Internet service providers

A back-and-forth battle is brewing between Internet search giant Google and media giant Viacom. Both companies are taking aggressive legal shots against each other after Viacom filed a copyright claim against Google's YouTube service.

Google has fired back, saying Viacom illegally uploaded videos to YouTube, according to documents filed with U.S. District Court in New York.

When asked how governments ought to deal with freeloaders who illegally copy music and movies on the Internet, James Murdoch, head of News Corp.'s European and Asian operations, does not mince his words: "Punish them."

"There is no difference with going into a store and stealing Pringles or a handbag and taking this stuff," he said last week at a media conference in Abu Dhabi. "We need enforcement mechanisms and we need governments to play ball."

Repressive regimes have stepped up efforts to censor the Internet and jail dissidents, Reporters Without Borders said in a study out Thursday.

China, Iran and Tunisia, which are on the group's "Enemies of the Internet" list, got more sophisticated at censorship and overcoming dissidents' attempts to communicate online, said Reporters Without Borders' Washington director, Clothilde Le Coz.

Meanwhile, Turkey and Russia found themselves on the group's "Under Surveillance" list of nations in danger of making the main enemies list.

The Internet has long adhered to one basic principle: Nobody's in charge.

That hallmark owes to the Internet's grand design. It's basically a global confederation of unrelated computers, making it impervious to hurricanes, earthquakes and other disasters. Hackers regularly attack, but can't shut it down. Governments, try as they might, also can't control it.

That doesn't mean the Internet is meddle-proof.

The chief executive of Fox Filmed Entertainment said Monday the U.S. should join France in cutting off the Internet connection of users who repeatedly download copyright-protected films.

CEO Jim Gianopulos said Internet piracy is the single biggest threat to the film industry worldwide, and independent films are the hardest hit.

"The bad news is that the Internet is big, and it's anonymous," Gianopulos told a news conference in Athens.

Britain's business secretary, Lord Mandelson, says he will press for controversial legislation that would kick off the Internet -- at least temporarily -- persistent downloaders of copyrighted material. If the so-called three-strikes law is passed by Parliament, people who flaunt repeated warnings will see their Internet access "suspended" for short periods.

Executives from Google, Twitter, Amazon.com and several other giant technology businesses have joined to support an open Internet. Twenty-four executives signed a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski.

Republican opposition is mounting as federal regulators prepare to vote this month on so-called "network neutrality" rules, which would prohibit broadband providers from favoring or discriminating against certain types of Internet traffic flowing over their lines.

Twenty House Republicans -- including most of the Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee -- sent a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski on Monday urging him to delay the Oct. 22 vote on his net neutrality plan.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said Monday that Internet providers, including wireless, phone, cable and satellite companies, should not be allowed to block some types of content traveling over their broadband networks.

He told the Brookings Institute in Washington, D.C., that wireless carriers should be held to the "open Internet" rules by which home broadband providers are already abiding.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski is expected to outline network-neutrality proposals on Monday, according to Reuters. The proposals could become rules at the FCC's October meeting.

Neutrality advocates want Internet service providers barred from blocking or slowing Internet traffic based on content. ISPs, including AT&T, Verizon Communications, and Comcast, say growing traffic needs to be managed, and they contend that neutrality could stifle innovation.