Harry C. Alford

Guest Columnist

Minority-owned small businesses need two things to compete and thrive in an economy that is dominated more and more each year by global megafirms: a level playing field where everyone plays by the same rules of the road and stable and certain regulations that maximize their ability to invest and grow.

This is true in the brick-and-mortar business world and even more so in the increasingly vital digital world, where a handful of dominant tech giants can use monopoly control over gateway services like search and social media and their ability to mine and exploit massive troughs of consumer data to choke off competition.

That’s why the FCC’s plan to reform the internet regulations known as “net neutrality” is so important.

Net neutrality is vital. It ensures all internet data is treated equally and that our websites cannot be slowed down, blocked or discriminated against online. Net neutrality ensures we can never be charged more to reach internet providers’ customers or put in a “slow lane” behind Silicon Valley bigshots like YouTube or Amazon.

Net neutrality also protects our freedom online and provides a failsafe mechanism to ensure political or racial expression is never used to thwart our ability to compete online. For those of us who built businesses in an earlier day, who fought the redliners for equal space on Main Street or fair access to the channels of commerce like railroads, finance markets and advertising time, this guarantee is invaluable. (And anyone who doubts it still matters today can ask Colin Kaepernick how his job search is going.)

But in several ways, the current FCC net neutrality rules, while well intentioned, simply aren’t good enough and need to be reformed to protect our operations and communities online.

First, they are legally insecure and unstable. Two prior versions of net neutrality have already been struck down by the courts and this current set is being challenged as well, introducing uncertainty that is a threat to all businesses but especially small firms without fleets of lawyers and permanent offices in Washington D.C. And because net neutrality is such a hot button issue, every time the political winds shift, the rules can be abandoned or changed. Net neutrality protection that comes and goes on the whims of elected politicians and ideological courts isn’t good enough.

Second, while the core net neutrality protections are critical, there are technical problems with this version of the FCC rules that are deeply harmful to small businesses — and to the growth of the internet.

The problem lies not with net neutrality itself, but with the FCC’s decision to invoke an obscure legal power called “Title II” when it passed the rules. “Title II” is an obsolete legal regime designed for the monopoly voice telephone system in the 1930s — a square peg that does not fit the round hole of the modern dynamic competitive internet.

Relying on it discourages companies from investing in the internet and makes it harder to deploy new products and services to consumers. Groups like the NAACP and the Communications Workers of America warned Title II would undermine broadband deployment, putting high-paid network jobs at risk and stifling efforts to close the digital divide.

Experts warn it could drive down spending on our networks as much as $40 billion a year. Small broadband providers say it “hangs like a black cloud” over their businesses and “inhibits our ability to build and operate networks in rural America”. So we must get rid of Title II.

And finally, the rules fail the basic test of even handedness. They apply to some parts of the internet — broadband network providers — but leave the giant social media, search and website companies free to discriminate and manipulate information and data, leveraging their monopoly control over key data gateways to boost their businesses and squelch competition. With long track records ignoring the needs of diverse communities, these giants spread fake news and use secret algorithms to control what Americans see online, yet proclaim themselves champions of “online freedom” while resisting reform.

Americans deserve a permanent, stable and evenhanded net neutrality law that protects our data and fair competition online. That is something that can only be accomplished by Congress, where bipartisan support clearly exists to make net neutrality the law of the land. A law would put net neutrality beyond politics, eliminate the need to rely on legal contortions like Title II and boost fair competition and equal opportunity everywhere online.

Harry C. Alford is president and CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce.