FCC to Regain Net Neutrality Powers to Protect National Security

The return of Obama administration-era net neutrality policies empowers the Federal Communications Commission to weed out Chinese and other foreign government-tied companies classified as a threat to national security.

In a press call on Wednesday, a senior Federal Communications Commission official said that reclassifying broadband as a regulated service will help shorten the list of foreign-owned ISPs, allowing the FCC to strip identified companies of telecom operating authority.

The reclassification is part of a Biden-Harris administration initiative to ensure fairness and accessible internet landscape across the country, Nextgov/FCW reported.

Defending the U.S. against growing threats has been a priority for the federal government in the last few years. In a blog post published in February, Clayton Romans, associated director at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said that countering threats from China-backed groups is among the agency’s top priorities in 2024.

FCC gave up its regulating power over the internet in 2017, an act its then-chairman, Ajit Pai, described as a beneficial development that would allow ISPs to offer a wider variety of services.