This morning FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski announced the winners of the agency’s latest contest on Challenge.gov, a competition for scientists and software developers to engage in innovative research and create useful apps that further the understanding of Internet connectivity and network science. A video of the Chairman’s remarks and the award presentation are available here: www.fcc.gov/live.

The three winning teams were recognized at a ceremony with remarks by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski at FCC headquarters in Washington, D.C.  The winning teams also presented their apps and research to the Commission.

The three winning teams are University of Michigan & Microsoft Research; School of Computer Science, Georgia Institute of Technology; and The ICSI (International Computer Science Institute) Netalyzr Project. Descriptions of the winning entries are detailed below.

The Open Internet Challenge sought to encourage the development of innovative and functional applications that provide users with information about the extent to which their fixed or mobile broadband Internet services are consistent with the open Internet.  The research component of the challenge sought academic papers that analyze relevant Internet openness measurements, techniques, and data.  The challenge was designed to encourage and reward the creation innovative and useful research.

The challenge is posted on Challenge.gov, a new website and digital platform where entrepreneurs, innovators, and citizen solvers can compete for prizes by providing novel solutions to problems large and small.  Details of the challenge are posted at openinternet.gov/challenge. You can view other FCC challenges at www.fcc.gov/challenge.

Thank you to our judges:

And congratulations to our winners:

MobiPerf, Mobile Network Measurement System

MobiPerf (official website http://mobiperf.com) is a lightweight and accurate mobile network measurement tool designed to collect anonymous network measurement information directly from mobile end users. It runs on Android, iOS, and Windows Mobile devices and completes within 2-3 minutes. Users are able to obtain a rich set of basic network information (e.g., the device’s IP address as seen by the server and the network type such as HSDPA), network performance information (e.g., downlink/uplink throughput), as well as a set of more advanced network properties including network policies (e.g., cellular ISPs’ port blocking and NAT policies).?  MobiPerf helps identify the bottleneck network behavior for resource constrained mobile platforms as well as expose both the performance and energy impact of mobile network policies on end users.

Open Internet Research Award

The research proposes methods that enable Internet users to detect two aspects of openness. First, an active probing method called “Differential Probing” or DiffProbe, to detect whether an access ISP is deploying delay or loss discrimination against some of its customer flows. The basic idea behind DiffProbe is to compare the delays and packet losses experienced by two flows: an application flow of interest and a probing flow. The paper describes the statistical methods that DiffProbe uses, a novel method to identify scheduling, evaluation experiments, and a few real-world tests at major access ISPs. Second, the work presents methods for active and passive detection of traffic shaping in ISPs. The active tool, ShaperProbe, enables users to detect whether their ISP is shaping traffic, and to estimate the extent of shaping. ShaperProbe is hosted as a free, open source, service on M-Lab.  The paper presents traffic shaping data from users of the tool since 2009 (from about one million runs), and showcases studies of four large ISPs. The passive tool detects and estimates application-specific traffic shaping by looking at an ongoing TCP connection on the user’s machine.

Netalyzr: Illuminating The Edge Network

This paper presents Netalyzr, a network measurement and debugging service that evaluates the functionality provided by people’s Internet connectivity. The design aims to prove both comprehensive in terms of the properties it measures and easy to employ and understand for users with little technical background. Netalyzr is structured as a signed Java applet (which users access via their Web browser) that communicates with a suite of measurement-specific servers. Traffic between the two then probes for a diverse set of network properties, including outbound port filtering, hidden in-network HTTP caches, DNS manipulations, NAT behavior, path MTU issues, IPv6 support, and access-modem buffer capacity. In addition to reporting results to the user, Netalyzr also forms the foundation for an extensive measurement of edge-network properties. To this end, along with describing Netalyzr’s architecture and system implementation, it presents a detailed study of 130,000 measurement sessions that the service has recorded between June 2009 and September 2010.

University of Michigan & Microsoft Research team

The ICSI Netalyzr Project team

Georgia Institute of Technology team

The rules that govern when and how parties may challenge FCC orders are clear, and Verizon and MetroPCS filed too early when they challenged the Open Internet order.

