Bell to stop slowing retail traffic by March

BCE Inc. Internet provider Bell Canada will stop throttling retail Internet traffic on its networks by March 1, 2012, the company told the CRTC in a letter dated Dec. 19. In the two-page letter, BCE subsidiaries Bell Canada and Bell Alliant told the commission that a number of factors have allowed them to discontinue the companies’ throttling practices, which primarily targeted peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing traffic. Those developments included the commission’s recent imposition of capacity-based Internet wholesale billing, the company’s network upgrades, and the increasing popularity of other demanding Internet functions that have reduced p2p’s overall proportion of all net traffic. “The Companies will continue to monitor traffic levels and take steps to ensure a good user experience for the majority of end-users served by their networks in accordance with the ITMP Framework,” the letter said. Bell previously announced that it would roll back its traffic shaping of wholesale Internet services in November. Responding to the companies’ announcement Monday, Internet advocacy group OpenMedia.ca said the move should make consumers question other Internet providers that continue to use throttling practices. “Bell, Canada's largest Internet provider, has decided to pull back some of the discriminatory restrictions it has been imposing on the Internet for the last several years, namely the slowing (throttling) of online content,” OpenMedia spokeswoman Lindsey Pinto said in a statement. “Over the last few years, many Canadian ISPs have attempted to justify Internet openness violations by claiming that certain types of traffic make their networks unmanageable. Bell’s move today demonstrates clearly that this is not the case. This announcement is further evidence that ISPs are breaking Internet openness rules when they restrict access to online services.”

Bell to stop slowing retail traffic by March

Brief | December 20, 2011

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