000 to less than under $US 20 per month.

Thus, increasing public investment in the internet access should be seen as “a public good for the information society of tomorrow,” she said.

Favourable Legal Framework

The perspective of a network operator was presented by Amy Alvarez, executive director of international external & regulatory affairs at AT&T, who said that over the past 6 years, $US 120 billion has been invested into fixed and mobile networks to ensure they meet the ever-increasing demand of their consumers “who want their information available at any time, anywhere and on any device.”

In order to keep this on track, the key factor is the type of regulatory framework that is put in place, Alvarez said, adding that it should provide an environment conductive to investment, competition and innovation. Updating regulatory tools is essential to ensure they match the network of the future, she said.

While affordability remains a crucial issue, innovative charging and pricing models have been developed across different markets. For instance, in emerging countries, a free social media plan has been launched, which “enable[s] wireless operators to bundle access to certain media, such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, as part of a free or very cheap service in addition to their phone service,” she said. This allows consumers to discover “the value of the internet services and perhaps move on the full price subscription,” she said.

However, a recent decision in Chile banned such arrangements, finding that it violated their internet neutrality laws. The judgment ruled that, “if an operator allows access to one part of the internet, it must allow access to the entire internet,” she said.

According to Alvarez, although “it has been a well-intentioned policy, we can see how it is having unintended consequences on citizens in terms of reducing access to those who cannot afford it and possibly have detrimental effects.”

Building National Hosting Capacity

Moez Chachouk, head of the technical department at the Tunisian Telecommunication Regulation Authority (INT) said that open access is essential for sustainable development.

“We should also think differently,” he added with regard to the localisation of the internet content. Today, governments invest huge amount of money to merely enable access to content hosted in different places around the world. In lieu of that, “we need to build hosting capacity,” i.e., promote local content, he said.

In Tunisia, for instance, such initiatives have been launched by the INT in partnership with companies like Google and YouTube.

Another challenge is to raise awareness among the Tunisian population with respect to privacy issues. These internet users do not have any idea of “what the NSA is doing” for example, he said, referring to the US National Security Agency’s surveillance online.

Create Local Internet Content

Ellen Blacker, vice president for global public policy at Walt Disney Company, gave a brief overview of how to design an environment to encourage production of local content. “Content, really brings people to the internet, and more they find to do there, more they will stay, and then more people are stayed, more content can be produced,” she said. In other words, it is a real virtuous cycle.

Policymakers should, according to Blacker, opt for a broad view of “what is considered as locally relevant content,” she said. Along to Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, internet users are also browsing on websites to get information on governments, businesses, culture, education, etc. It is this mosaic of relevant information that should be promoted, she said.

Blacker also mentioned the importance of freedom of expression, trust, intellectual property protection, global interoperability in the regulatory framework, and innovative business models.

However, Kende told Intellectual Property Watch, “content is much more difficult than access. We understand the access issue … everyone knows how to solve that problem, but the content side, it is much more difficult. Creativity is very difficult to capture.”

Internet Society (ISOC)

In addition to this annual report, ISOC supported by more than 65,000 members, 100 chapters and 145 organisation members, promotes open and sustainable access to the internet by looking at the standards, public policy and development across the world.

In developing countries, their regional offices deliver different projects such as workshops and technical training, with a special focus to “really demonstrate the government the value of having all stakeholders’ participation in the growth of the internet,” Kende said.

Since March 2014, Inforum, an online educational program providing divers modules has also been launched and already attracted thousands of users.