Should Net Neutrality be undermined during natural disasters to free up bandwidth and increase access to more "essential" services? Net Neutrality regulations around the world frequently have exemptions for emergency situations. This is the case even in India, which has arguably the strongest Net Neutrality regulations in the world; regulations make an exception for emergency circumstances, but don't elaborate on what can be done in such situations, such as pandemics. Indian telcos asked the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India earlier this year to allow them to offer some websites for free during the first few days of the pandemic. Panelists at the United Nations-backed Internet Governance Forum discussed the ways Net Neutrality principles played out during the pandemic, and how these principles should be interpreted in times of crisis. How Europe grappled with Net Neutrality during COVID "Network neutrality rules are designed for such exceptional circumstances," Frode Sorensen, senior adviser for internet governance at the Norwegian Communications Authority said. "Resilience of Internet technology does a good job and ISPs may also use exceptional traffic management measures when needed. At the same time, end users’ rights are safeguarded" by the European Union's net neutrality regulations, he added. "The European Internet infrastructure has coped well despite the increased load in Internet traffic." "Indeed, major content and service provider challenges' impact on the networks warrants attention," Aurore Tual, chief of the French telecoms regulator Arcep's open internet unit, said. "Networks in France did not experience issues during the COVID-19 lockdown that lasted from…
