HI5015 Legal Aspects of International Trade And Enterprise - Assignment Help on Research Paper

Company Profile

Charter communications is an American multi-national enterprise providing telecommunications, networking and cable services to over 26 million customers in 41 US states. Globally it operates under the brand name of Spectrum and has presence in all of the continents. As of December 2017 it had over 94,800 employees in the US (Charter Communications Inc., 2019). In Australia it operates as a private limited company by the name of Spectrum Networks Pty Ltd. Established in 1991, it is one of the oldest and first public ISP of Australia. It’s headquarters is located in Stamford, Connecticut, U.S. The company has achieved growth through innovation in TV cable and networking technology and acquisition of cable properties and ISPs throughout the world, with the most recent acquisition being Time Warner Cable and one of its sister concerns Bright House Networks in 2016 (Thielman, 2015). It ranked no. 74 in Fortune 500 companies of 2018 in terms of largest US companies by sales revenue (Fortune, 2018).

2.0 Legislative and Regulatory Frameworks affecting Charter’s operations in Australia

To identify the legislation and regulation that may have an impact on Charter’s operations in Australia, it is essential to understand the nature of products and services it offers to consumers in Australia. 

2.1 Services offered in Australia

The services offered by Spectrum Networks include the following:

1. Business data solutions – providing high speed internet data connections to corporate customers
2. Business telephony – it offers soft phone as well as desk phone, managing corporate customers phone lines and networking 
3. Web servers – including hosted web servers and virtual private servers for business client
4. Cloud computing – Spectrum also offers connection of business network to many VM cloud service providers including Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services.
5. Custom designed IT network and infrastructure for corporate clients

Although in US Charter offers other services as well besides those mentioned above, including cable TV, home phone connections and mobile services. These are not yet introduced in the Australian operations by the company.

2.2 Legislation and regulatory frameworks applicable 

Since the company operates in telecommunication and networking industry it is required to adhere to and comply with all the regulation and corporate governance requirements as applicable in Australia. These can broadly be classified in the following categories and briefly discussed in the following paragraphs. 

1. Laws and regulation relating to internet censorship in Australia
2. Laws relating to classification of films, games and publications 
3. The Telecommunications Act 1997
4. Corporate and tax laws as applicable on private limited companies incorporated in Australia and registered with Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).

2.3 Internet censorship

Censorship in Australia is conservative with a focus on blockage of websites that primarily infringe or facilitate infringement of copyrights. In addition, websites that promote child pornography, sexual violence, hatred against a particular group and promotion of other illegal activities as definied in the Australian criminal laws are blocked access.

Blockage is both enforced as well as voluntarily adopted by ISPs in Australia. Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is the primary regulator with power to enforce websites blacklisted. ISPs have also voluntarily helped in enforcing the blacklists. For example, many ISPs including Spectrum blocked access to websites broadcasting footage of the Christchurch mosque shooting before the related bill was even passed (9news.com.au, 2019).

Being an ISP, charter would be interalia required to comply with the following Federal laws:

1. Broadcasting Services Act 1992
2. Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Bill 2015
3. Criminal Code Amendment (Sharing of Abhorrent Violent Material) Bill 2019
4. Suicide Related Materials Offences Act 2006