DT gets slap on wrist for net neutrality naughtiness

Deutsche Telekom has found itself on the wrong side of right after its ‘Stream On’ offering was found to break European net neutrality rules.

After the Federal Network Agency (BNetzA) imposed restrictions on the telco on the grounds of net neutrality, DT took to the courts to fight the decision. Unfortunately, the lower courts and today in the Higher Administrative Court in Muenster, it was confirmed the telco would no-longer be able to offer the ‘Stream On’ value add feature in its current form.

The issue which the telco is facing boils down to the small print. DT customers have found themselves to have traffic throttled and are unable to make use of the ‘Stream On’ feature outside the German borders, violating European rules on roaming.

‘Stream On’ was first introduced to customers in the US, with the German business following suit after witnessing the success. Offering zero-rating benefits on video streaming, the proposition proved to be as successful in Europe, with two million German customers signed up.

It is of course a strategy which will sound attractive to the data-intensive consumers of today. With entertainment and gaming content from selected partners not bleeding the monthly data allotments, it sounds very interesting, however it seems DT is a victim of its own sluggishness.

One of the issues which BNetzA found was on the data throttling side of the offer. For cheaper data tariffs, download speeds were throttled with the critics arguing this violated one of the key principles of net neutrality, irrelevant as to whether the user consented to the downgraded speeds.

For the tariffs at the bottom end of the scale, download speeds had been throttled to 1.7 Mbps. This might have been sufficient at some point, but at this is not fast enough to deliver a HD quality resolution, the courts decided it was undermining the rules.

Secondly, in limiting the zero-rating offering of ‘Stream On’ to its own borders, DT has also been found to have broken European roaming rules. As the free data stream ended at the border, the courts agreed with regulators that the user was effectively being ‘charged’ for using video and gaming services when in another country. Charging more for services while abroad is a no-no when it comes to the European Union’s rules on roaming.

Although the telco will not be happy with the outcome of this case, it is not the end for the ‘Stream On’ proposition. With two million users signed up, it is clearly at attractive value add for DT, but the telco will have to tweak the small print and update some permissions to ensure it is compliant with current regulations.