Mike Blake/Reuters
It’s not Verizon’s fault if your Netflix streaming quality sucks, says Verizon. The Internet service provider sent Netflix a cease-and-desist letter on Thursday demanding that it stop making what it says are false claims and unfair business practices. It has called Netflix’s new error message, which tells users when ISP congestion is hurting video quality (“The Verizon network is crowded right now”) “inaccurate” and “deliberately misleading.” Verizon: “The source of the problem is almost certainly NOT congestion in Verizon’s network. Instead, the problem is most likely congestion on the connection that Netflix has chosen to use to reach Verizon’s network. Of course, Netflix is solely responsible for choosing how their traffic is routed into any ISP’s network.” Netflix has deals with both Comcast and Verizon to connect directly to their networks though, as Verizon says, “It would be more accurate for Netflix’s message screen to say: ‘The path that we have chosen to reach Verzon’s network is crowded right now.’”