The chairman of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) is considering the possible supervision of over-the-top (OTT) platforms in Thailand.
Although major foreign OTT platform providers have already established their operations offices in Thailand and comply with the value-added tax (VAT) payment rules, the regulator is mulling whether these platform operators should pay additional fees to benefit the country's economy.
Supervision of OTT players would create a level playing field and ensure equal treatment in the telecom industry, said NBTC.
NBTC chairman Dr Sarana Boonbaichaiyapruck said the regulator may consider studying a regulatory framework for OTT players' utilisation of local telecom operators' networks, especially mobile phone operators.
However, the framework to govern OTT platforms will have to be carefully implemented and requires fruitful discussion and the active participation of relevant stakeholders, including the government, the regulator, network providers, OTT service providers and consumers, he added.
"It's too early to elaborate exactly when and how it would be implemented," Dr Sarana said.
The OTT business, involving the streaming of content over the internet, has raised challenges and concerns for years about how they are responsible for their content, how to set a proper policy measure to govern them and how they can be leveraged to make contributions in terms of fee collection. Popular OTT platforms in Thailand include YouTube, Facebook, TikTok and Line.
Dr Sarana said content on OTT platforms is regulated by the Computer Crime Act, under the Digital Economy and Society Ministry.
He said Thai consumers' heavy use of digital platforms helps drive the continuity of digital platform development.
Dr Sarana said the NBTC has to balance the roles of governing and promoting the industry to benefit the local economy.
Previously, the NBTC management floated an idea to supervise the new telecom market segments through the Net Neutrality policy, which is a global standard measure that aimed to supervise all the market players on the basis of fairness and competitive promotion.
The players in the new market segments include digital platforms, OTT services, low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite communications, and upcoming innovations driven by next-generation networks such 5.5G and 6G.
The move to supervise these new markets is also part of the strategy for supervising telecom business, studied by Phoomsisth Mahavessiri, deputy secretary-general of NBTC. The study was proposed to the NBTC's subcommittee for governing OTT business.
Mr Phoomsisth said the telecom landscape has been continuously changing as traditional telecom markets are being phased out and replaced by data-providing applications. The telecom players that provide high-speed internet are also facing competition from small satellites' broadband internet service providers that are multinational corporations.
All challenges cause telecommunication operators to face crises in terms of structural development and free riding on their infrastructure operated by those foreign OTT foreign platforms, despite the local telecom players having spent heavily on network installation as well as regulatory fees.
Mr Phoomsisth said the existing definition of telecom players and significant market power has to be adjusted to be in line with the updated situation.
According to his study, the NBTC should adopt a plan comprising four categories: frequency management strategy, economic regulatory strategy, telecom innovation promotion, and a strategy for comprehensive access to a variety of telecom services.
"Digital platforms, Internet of Things, LEO, and 6G raise challenges on how to strike a balance between a regulatory scheme for all players with fairness, and a supportive ecosystem for innovation development," Mr Phoomsisth added.
In a related matter, Dr Sarana said his advisory team is studying what it called "universal service access", or USA, which would be used to let people access some websites and applications that can serve the basic needs of daily life without the need to pay a usage fee. The move would be designed to provide everyone with fair access to those websites and apps.
However, Dr Sarana said the implementation of USA needed to be discussed with telecom licensees as their licences do not require them to provide this access.