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Technology Stocks : Voice-on-the-net (VON), VoIP, Internet (IP) Telephony -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Francis Gaskins who wrote (395)	4/7/1998 8:22:00 AM
From: Frank A. Coluccio	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3178

All, Another side to the proposed FCC Fees: --- Congressional Group Opposes Net Phone Charges (04/06/98; 8:54 p.m. EST) By John Borland, Net Insider The Federal Communication Commission should not impose new regulations and fees on Internet telephony companies, a congressman influential on telecommunications issues said Monday. Speaking to a group of reporters and company officials at the headquarters of Netscape in Mountain View, Calif., Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-La.) said the FCC was badly off track. "There's a simple answer," he said. "[The FCC] should keep their hands off the Internet." Tauzin chairs the influential Commerce subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade and Consumer Protection. The FCC is scheduled to report to Congress later this week on how it will implement new rules governing the national universal service fund, into which telephone companies pay to subsidize service for rural areas and poor customers. In their report, the Commission is expected to recommend that Net phone companies begin contributing to this fund. "Those people who are talking about doing that are, I think, the biggest enemies of the Internet," Tauzin said. Along with Reps. Rick White, (R-Wash.), Chris Cox (R-Calif.), and several others, Tauzin is sponsoring a wide-ranging Internet Protection Act that would take away the FCC's authority to impose new regulatory fees on Net services "until we give it back," he said. The FCC is caught in the middle of a struggle between traditional telephone companies and high-tech interests as it tries to implement the provisions of the 1996 Telecommunications Act. Telephone companies are required to pay billions of dollars in regulatory fees every year, and they say their Internet competitors are getting a free ride. Net phone companies say their industry would be crippled if they were forced to pay the fees now. The FCC's report was commissioned by U.S. Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), who has advocated forcing Internet phone companies to pay the same fees as their telephone competitors. The report will not be final, however: The FCC must still propose a set of rules that would apply the universal service fees to Net telephony companies, which would go through a public comment period before being voted on by the Commission. Commissioners have not yet officially commented on their report's contents, although FCC Chairman Bill Kennard alluded to the controversy in a statement last week. "We must ensure that Americans have affordable access to telecommunications service as we promote the continued development of information technology," Kennard said. Net phone companies are already mobilizing against the FCC report. For example, IDT Corp. company officials said Monday the company will offer free Internet calls for consumers to call Congress and the FCC and register their opposition to the new charges. Tauzin also addressed other high-tech issues pending in front of his subcommittee at the Monday meeting. He said he was confident that encryption supporters could find a way to satisfy federal law enforcement concerns about liberalizing the nation's encryption export policy this year. The congressman said Silicon Valley companies and encryption lobbyists need to convince the FBI that it can do its job even in a "high-tech, encrypted" environment. The FBI would drop their objections to current legislation allowing the export of strong encryption software if high-tech interests assured the Bureau they will help set up an National Security Agency-style encryption-breaking lab, he added. Tauzin visited the west coast as part of a round of meetings with TechNet executives, including Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale and Cisco's John Chambers. TechNet is a Silicon Valley-based lobbying group headed by Barksdale and venture capitalist John Doerr.