NEW DELHI: India’s telecoms regulator has ordered mobile operator Reliance Communications to stop offering Facebook’s “Free Basics” service to its customers, due to concerns over net neutrality.
Free Basics is a suite of basic internet tools including news, travel, job listings and health services, offered to people in a number of countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America through partnership with operators that remove data charges.
Reliance is Facebook’s first partner in India, but the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India has now blocked its launch. “We have asked them to stop it and they have given us a compliance report that it has been stopped,” a government source told the media.
