In Hungary, the government of Victor Orban wants to impose world's first traffic-based tax of 150 HUF (0.62 USD) per gigabyte of internet traffic.
According to economy minister Mihaly Varga, this has been neccessary to "plug holes in the 2015 budget", and to compensate for the people's move of communication habits from 2 cents per min taxed POTS to the untaxed internet. This tax has not just raised criticism by telecom providers, but also resulted in heavy revolts, even though the government later announced to cap the tax at 700 HUF for consumers and 5000 HUF for businesses, and let the telecom providers pay the remaining part.
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El Reg reports:
Following mass protests across the country over the past week, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban announced on Friday that he would scrap a planned internet tax.
The idea of taxing internet service providers for every gigabyte of data flowing across their networks was condemned by everyone from telcos and Hungary's opposition party to Steelie Neelie of the European Commission. A Facebook group opposing the tax garnered more than 200,000 members and tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets last Sunday and again on Tuesday night.
In the face of such opposition, Orban said on a radio show early Friday morning that he would drop the tax for now and instead hold a nationwide public consultation on internet regulation at the beginning of next year.
... it seems Hungarians have developed a taste for street marching: there have been calls on social media for another mass gathering at 5pm tonight in Budapest to celebrate the government's decision.
Reports say that the headquarters of the ruling party had been surrounded and pelted with objects that did some damage.
Some said those were stones; some said they were old computer kit and surplus cellphones.
El Reg reports
Following mass protests across the country over the past week, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban announced on Friday that he would scrap a planned internet tax.
The idea of taxing internet service providers for every gigabyte of data flowing across their networks was condemned by everyone from telcos and Hungary's opposition party to Steelie Neelie of the European Commission. A Facebook group opposing the tax garnered more than 200,000 members and tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets last Sunday and again on Tuesday night.
In the face of such opposition, Orban said on a radio show early Friday morning that he would drop the tax for now and instead hold a nationwide public consultation on internet regulation at the beginning of next year.
[...]it seems Hungarians have developed a taste for street marching: there have been calls on social media for another mass gathering at 5pm tonight in Budapest to celebrate the government's decision.
Reports say that the headquarters of the ruling party had been surrounded and pelted with objects that did some damage. Some said those were stones; some said they were old computer kit and surplus cellphones.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by physicsmajor on Tuesday October 28 2014, @01:33AM
So let me get this straight. They are demanding the full amount, but to placate the idiot masses they say they'll cap the amount from consumers?
To everyone in Hungary: this means you are still paying the full amount. It's in your bill, it's just not a line item. The telecoms don't get to magically waive money out of thin air; they'll raise your rates immediately sufficient to amortize this "tax" across their consumers (that's you) and pass this directly on.
If you were outraged to begin with, you should still be up in arms.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by RamiK on Tuesday October 28 2014, @06:51AM
It might be the dumbest tax ever, but at least it shows the Hungarian telecom firms refused to pay bribe the politicians to the point the government resorted to such a crude shakedown attempt.
When was the last time an entire US sector was taxed so severely?
compiling...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @10:57AM
Correction: The telecoms will raise their prices to accommodate that tax plus the additional administrative cost the tax causes them. In other words, you'll pay even more.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Tuesday October 28 2014, @01:34AM
I use about 200 gb per month -- that would be $124 -- 2.5x what I pay for access.
In ______ Hungary, Internet bankrupts you.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @02:34AM
Yes, its way too high. Its over 12x what Amazon charges for high volume (And thats only outbound, inbound is free): if they were to have datacenters in Hungary, their prices would have to go up by at least a factor of 13 just to cover the tax burden their ISP will be forwarding to them. Their Tokyo region already has some VAT tax, but what Hungary is proposing is big enough they simply won't offer services located there if it happens.
Making your country basically uncompetitive for a whole class of businesses is stupid. No one would run any web hosting or crawling there.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Tuesday October 28 2014, @04:41AM
It remains to see if this decision comes around to bite and chew a painful bite out of the government. Ie a sufficiently strong negative feedback loop.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by DrMag on Tuesday October 28 2014, @01:56AM
A friend of mine teaches high school history. When discussing the reasons for the American Revolution, a student asked why the tea tax was such a big deal. After thinking for a moment, she replied, "Imagine if every time you accessed the internet you'd have to pay ten cents."
The resulting silence from the statement was finally broken by a young girl in the back. "... I think I'd murder somebody!"
(Score: 4, Insightful) by meisterister on Tuesday October 28 2014, @01:56AM
To all of our friends in Hungary, I would like to wish you warm welcome to the United States' "Let's be technologically backwards for political reasons" club. Please be sure to pick up your complimentary lack of regulation and for a very special discount, massive internet monopolies.
(May or may not have been) Posted from my K6-2, Athlon XP, or Pentium I/II/III.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday October 28 2014, @03:05AM
Please be sure to pick up your complimentary lack of regulation
A 60 cent per GB tax is "lack of regulation"? If it were true "lack of regulation", then there wouldn't be any such tax.
(Score: 2) by meisterister on Tuesday October 28 2014, @04:13AM
The general idea was as a satire of what we're doing, and that they should be careful not to do the same thing.
(May or may not have been) Posted from my K6-2, Athlon XP, or Pentium I/II/III.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday October 28 2014, @03:51PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @03:53AM
s/t
(Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Tuesday October 28 2014, @04:36PM
No, maybe they shouldn't have. But this isn't even fascism, it's just plain stupidity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @05:01PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @08:29AM
Imagine an internet without advertisements. wasting your precious expensive bandwidth.
such a thing existed once. and with your goverments greed we can have it back!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @11:00AM
Good point. As long as ads are only annoying, many people put up with it. But if you feel the effect of advertising (and more importantly, the effect of blocking it) right in your pocket, you'll be very motivated to block it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @12:44PM
So if it passes and there's someone in Hungary you don't like, you can get them DDoSed into bankruptcy?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 28 2014, @01:32PM
Distributed Denial of Solvency?