Universal Connectivity, Net Neutrality Can Coexist In India: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg
“I believe everyone in the world deserves access to these opportunities,” he added.
In many countries there are big social and economic obstacles to connectivity, Zuckerberg said, adding that Internet is not affordable to everyone and in many places awareness of its value remains low.
Besides, women and the poor are most likely to be excluded and further disempowered by lack of connectivity, he added.
“This is why we created Internet.org, our effort to connect the whole world. By partnering with mobile operators and governments in different countries, Internet.org offers free access in local languages to basic Internet services in areas like jobs, health, education and messaging,” he noted.
The initiative lowers the cost of accessing the Internet and raises awareness of the value of Net connectivity and it helps include everyone in the world’s opportunities, he said.
“We’ve made some great progress and already more than 800 million people in 9 countries can now access free basic services through Internet.org.
“In India, we’ve already rolled out free basic services on the Reliance network to millions of people in Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Kerala and Telangana,” he added.
Zuckerberg informed that internet.org has been launched in Indonesia on the Indosat network today.
In India, telecom regulator Trai has invited public comments on a discussion paper for policy framework on Net neutrality and Internet-based messaging and calling service providers such as WhatsApp, Skype, Viber and Google Talk.
Petitions to the telecom sector regulator has neared the 8-lakh level to ‘keep Internet free’.
An intense debate, including on social media platforms, began on the issue of ‘net neutrality’ has started after some telecom firms, including Bharti Airtel and RCom, announced services that are being billed as going against the concept of maintaining equal Internet access for all.
These platforms claim to allow users to access a variety of mobile and Internet applications for free, but the critics allege that these services restrict the ‘free’ access to a select group of websites and apps and therefore sabotage the entire concept of keeping the Internet free.
Buckling under a growing public outrage, ecommerce giant Flipkart decided to ‘walk away’ from Airtel Zero.
Net neutrality advocates claim such initiatives go against the principle and that users should be able to access all websites at the same speed and cost.
