Microsoft, Google, and a few other major companies are joining forces to fight new regulations proposed by hoteliers that would ban personal Wi-Ficreated by hotel guests.
It all started this summer, when the American Hospitality & Lodging Association and Marriott International asked the FCC to create new regulations that would allow hotels to block personal Wi-Fi networks using special equipment, but only the business's wireless connections would be available.
The American Hospitality & Lodging Association explained that this is legal for hotels to use, that is, equipment that “may cause ‘INTERFERENCE’ with a wireless device used by a guest on the business’s property” and thus make it possible to “provide secure and reliable Wi-Fi services for guests.”
But Microsoft, Google, and several other companies have formed a group called CTIA, which claims that all devices, whether phones, laptops, or tablets, have “equal rights to use the Internet spectrum, without requiring special permission, and no one can prohibit connections.” They also argue that hotels should not be allowed to reserve personal hotspots.
Marriott is one of the hotels that was embroiled in a legal dispute over its bans on guests creating personal Wi-Fi hotspots, but the company settled the case for $600,000 (€492,000).
The hotel blocked guests from turning their smartphones into personal hotspots in the convention center at Opryland, but the company claimed that this did not violate any law because the sole intent was to provide more secure connections for guests.
The problem, however, was that Marriott tried to prevent customers from creating their own hotspots, but charged guests up to $1,000 (€730) for access to the hotel's network.
