Online restriction

Consumer groups see 'Net threat in Cisco's blocker

By CHRISTOPHER STERN

WASHINGTON -- Cisco Systems is marketing a device that will allow cable operators to discourage or even block customers from going to rival servers' Web sites, consumer groups have charged in a letter to FCC chairman Bill Kennard.

Quoting sales literature distributed on the floor of the recent National Cable Television Assn. confab in Chicago, public interest groups said they have evidence that the cablers want to re-create their monopoly of the video business on the Internet.

"The fundamental nature of the Internet -- its ability to support a wide range of distinctive applications and content providers -- would be sacrificed if broadband networks are allowed to create traffic management policies that can openly discriminate against competitors," said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, CEO of the Media Access Project.

Schwartzman's group, along with the Consumer Federation of America, Consumers Union and the Center for Media Education urged the Federal Communications Commission to abandon its hands-off policy when it comes to Internet regulation. They, along with companies such as America Online, would like to see the FCC be more aggressive when it comes to cablers and the 'Net.

Top on the list of the public interest group's concerns is AT&T's plan to require high-speed Internet subscribers to sign up for @Home, which the telco-cabler owns, as a condition for getting turbocharged Web access.

Use of Cisco's device would apparently run directly counter to AT&T's claims that once a subscriber is using its high-speed service, he or she would have equal and open access to the entire Internet.