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The Electronic Frontier Foundation believes that T-Mobile's new One plan, which offers unlimited data, calls, and texts, may fall afoul of net neutrality rules due to the restrictions that it imposes on how customers can consume data.
T-Mobile One offers unlimited video streaming at 480p, but getting HD video will cost you an extra $25 a month per line. Many are saying this violates net neutrality, and even the Electronic Frontier Foundation has spoken up.
EFF senior staff technologist Jeremy Gillula told the Daily Dot that, based on what his group has read about T-Mobile One so far, “it seems like T-Mobile’s new plan to charge its customers extra to not throttle video runs directly afoul of the principle of net neutrality.” He added that T-Mobile One’s video throttling could also violate the FCC’s Open Internet Order that says that “ISPs can’t throttle traffic based on its type, or charge customers more in order to avoid discriminatory throttling.”
On accused of violating the net neutrality rules, T-Mobile CEO John Legere gave his clarification.
“Listen, we have made it painfully clear from the beginning, we are pro net neutrality. This is all about customer choice. So if a customer buys this program, we will, based upon the offer itself, deliver them video at standard definition. If they want Ultra HD and they upgrade and pay the $25, we will give them that, too. That’s choice.
“We actually believe that there were questions associated with how we got here, and this is a very strong statement of responding to what we think are the things that are very important from a net neutrality standpoint. I’m glad to have that discussion, but it is clearly not an anti-net neutrality position.”
This isn’t the first time that T-Mobile has been accused of violating net neutrality. In the months following last year’s launch of Binge On, there were several accusations of net neutrality violations.
