YouTube Claims T-Mobile Is Throttling Its Video Traffic

Last month T-Mobile announced Binge On, a new service they were offering where basically users could stream video without it eating into their bandwidth. Granted the video quality won’t be particularly high, but if you’re on the go we suppose it will actually be useful. However the catch is that you will need to use one of the streaming platforms that is supported by the carrier.

While the list is pretty extensive, for some reason YouTube was not part of the mix. So much so that YouTube has recently accused T-Mobile of throttling its video traffic, or at least degrading it so that maybe the bandwidth could be allocated to these video services instead. According to a YouTube spokesman, “Reducing data charges can be good for users, but it doesn’t justify throttling all video services, especially without explicit user consent.”

T-Mobile declined to address YouTube’s complaint but no doubt this is something the FCC wants to take a look at. Recently the FCC had publicly stated that they wanted to speak to the likes of AT&T, T-Mobile, and Comcast about their free data programs. The FCC noted that this wasn’t an investigation, but rather they wanted to gather all the facts about it.

However the FCC had previously stated that they would be keeping a close eye on such sponsored data programs, especially over the possibility where they might violate net neutrality rules, where internet providers shouldn’t prioritize bandwidth to companies who pay them.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Cellphones, Web
Tags: Legal, T-Mobile, YouTube