Interior minister on Telia offer: This kind of behavior unacceptable

At the government press conference Thursday, Minister of the Interior Lauri Läänemets (SDE) criticized the approach of ISP Telia in forcing new and more expensive internet packages on people and said that telecoms should be called to order in Estonia.
A campaign run by ISP Telia, which automatically upgrades customers to faster and more expensive packages, with manually opting out the only alternative, violates consumer rights, according to the Consumer Protection and Technical Regulatory Authority (TTJA). The agency has opened an investigation but Telia believes the offer is innovative and straightforward.
Interior Minister Lauri Läänemets described such an approach by a semi-monopolistic company as "unsatisfactory" and in need of intervention from the TTJA.
"We need to find ways of calling these companies to order, because we are talking about fair competition and enterprise, as well as the fact that Estonians are not a bunch of peasants forced to pay arbitrary levies to foreign companies. I do not see honest competition here," Läänemets slammed.
"The TTJA should also review Telia's de facto semi-monopolistic position where they own a lot more of the distribution network than other ISPs. We see this aspect as problematic," the interior minister said, adding that it's possible these networks need to be separated from Telia.
Läänemets said that the government plans to take a closer look at service providers and their efforts to ensure continuous operation.
"This includes in terms of whether cell towers work in the case of extensive blackouts. Based on what we know, not all towers will remain operational as only some have backup battery power. But talking about [outages of] 24 or 36 hours, we see a peculiar situation where profits are in the tens of millions, while crucial investments to prepare for crisis situations have not been made," the minister noted.
Digital affairs minister: Vague statements amount to scoring political brownie points
The interior minister's criticism drew the ire of Minister of Justice and Digital Affairs Liisa Pakosta (Eesti 200) who urged Läänemets to stick to the facts.
Pakosta said that Estonia decided back in the 1990s that its communications networks would not be state-owned, unlike in Latvia and Lithuania, that privatizing a company's property is not that simple in the conditions of the rule of law and that the government would be hard-pressed to find the money to do so.
"I believe we should be thankful for the cooperation we have with private companies. If there's anything that requires additional regulation, I'm willing to discuss it, but I would expect relevant proposals in other forms than during government press conferences. I also did not hear a single concrete proposal," Pakosta said.
Läänemets then clarified by saying that he and Pakosta were talking about different things, but it remains a fact that Estonia's decision to sell Eesti Telefon and its networks to Telia has created a situation where fees are so high, especially in rural areas, that local operators are forced to build their own networks, which consumers end up paying for.
"My proposal was not for Estonia to buy or nationalize something. I merely said the situation should be revised. Separating networks and services is an entirely common market phenomenon /.../," he said.
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Editor: Aleksander Krjukov, Marcus Turovski