Cablevision Slaps Verizon With WiFi Suit
The wild WiFi claims and counters will only escalate as people park more devices on wifi and as carriers offload as much as possible from LTE to wifi.
In a clear sign of just how important and competitive a service WiFi has become for broadband providers, Cablevision is taking Verizon to court over the telco’s ads that claim Verizon offers the fastest WiFi around.
Just three days after introducing its new Freewheel WiFi-only phone service, Cablevision Systems Corp. (NYSE: CVC) lodged the suit in federal court for the Eastern District of New York Thursday afternoon. In the suit, Cablevision charges that Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) has been running ads that make “false” and “deceptive” claims “designed to mislead consumers” into believing that the telco offers the speediest WiFi service of any provider. (See Cablevision’s New WiFi Try - Freewheeling Enough?)
Those ads, designed to promote Verizon’s new FiOS Quantum Gateway, boast that FiOS can now deliver “the fastest WiFi available from any provider, period.” Verizon says the new gateway, introduced with great fanfare in November, offers home networking speeds as high as 800 Mbit/s.