Experience:

In two decades, the internet revolution has transformed citizens’ lives and supported the development of a wide range of new services. It has also deeply transformed the way telecommunication networks are used, with sometimes services and usages far from those for which those infrastructures were originally designed. Meanwhile, an increasing number of communications services (voice, messaging or geolocation for instance) are today provided “over the top” (over the internet) by internet players independently of the network operation, and running alongside similar services provided by telecom operators.

This growing range of innovation and uses opened up by the internet has been of a great benefit for consumers. However, the resulting situation also demands a fresh look at the regulation of digital services in order to ensure consistent protection and rules: similar services have to be governed in a similar way. This is currently not the case.

The electronic communication framework dates back from the time of internet infancy and therefore ignores internet services. As a result, digital services today may fall under the legal categories of electronic communication services (operators’ services) or information society services (covering most internet services), each category being subject to a very different set of rules. Services deemed similar do therefore not offer the same guarantees for the consumers; for instance, customers using internet-based services cannot access emergency services or do not benefit from the same level of privacy or confidentiality rules. This legal distinction is no longer relevant and leads to a very complex situation that is detrimental to consumers, public authorities and, last but not least, to the development of fair competition between industry players.

Ideas:

To re-establish healthy foundations for a blooming digital economy in Europe, for more trust and fairness, Orange considers that a future proof, holistic and technology or provider neutral solution is to set up a new common European law applicable to all digital services independently of the provider. This law would cover all digital services (voice, text, etc.) being provided by telecoms operators or by internet players with the same set of obligations, such as rules on data protection, openness, transparency, consumer rights, security, portability, emergency services, legal enforcement, measures for disabled users. A proportionality test would ensure that those rules apply in a way that does not stifle innovation.

This approach would require modifying the current electronic communication framework to reduce its scope to networks and internet access services regulation, thereby deleting the provisions on electronic communication services (covered by the new European law on digital services). To ensure full consistency, the e-privacy directive, only applicable to operators’ services, should be deleted as data protection for digital services has to be governed by a single text. This would mean translating its specific provisions within the future regulation on data protection, or would it not be possible, within the new law on digital services.

While setting the ground for an ambitious plan, this solution would be the best way to ensure a consistency of rules over all digital services. It would also be in line with the cross-sectors methodology recently set by the European Commission in its draft regulation on data protection or in the draft directive on network and information security.

More details on this proposal are available in the evidence section of the Digital4EU website.