What is this case about? What has the Commission said in its letter? What does the Dutch telecoms regulator have to do now?

In a video posted on her website this morning, Viviane Reding, the European Union's Commissioner for Information Society and Media, said that Europeans must have the right to control how their personal information is used, and said that the Commission would take action wherever EU Member States failed to ensure that new technologies such as behavioural advertising, RFID 'smart chips' or online social networking respected this right.

Following today's strategic meeting with Dániel Pataki, Head of the Hungarian Regulatory Authority and Chairman of the Radio Spectrum Policy Group (RSPG) – a high-level advisory group on radio spectrum set up by the Commission in 2002 –, Commissioner Reding stressed this morning the importance of the "digital dividend" for stimulating growth and competition on Europe's telecoms markets. The digital dividend is the additional spectrum that will become available for new wireless and TV services as a result of the switchover from analogue to digital TV, which has started in the EU Member States and is expected to be completed by 2012 (IP/09/266). The Commission believes that the digital dividend gives a welcome boost, in particular for wireless internet broadband services, thereby supporting the EU's "broadband for all" policy, especially in these times of economic downturn. After her meeting with Mr Pataki today, Commissioner Reding highlighted the pivotal role that national spectrum regulators in the RSPG will play over the coming months in turning the digital dividend into a practical reality for the benefit of Europe's economy and citizens.

Europe leads the world in mobile phone services with the number of subscriptions in 2008 at 119% of the EU population (up 7 percentage points from 2007), well ahead of the US (87%) and Japan (84%). This is a finding of today's Commission progress report on the single telecoms market. Despite the economic crisis, the EU's telecoms sector (worth about 3% of EU GDP) continued to grow in 2008 with revenues estimated at above €300 billion, up 1.3% compared to 2007 and outperforming the rest of the economy (up by 1% only).
Other Press Packs

European consumers paid less for their fixed broadband internet access (DSL, cable modem, fibre) in 2008 than a year ago according to a study released today by the European Commission. However, there are significant differences between Member States in broadband retail prices and cost structure for similar products. EU rules should be consistently applied in a telecoms single market for all businesses and consumers equally.

The European Commission has endorsed, in a letter published today, the Danish telecoms regulator's (NITA) proposal to oblige the largest cable operator in Denmark to open wholesale access to its cable broadband network to competitors. The Commission recognised that Denmark is in a unique situation because the Danish incumbent telecoms operator, TDC, controls both the telecoms network and large parts of the cable network. Extending obligations already existing for the telecoms network to TDC's cable network should help to maintain the ability of alternative operators to compete effectively with TDC in the broadband market by enabling them to access high bandwidth wholesale products, even if such products are not available over the telecoms network.

Connecting the 30% of the EU's rural population that has no high speed internet access should be a priority for achieving 'broadband for all' by 2010, the Commission said today. Improved internet connectivity is a powerful tool to stimulate swift economic recovery. The Commission today outlines how it would use its own support programmes to boost internet networks and services in rural areas, and called on EU Member States to do the same. Good internet access can make farms and companies in rural areas, especially small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), less isolated and more competitive through access to international markets and faster and more efficient ways of doing business. Meanwhile, the European Parliament and the Council are discussing a Commission proposal to make a further € 1 billion available through the European Economic Recovery Plan to spread high speed internet access more widely across all regions of Europe.

The 27 EU Telecoms Ministers will meet in Prague on 17 February 2009 following an invitation from the Czech EU Presidency. They will discuss issues related to the telecoms sector, crucial for the future development of a European knowledge economy. The main topics are expected to be the role of information and communication technologies (ICT) and of a single market without regulatory borders in responding to the economic crisis. The European Commission aims to achieve high-speed internet coverage for all citizens by 2010 as part of the European Economic Recovery Plan and has proposed to earmark € 1 billion to support broadband infrastructure investments. The Commission will be represented at the Ministerial Conference by Viviane Reding, EU Telecoms Commissioner.

The European Commission aims to achieve 100 % high-speed internet coverage for all citizens by 2010 as part of the European Economic Recovery Plan. € 1 billion has been earmarked today to help rural areas get online, bring new jobs and help businesses grow. On average, 93 % of Europeans can enjoy a high speed online connection but in some countries broadband covers less than half of the rural population (see the table in the annex). Broadband internet connection is expected to create 1 million jobs and boost the EU's economy by €850 billion between 2006 and 2015.

As part of the ongoing implementation of the EU recovery plan endorsed by the European Council in December 2008, the European Commission has today presented proposals to invest in key energy and Internet broadband infrastructure projects. These will deliver a much needed stimulus to the EU economy in the short term, while at the same time targeting strategic goals such as energy security. All Member States will benefit from the package of measures.

The Commission today said it approved the Portuguese telecoms regulator's proposal to deregulate some parts of the wholesale broadband market, covering around 61% of all Portuguese broadband lines. The regulator ANACOM's (Autoridade Nacional de Comunicações) proposal is a reasonable move towards better targeted regulation, concentrating on regions where structural competition problems persist. The Commission also called for effective regulation in regions where competition problems persist. With the move towards faster and higher capacity next generation fibre networks underway in Portugal and across the EU, the Commission highlighted the importance of alternative operators having access to new fibre technologies.

