According to experts, the massive disruption of Rogers Communications last Friday that prevented many Canadians from accessing crucial services demonstrates the need to better regulate the country’s telecommunications sector.
On Monday, Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne convened a meeting of telecoms CEOs, including Rogers ’Tony Staffieri, to talk about ways to avoid similar service outages in the future.
Champagne said he wants companies to create a plan within 60 days to mitigate the impact of future disruptions on consumers that includes providing emergency roaming.
But experts say the problems facing the industry go beyond a quick fix.
The disruption stopped basic communication and Internet access, stopped financial payments, and in some cases prevented people from making emergency calls, underscoring the essential role of Internet providers.
“The fact that we can cause a provider to download and destroy much of our Internet really, I think, raises significant questions about how we approach Internet regulation, as it is increasingly a critical capability in our lives. everyday, ”Fenwick McKelvey said. , associate professor of communications at Concordia University and expert in telecommunications policy.
On Monday, Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne convened a meeting of telecommunications CEOs, including Rogers ’Tony Staffieri. Champagne said he wants them to create a plan within 60 days to mitigate future disruptions. (Justin Tang / The Canadian Press)
Concentrated property
Five companies —Rogers, along with Bell, Shaw, Telus and Videotron— they account for 90 percent of the Canadian telecommunications market. (Rogers and Shaw are in the middle of a $ 26 billion merger proposal, but face questions from the Competition Office).
Part of the challenge in Canada is that these companies own many of the steps in the supply chain, McKelvey said.
“Rogers is both an infrastructure provider in the sense that it owns or leases the lines,” he said. “It’s the one that has exclusive access to that critical backbone and it’s the one that manages it exclusively and sells it.”
McKelvey suggests making infrastructure a public utility, something that has been done in Australia, and then opening up more competition between companies for mobile contracts and other services.
“We’re talking about something that is so fundamental to the very functioning of society,” McKelvey said. “I think what we’re missing now is an imagination about different ways of managing and running the Internet.”
Dwayne Winseck, a professor of communication at Carleton University and director of the Canadian Media Concentration Research Project, said increased competition among service providers could help reduce the cost to consumers.
But that alone would not address the infrastructure problem that caused the disruption, Winseck said. Given the high cost of setting up cables and towers, the additional competition would probably not lead to more reliable networks.
“What you would have is for competitors to buy the most lucrative markets and reduce costs on the margins,” he said. “These margins would include accepting higher levels of risk for breakdowns, and so on.
It is imperative, Winseck said, that the federal government and the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) better regulate telecommunications companies.
“We have a small number of players in what we can call a tight oligopolistic market, basically a market with very few players,” he said.
Ottawa needs to be more aggressive, the expert says
Rogers has yet to provide details on what caused the outage, blaming a network system crash after a maintenance upgrade.
Champagne said the CRTC will initiate an investigation into the disruption. In a statement issued Monday to CBC, the independent body did not confirm its plans to investigate.
After Monday’s meeting, Saffieri said he welcomed Champagne’s suggestions and added that Rogers would work with other companies to bring the plan into action.
“We are united in our commitment to ensuring strong and reliable wireless and Internet connections that meet the high standards that Canadians expect,” Saffieri said in a statement.
MIRAR | An investigation into Rogers’ disruption is needed, the consumer group says
The consumer group is asking the telecommunications control dog to investigate Rogers’ disruption
John Lawford, executive director of the Center for the Defense of the Public Interest, has called on the Canadian Telecommunications and Broadcasting Commission (CRTC) to conduct an investigation into Rogers’ national disruption and establish new rules for all telecommunications providers.
Dr. Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa and an expert in Internet regulation, said the first step should be to determine exactly what caused the disruption.
The magnitude of the impact, from crashed Interac machines to blocked 911 calls, shows that many sectors and the federal government were unprepared to deal with this situation, Geist said.
He said the government should put in place compensation and standardized rights for consumers affected by this disruption, as was done with air travel in 2019.
Geist said the next government-appointed CRTC president should focus on more rigorous oversight of the industry. The current five-year term of President Ian Scott will end this year.
“There has been frustration with the government because it has not been inclined in recent years to take a particular combative approach with telecom providers,” Geist said. “I think Canadians will seek to get the government to take a more aggressive and serious tone, recognizing the gravity of a situation where you can literally lose connectivity for millions of Canadians.”