Today, the FCC filed several motions with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit asking that court to dismiss both companies’ challenges as premature.

For easy public access, we have posted the motions below:

Motion of the FCC to Dismiss
Verizon v. FCC, No. 11-1014 (D.C. Cir.)

Motion of the FCC to Dismiss and to Defer Filing of the Record
MetroPCS Communications, Inc., et al. v. FCC, No. 11-1016 (D.C. Cir.)

Motion of the FCC to Defer Consideration of Verizon’s Motion for Panel Assignment and to Defer Filing of the Record
Verizon v. FCC, No. 11-1014

Almost everyone seems to agree that the openness of the Internet is essential — it has unleashed an enormous wave of innovation, economic growth, job creation, small business generation, and vibrant free expression.

But for too long, the freedom and openness of the Internet has been unprotected.

No rules on the books to protect basic Internet values.  No process for monitoring Internet openness as technology and business models evolve.  No recourse for innovators, consumers, or speakers harmed by improper practices. And no predictability for Internet service providers, so that they can effectively manage and invest in broadband networks.

Earlier today, that all changed.

As a result of a vote, which was just taken by the FCC, we have — for the first time — enforceable rules of the road to preserve Internet freedom and openness.

The rules we have adopted are straightforward, and they enshrine a set of key principles.

First, consumers and innovators have a right to know the basic performance characteristics of their Internet access and how their network is being managed.  We have adopted a transparency rule that will give consumers and innovators the clear and simple information they need to make informed choices in choosing networks or designing the next killer app.

Second, consumers and innovators have a right to send and receive lawful traffic — to go where they want, say what they want, experiment with ideas — commercial and social, and use the devices of their choice.  Our new rules thus prohibit the blocking of lawful content, apps, services, and the connection of devices to the network.

Third, consumers and innovators have a right to a level playing field.  No central authority, public or private, should have the power to pick winners and losers on the Internet; that’s the role of the commercial market and the marketplace of ideas.

That is why we adopted a ban on unreasonable discrimination.  And we are making clear that so-called “pay for priority” arrangements involving fast lanes for some companies but not others are unlikely to be allowed.

The rules also recognize that broadband providers need meaningful flexibility to manage their networks to deal with congestion, security, and other issues.  And we recognize the importance and value of business-model experimentation, such as tiered pricing.

These rules fulfill many promises, including a promise to the future – a promise to the companies that don’t yet exist, and the entrepreneurs who haven’t yet started work in their dorm rooms or garages.

Today, the FCC did the right thing for the future of Internet freedom, and I look forward to building on today’s roles as the FCC continues its work to promote innovation, investment, and job creation, and to improve the lives of the American people through communications technology.

Guest Post by Kevin Werbach

It has been a busy week in U.S. communications policy, with an FCC meeting adopting important spectrum policy reforms, an FCC complaint about Comcast’s approval policies for cable modems, and a dispute between Comcast and Level 3 over fees for Internet backbone traffic.  And late last night, it got even more interesting.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski reportedly circulated a draft Open Internet order, to be considered at the FCC’s December 21 meeting.  According to a statement given to reporters, the order builds on the compromise terms from Congressional negotiations led by Representative Henry Waxman this fall.  What does that mean?  I’m confident of two things: Hardly anyone will like the proposal; and it’s the right thing to do.

Advocates of network neutrality will be disappointed the FCC isn’t going forward with “reclassification” of broadband access as a regulated telecommunications service, while many Republicans and network operators will complain about a “power grab” to “regulate the Internet” even after Democratic losses in the midterm elections.  Both should  put aside their ideologies and look realistically at the situation.  Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

If you believe in the need to protect the open Internet, this is the realistic way forward, and it could lay the groundwork for other steps if necessary in the future.  If you see network neutrality as a dangerous drag on Internet investment, this is the realistic way to remove that regulatory overhang. Kill this proposal, and it’s hard to envision anything but years of further uncertainty, most likely ending with a worse compromise down the road. I don’t love it either, but I’m a realist.  The fate of network neutrality will hinge not on the FCC’s rhetoric, but on its implementation.  There can’t be implementation without an order.  And I can’t see any other order making it through in the current environment.

