The Federal Communications Commission’s investigation on Comcast’s Internet practices revealed that in fact, the company used an equipment that affected a large part of the Internet subscribers, even when the network was not congested.

Despite the company’s claims that they had only interfered with peer-to-peer transfers in order to stop some users from harming other users’ experience by overwhelming the network, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said in his testimony before a Senate Committee:

“Based on the testimony we have received thus far, this equipment is typically deployed over a wider geographic or system area and would therefore have impacted numerous nodes within a system simultaneously.”

Considering that the equipment used by Comcast doesn’t have the ability to know when an individual segment is congested, “it appears that this equipment blocks the uploads of at least a large portion of subscribers in that part of the network, regardless of the actual levels of congestion at that particular time,” Chairman Martin said.

At the same time, FCC Chairman said it still remains unclear whether Comcast will stop its practices by the end of the year or will simply start that migration.

The Commission’s investigation hasn’t reached its end yet, as they still “need to obtain greater information to more fully understand what is happening and what impact operators’ actions are having so that we may better evaluate the reasonableness of any network management practices at issue,” Martin continued.

In a world where the Internet has become a part of our everyday lives and has had a significant influence on the economy over the past years, policymakers should maintain “an engine of productivity and innovation” to benefit all Americans, which means users should be protected from unfair network management.

Last October, the AP conducted a test that revealed an interference with the BitTorrent traffic from Comcast, which greatly affected users’ Internet experience, which led to the question: do Internet service providers have the right to use such practices, which are considered discriminatory?

Although a common practice among ISPs, consumers are often unaware about potential limitations when they purchase an Internet service. In last week’s hearing at Stanford University, Commissioner Michael J. Copps said in his statement: “Now is the time for the FCC to add enforceable principle of non-discrimination to our Internet Policy Statement,” highlighting that unreasonable discrimination should not be tolerated.