It wasn’t too long ago that Verizon announced that they would begin to throttle the internet speeds of their heaviest data users during peak periods. According to Verizon, they claim that this is for network optimization. While we can only assume that subscribers might not be too pleased to have their speeds throttled, they are not alone as the FCC’s chairman expressed doubts of his own as well.
Verizon has since responded to the chairman’s concerns, claiming that other carriers are essentially doing the same thing. “Rather than an effort to ‘enhance [our] revenue streams,’ our practice is a measured and fair step to ensure that this small group of customers do not disadvantage all others in the sharing of network resources during times of high demand.”
According to Verizon’s CEO, Daniel S. Mead, he claims “I don’t think the FCC really understood what we were doing,” adding that only a minority of users on Verizon’s network will be affected (estimated about 5%). Since this throttling only affects the heaviest users who are grandfathered into Verizon’s unlimited 4G LTE plans, we guess it is true to a certain extent.
However as previously mentioned, the FCC’s concern might be because Verizon could be violating the agreement when they acquired the C Block spectrum, and as part of the agreement they were not allowed to deny, limit, or restrict users to take advantage of it.