Sky_2000
04-05-2011, 01:12 PM
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/technology/Internet+services+marked+study+says/4547037/story.html
Last June, Bell customer Wanda Rooney was billed $47,000 for one week's worth of Internet service because she used her cellular phone as a modem. Hackers broke into Amber Hunter's Videotron account and she was charged more than $1,000 for months of exceeding her monthly Internet cap.
While those cases are exceptional, Canadians in general have been complaining about the high cost of Internet services for years.
A report published at the end of March by Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa who specializes in Internet and e-commerce, shows Internet services are marked up a staggering 6,000 per cent and rising.
It costs ISPs only about a penny to deliver a gigabyte of data over a high-speed Internet line, and it costs another seven cents a month to provide and maintain the physical infrastructure on a DSL telephone line for a residential customer, according to Geist's calculations. Since neither Bell nor Videotron has ever made such numbers public, Geist said the cost of about eight cents roughly includes what it costs to build and maintain the network, but may not include all costs.
While telecommunications companies claim high traffic on their networks costs them money, experts disagree.
"The expensive portion is the wires, and the equipment that drives the wires," said Adrian Byram, the chief technology officer of ISP Radiant Communications, which pays to use the infrastructure of the large ISPs. "They're charging an enormous amount of money (for data), and everybody who knows anything in the industry knows that's completely made up."
A recent report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development showed Canadians pay among the highest prices for highspeed Internet in the world at $11.85 per megabit per second, behind only Sweden, Luxembourg, Turkey, Poland and Mexico. In Britain, which has the second-lowest rates in the OECD survey, telecom company O2 advertises on its website a charge of $21.06 Cdn, for Internet service of up to 20 megabits per second with a limit of 20 gigabytes of data per month. Bell charges $62.95 for a 16-megabit-per-section speed, and Videotron's 15-megabit service costs $65.95 a month.
Isabelle Dessureault, vice-president of corporate affairs for Videotron, said Canada's vast territory and lack of large urban centres results in a higher cost to install infrastructure here. She said Videotron must constantly re-invest profits to bolster the network.
Agustin Diaz-Pines, an OECD telecommunication economist and policy analyst, said he believes the main reason for high prices is the lack of competition in Canada.
Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/Internet+services+marked+study+says/4547037/story.html#ixzz1IgZIbJCo
Last June, Bell customer Wanda Rooney was billed $47,000 for one week's worth of Internet service because she used her cellular phone as a modem. Hackers broke into Amber Hunter's Videotron account and she was charged more than $1,000 for months of exceeding her monthly Internet cap.
While those cases are exceptional, Canadians in general have been complaining about the high cost of Internet services for years.
A report published at the end of March by Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa who specializes in Internet and e-commerce, shows Internet services are marked up a staggering 6,000 per cent and rising.
It costs ISPs only about a penny to deliver a gigabyte of data over a high-speed Internet line, and it costs another seven cents a month to provide and maintain the physical infrastructure on a DSL telephone line for a residential customer, according to Geist's calculations. Since neither Bell nor Videotron has ever made such numbers public, Geist said the cost of about eight cents roughly includes what it costs to build and maintain the network, but may not include all costs.
While telecommunications companies claim high traffic on their networks costs them money, experts disagree.
"The expensive portion is the wires, and the equipment that drives the wires," said Adrian Byram, the chief technology officer of ISP Radiant Communications, which pays to use the infrastructure of the large ISPs. "They're charging an enormous amount of money (for data), and everybody who knows anything in the industry knows that's completely made up."
A recent report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development showed Canadians pay among the highest prices for highspeed Internet in the world at $11.85 per megabit per second, behind only Sweden, Luxembourg, Turkey, Poland and Mexico. In Britain, which has the second-lowest rates in the OECD survey, telecom company O2 advertises on its website a charge of $21.06 Cdn, for Internet service of up to 20 megabits per second with a limit of 20 gigabytes of data per month. Bell charges $62.95 for a 16-megabit-per-section speed, and Videotron's 15-megabit service costs $65.95 a month.
Isabelle Dessureault, vice-president of corporate affairs for Videotron, said Canada's vast territory and lack of large urban centres results in a higher cost to install infrastructure here. She said Videotron must constantly re-invest profits to bolster the network.
Agustin Diaz-Pines, an OECD telecommunication economist and policy analyst, said he believes the main reason for high prices is the lack of competition in Canada.
Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/Internet+services+marked+study+says/4547037/story.html#ixzz1IgZIbJCo