Federal Trade Commission v. AT & T Mobility LLC

Through a practice referred to by the Federal Trade Commission as “data throttling,” AT & T Mobility LLC intentionally reduces the data speed of its customers with unlimited mobile data plans. A throttled customer receives data at a substantially reduced speed during a given billing cycle once the customer’s data usage during that billing cycle exceeds a threshold determined by AT & T. Unlimited data plan customers are throttled without regard to real-time network congestion.

The FTC filed a complaint against AT & T under section 5 of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. § 45 (a), taking issue with the adequacy of AT & T’s disclosures regarding its data throttling program. The central issue before us is whether AT & T is covered by section 5, which exempts, among others, “common carriers subject to the Acts to regulate commerce.” We conclude that AT & T is excluded from the coverage of section 5, and that the FTC’s claims cannot be maintained.

I.

AT & T offers mobile voice service and mobile data service to its customers. Mobile data service allows customers with smartphones to access the internet using AT & T’s mobile data network. Customers with mobile data service can, among…