March 6th/2023.
The draft National Development Plan 2022-2026 presented by the Colombian National Government proposes in its article 113 to modify the current powers of the Communications Regulation Commission (CRC) to broaden its scope to companies and services that offer services through the Internet. To date, the CRC is only competent with respect to providers of telecommunications networks and services in the traditional sense, such as providers of fixed telephony, mobile telephony, television, or radio broadcasting.
In this regard, article 113 of the draft National Development Plan seeks to amend Article 22 of Law 1341 of 2009 (general framework for the ICT sector) to allow the CRC to demand and collect “comprehensive, accurate, truthful and timely information” regarding the operation of providers that offer services through the Internet, accessible from the Colombian territory, such as, video on demand, exchange of user-generated videos provided through platforms, and interpersonal, direct and interactive voice, video or online messaging services.
Failure to deliver information that is specifically required by the CRC, or when the delivery is not made under the required conditions, may cause against service providers, a penalty of 250 legal monthly minimum wages for each day in which they incur in this conduct.
If approved, the new regulation will explicitly expand the scope of the powers assigned to telecommunications authorities to include and sanction companies and services that are not covered today, which will have the effect of increasing the regulatory risks of those companies that offer video on demand services, exchange of user-generated videos provided through platforms, and interpersonal, direct and interactive voice, video or online messaging services, which were not part of the initial powers or faculties of the CRC.
The project does not develop in detail the scope of the functions that would be granted to the CRC in terms of the information that may be required, the limits that such powers will have, or if it will also cover companies that offer services whose essence is not online messaging but that include it as one of the accessory functionalities (calls or customer service chatbots embedded in an application), thus we recommend to be observant to its progress.
On behalf of Gómez Pinzón Abogados, we will be permanently monitoring the evolution of the project and in general the evolution of the National Development Plan, and please do not hesitate to contact us with any concerns that may arise.