Share

July 26, 2021 `` Helping to govern this complex phase, characterized by a tumultuous transition to the digital world, especially in relation to the implementation of the PNRR, constitutes one of the most important challenges facing Agcom in this council. Agcom is in full harmony with the other institutions of the Republic, including in the first place the Parliament as well as, of course, within them the Government and other authorities ''. President Giacomo Lasorella said this in the annual report to Parliament.



'' The Council and I are aware of our mission: to accompany the country towards the digital transition. A slogan that is realized in the possibility of guaranteeing citizens fast communications, efficient networks, packages delivered in the right time, information and entertainment offered at fair prices and in compliance with the pluralism and values ​​of the Constitution, as well as an internet network that constitutes a place for exchanges and relationships marked by freedom and respect for rights '', concluded the president.



Internet network, a major protagonist of 2020

The internet "was the great protagonist of the year just ended: a year of pandemic in which the use of the network has expanded and intensified". Agcom president Giacomo Lasorella takes stock of infrastructures but also on the diffusion of services that slowly grow.



"Currently, the coverage of the national territory, considering the infrastructure qualitatively capable of guaranteeing performance in terms of speed of better connections, that is the optical fiber, is equal to 33.7% of Italian families, an increase compared to 30% in 2019. Looking at the current situation of the diffusion of broadband services on the Italian territory, at the end of 2020 the broadband and ultra-broadband access, residential and business, exceeded 18.1 million units, equal to a ratio of 30.4 lines per 100 inhabitants . This indicator is equal to 20.4 lines per 100 inhabitants for connections with capacities greater than 30Mbit / s (16% in 2019) and drops to 15.6 lines (11.7% last year) with regard to those with higher than 100Mbit / s ".   



The digital divide is still there but Agcom sees rapid change underway. "There are still very significant differences between the different territories of the country and, in particular, between Central North and South and, as they used to say, between city and countryside. However, the huge public and private investments currently in place and a context of growing competition in the markets for fixed network access services suggests a rapidly evolving infrastructure situation ". (+ 2.8%).   



"It is a sector in great technological evolution, with a very strong impact on the citizen and with significant effects on the economic and social framework" underlines Lasorella, resilient but he too suffered from the pandemic crisis. "It showed a decline, in terms of total resources, of 4.8%. The contraction is more marked in the mobile network (-5.9%), while the fixed network shows more contained reductions (-3.8%)" .



Lasorella: worries about the weakening of the media industry

'' In Italy the most evident (and most worrying) effect is that of the weakening of the Italian media industry, whose economic value has been declining for over a decade. This not only confirms the fragility of our cultural industry, but probably also signals an industrial policy vacuum to be filled in a sector that enjoys great prestige in the world in terms of technical knowledge and quality of content '', said the Agcom president.



Structural crisis increasingly marked press

 '' The structural crisis of the traditional press is becoming increasingly marked and shows that it has not benefited particularly from the increased demand for information due to the pandemic crisis. In the second quarter of 2020, only 17.6% of Italians chose on average to get information in the newspapers, according to a downward trend that is common to the whole European Union '', says Giacomo Lasorella.



'' In daily publishing, the Authority registered 105 publications, for a total value of 1,103,826,466 copies (-13.4% compared to 2019). Also in 2020, no publisher has exceeded the legal threshold established at 20% of the global circulation '', for this reason, according to the Agcom president, it is essential to monitor pluralism. '' In this scenario, the Authority was particularly careful to monitor pluralism. in its individual aspects. Starting from what is defined external pluralism, by monitoring the main competition indicators, there has been substantial stability over the years of concentration and market shares of leading operators in the various fields ''



The guarantee of pluralism passes through algorithms

Speaking of Artificial Intelligence, for Giacomo Lasorella president of Agcom, '' The new frontier of guaranteeing pluralism passes, in fact, to a large extent, through the transparency of algorithmic decisions (in a way compatible with respect for the relative industrial secrets), according to a a side concept of net neutrality that also extends to online information pluralism which, in fact, is mediated by large platforms that select and suggest content ''. France has expressly conferred ex lege an independent authority, the CSA, an independent authority, the CSA, in terms of algorithmic transparency. ''



Lasorella: today convergence is a reality

'' Agcom, as everyone knows, by virtue of a happy intuition of the legislator in 1997 was born as a "convergent" authority, aimed at regulating a series of sectors destined to converge, electronic communications networks, audiovisual , now more and more digital and also post offices (which, as the Amazon experience teaches us, fully belong to this evolutionary process). This convergence, then largely futuristic or at least only theoretical, is now fully reality ''. So Giacomo Lasorella.