It’s important to understand how we got here.

It seems like the network neutrality fight has been going on forever.  When I entered academia in 2004, I thought the issues were pretty well developed.  Concerns about closed, discriminatory broadband networks, which I and others started writing about five years earlier, were widely recognized. The outcome also seemed pretty clear.  Even FCC Chairman Michael Powell, a Republican who favored deregulation of broadband access networks, acknowledged the importance of an open Internet.  He gave a speech setting forth four “Internet freedoms” which should be protected to ensure innovation and consumer choice.  A year later, the FCC memorialized those principles in a policy statement, and the Supreme Court ratified the FCC’s deregulatory classification of broadband on the theory that it retained the power to act when it found the justification.  The only question was how the FCC would actually move forward when issues arose.

Fast forward through five years of loud, contentious fights.  We’re pretty much still in the same place.  The FCC’s one attempt to take more specific action, its 2008 order against Comcast’s network management practices, was overturned in court earlier this year.  This uncertainty benefits no one.  It hurts those in favor of network neutrality the most, because companies are moving forward with infrastructure investments and business strategies that become difficult to unwind after the fact.  We’ve already seen exclusive content deals like ESPN3 and TV Anywhere take hold.  There are reports of application blocking and other restrictions on wireless networks.  And now, Comcast and Level 3 opening up a can of worms in the backbone market.  The FCC might find these practices legitimate, but until it’s operating under a defined legal and procedural framework, it can’t even make that assessment.

The network neutrality battle is frequently posed as a binary choice: inaction or reclassification.  In fact, neither is realistic.  Concerns about the open Internet won’t go away if the FCC does nothing now.  Comcast’s clumsy 2008 response to peer-to-peer file-sharing traffic won’t be the last time a network operator provokes popular and Congressional ire.  And broadband will only become more important and economically significant.  In other words, network neutrality rules will be on the FCC docket indefinitely, until the agency takes a concrete step forward.  Again, I say this with the perspective of someone who has watched this issue now for a dozen years.

On the other side, whatever the merits of the reclassification path, it’s not going to happen.  There may have been a window of opportunity earlier this year, but it closed.  A majority of the members of the House of Representatives signed on to a letter opposing the idea, and one could scarcely create a better issue to draw the united fire of grassroots Tea Party activists, the most powerful bipartisan corporate lobbying interests, and Republicans eager to take down the Obama Administration.  I could imagine an FCC Chairman risking everything to push reclassification at any cost, but I can’t say I’d recommend that to Chairman Genachowski now.  Especially when there’s an alternative that achieves the same objectives.

Keep in mind that reclassification itself doesn’t make Net neutrality happen, even if the FCC order survives the court challenge. It gives the agency legal authority and a set of precedents, but applying those precedents to contemporary broadband practices will still be a painstaking process. Everyone knows the 1996 Telecommunications Act is outdated in this converged digital era.  Anything the FCC does is a necessary stopgap until Congress replaces it, a process likely to take several years.  The open Internet is the principle worth fighting for, not a particular legal theory.

While there is no guarantee of success under the approach Chairman Genachowski has chosen either, there is a good legal basis to support it.  The Supreme Court in the 2005 Brand X case expressly stated that Title I “ancillary authority” gave the FCC some authority to adopt broadband rules.  And the court that overturned the FCC’s Comcast order actually provided a roadmap for a successful do-over, by emphasizing what the Commission failed to argue then.  This new approach would parallel what I proposed in a law review article, Off the Hook, published at the beginning of this year. The FCC picked the wrong statutory provision in Comcast, and its sloppiness in the proceeding under prior Chairman Kevin Martin undermined its legal case.  The current Chairman won’t make those mistakes.

It’s not the most satisfying solution, but it’s the best option today.

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Disclosure: I co-led the FCC review for the Obama Administration’s Transition Team in 2008, and advised the FCC and National Telecommunications & Information Administration in 2009.  My FCC consulting engagement ended before Chairman Genachowski developed the current proposal, and these are entirely my personal views.

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Cross-posted from Werblog.com