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Mobile operators seek to 'block' Skype in Sweden

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  • 30-03-2012 11:58am
    #1
    bealtine
    Registered Users Posts: 4,051 ✭✭✭


    http://www.thelocal.se/39938/20120328/

    Swedish telecom operators want to implement technologies that will block mobile phone users in Sweden from making free calls using services like Skype and Viber.

    A spokesperson for telecom service provider Telia told Sveriges Radio (SR) that the technology exists to block users' ability to use mobile voice over IP (VoIP) telephony services.

    "It's going to mean that there will be service plans where it's not included so it won't work," Telia spokesperson Charlotte Züger told SR.

    "I believe, quite simply, that we need to be able to get paid for our various services no matter what, as different service plans include different things."

    A recent report by the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC), which oversees telecom regulations across the European Union, has found that Swedish telecom operators are not alone in their desire to prevent users from making free VoIP calls.

    However, Swedish companies looking to ensure users don't forego paid mobile phone calls in favour of VoIP services, may find their plans scuttled by the European Commission, which is considering banning telecom companies from blocking services like Skype and Viber.

    According to the European Commission, maintaining "net neutrality" – whereby all internet traffic is treated equally – is important and companies shouldn't be able to control how customers use the network.

    The findings of the BEREC report, published earlier this month, prompted calls by net neutrality advocates for legislation to ensure that competition isn't hampered by the blocking of VoIP services.

    "These preliminary findings prove that EU operators impose unjustifiable restrictions to Internet access," said Jérémie Zimmermann, spokesperson of France-based citizen advocacy group La Quadrature du Net.

    Swedish MEP Gunnar Hökmark of the Moderate Party told SR he's open to exploring legislation, but is generally critical of telecom companies' attempt to block customers from using VoIP services on their mobile phones.

    "From the start I think we should have an openness which means that we never have to take such measures," he told SR.


Comments

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    #2
    drunkmonkey
    Registered Users Posts: 28,118 ✭✭✭✭drunkmonkey


    Vodafone done it here, not sure if they still do. It wouldn't work on their unlimited broadband package.


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    #3
    srsly78
    Registered Users Posts: 7,157 ✭✭✭srsly78


    Skype works fine for me on both vodafone dsl, and vodafone mobile (no proxy set). But yeah I have heard that they throttle it, maybe only if you use the vodafone live proxy.

    You could just use skype through VPN tho, I don't see how they would stop that without blocking all vpn as well.


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    #4
    bealtine
    Registered Users Posts: 4,051 ✭✭✭bealtine


    drunkmonkey wrote: »
    Vodafone done it here, not sure if they still do. It wouldn't work on their unlimited broadband package.

    This is just greed. It was always done "this way" so it should continue being done this way. A bit like the content industry demanding that everybody consume DVDs and CDs for ever and ever and that governments legislate for DVDs to be the only content distribution method.

    All information and calls are just data over the network so if competition theory is "true" and followed to its logical conclusion then we should be allowed to use whatever information provider we want.
    The mobile industry has to change and become a data provider and stop the constant rip-offs of consumers :SMS and voice. Services that they charge handsomely for but which cost them next to nothing to provide.

    Incremental change is a constant:)


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