The European Commission has informed the Finnish telecoms regulator, Viestintävirasto or FICORA (Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority), of its serious doubts over the compatibility with EU law of its draft regulatory measures on the Finnish wholesale broadband access market. Finland's regulator has not provided enough evidence to justify the deregulation of access to the incumbent operators' broadband networks it proposes, namely that certain geographic markets ready for deregulation show different competitive conditions from the rest of the country. The Commission now has until 5 March 2009 to decide whether the regulator can adopt its proposed measures. The regulator may not adopt the measures until the Commission approves them.

The European Commission has, with reservations, given its green light to the Spanish draft regulation on wholesale broadband access, notified by the Spanish regulator, the Comisión del mercado de las telecomunicaciones ("CMT") on 4 December 2008. The Commission believes that the revised version of the draft measures addresses some of the issues on which the Commission had expressed serious doubts (IP/08/1704). However, the Commission still believes that regulation of wholesale broadband access should not be limited to speeds of up to 30 Mb/s. On the basis of the Commission's presently limited powers of oversight, it can only invite the CMT to change its regulatory approach in this regard.

Broadband penetration in Europe continues to grow, from 18.2% in July 2007 to up to 21.7% in July 2008, according to a report published today by the European Commission. The report also shows the gap between EU countries narrowing, from 28.4 percentage points in July 2007 to 27.7 this July. With 17 million fixed broadband lines laid in a year, today's figures show high-speed internet in the EU is more widespread and faster, while mobile broadband is starting to take off, with 6.9% penetration. Three quarters of broadband lines in the EU have download speeds of 2 millions of bits per second (Mbps) and above, a speed that supports TV over the Internet, for example.

The European Commission has informed the Spanish telecoms regulator, Comisión del Mercado de las Telecomunicaciones (CMT), that it has serious doubts that the draft measures on the Spanish wholesale broadband access market, notified under the Electronic Communications Framework Directive, are compatible with EU law. It is unprecedented that a national regulator proposes to regulate wholesale broadband access only up to a certain speed (30 Mb/s in this case). The CMT further proposes to impose less stringent regulation in areas where alternative infrastructure operators seem to be active. In the context of the transition towards high speed broadband in Spain, the Commission needs to ensure that the proposed measures do not hinder broadband competition and are supported by empirical evidence. The Commission now has two months (until 13 January 2009) to take a final decision on whether or not the regulator can adopt the proposed measures.

Scientists and researchers in Pakistan can now connect with their colleagues across the globe, thanks to a new high speed computer network link, made possible by GÉANT, the advanced pan-European backbone network, and TEIN, the Asian equivalent to GÉANT. GÉANT was launched in 2000 by the European Commission and the Member States as a jointly funded initiative to upgrade Europe’s research and education networking infrastructure. The EU-funded Trans-Eurasia Information Network (TEIN) and the US National Science Foundation (NSF) today agreed to link with the Pakistan Education Research Network (PERN). TEIN and GÉANT together serve close to 100 million researchers in Europe and Asia enabling ground-breaking research collaboration in fields such as climate change, radio astronomy and biotechnology.

Register before 31 October for the early bird fee. This conference is Europe's largest ICT research event in 2008 and takes place over three days from 25 - 27 November in Lyon, France. The event is organised by the European Commission in cooperation with the French Presidency of the European Union. It will examine EU priorities in ICT research for over €2 billion of funding available in 2009-2010. More than 4000 participants are expected to attend the event.

Europe could take the lead in the next generation of the Internet. The European Commission today outlined the main steps that Europe has to take to respond to the next wave of the Information Revolution that will intensify in the coming years due to trends such as social networking, the decisive shift to on-line business services, nomadic services based on GPS and mobile TV and the growth of smart tags. The report shows that Europe is well placed to exploit these trends because of its policies to support open and pro-competitive telecom networks as well as privacy and security. A public consultation has been launched today by the Commission on the policy and private sector responses to these opportunities. The Commission report also unveils a new Broadband Performance Index (BPI) that compares national performance on key measures such as broadband speed, price, competition and coverage. Sweden and the Netherlands top this European broadband league, which complements the more traditional broadband penetration index used so far by telecoms regulators.

How can the EU achieve that all Europeans – from the North of Finland to the South of Italy, from the Western Ireland to Eastern Romania – have access to broadband Internet? This is the main question raised in a Commission report today. From 2003-2007 broadband use in the EU tripled to 36% of households. However, 7% of the EU's population are still not connected (30% in rural areas). There are striking gaps in the EU: 100% of the population is covered in Denmark, Luxembourg and Belgium, but more than 60% in Romania (75% in rural areas) do not have broadband access. Even in strong economies such as Italy and Germany, 18% and 12% respectively of the rural population are not covered. With broadband increasingly important in daily life, policy tools like radio spectrum management and mobile satellite services should accompany a broad debate about the universal service in telecoms – a safety net guaranteeing a minimum level of services, such as connection to a phone network and basic Internet access, filling basic needs that the market does not.

Today the European Parliament in its plenary session voted on the European Commission's proposals of November 2007 to reform the EU Telecom rules, in place since 2003. The EU Telecoms Reform aims to create a Single EU Telecoms Market with improved rights for consumers and businesses by reinforcing competition and investment and boosting the take-up of cross-border services and wireless high-speed broadband for all.