Internet in Germany

xDSL Providers

As of December 2006, Deutsche Telekom has more than 10 million DSL customers in Germany, making Germany one of the top DSL countries in the European Union. Deutsche Telekom has a number of resellers, and many ISPs providing the service for it. Alternatively, there are DSL providers in Germany which have their own DSL network who rent the copper lines from the incumbent in a LLU arrangement.

The market is dynamic with lower prices and new technologies emerging rapidly, but a common problem is that most offers have very long contract terms of 1 or 2 years.

DSL coverage is incomplete in some rural areas.

Deutsche Telekom is building a VDSL network in summer 2006, but there is a political quarrel, (they demand exemption from the regulation, which the current German government wants to allow, but the EU does not). It is supposed to offer up to 50 Mbit/s download, 10 Mbit/s upload speeds and is intended to be used with proprietary digital TV offers, including live Bundesliga football matches.

Alternative technologies

Connection technologies other than DSL are not widely used in Germany so far, due to a lack of viable offers, but are starting to get interesting.

Cable

Until recently, cable internet was not available, because the cable TV infrastructure was owned by Deutsche Telekom, which promoted DSL and neglected the cable network. It was sold after political pressure a few years ago, and is now owned by Kabel Deutschland, Kabel BW, Unitymedia etc. (separated geographically), which slowly invest into upgrading the cable network's bandwidth/capacity and enhancing it for bidirectional capability. The available download speed is between 16 and 150 Mbit/s.

Optical Fibre

Germany has implemented in certain regions of the country FTTx Technologies and providing up to 100 Mbit/s downloads and 10 Mbit/s uploads for a flat monthly price of €29,90.

Satellite

Satellite links can be used by those who are not covered by DSL or other technologies. Companies like T-DSL Satellite and skyDSL are the market leaders. Until recently a dial-up uplink was required because only a one-way links based on DVB-S was offered. SkyDLS now offers packages including an up and downlink via satellite so that no dialup connection is required anymore

Internet via Satellite requires expensive hardware and also inherently has high latency. Thus the second choice for most people.

Mobile internet: UMTS/HSDPA

The high speed internet network in Germany is being expanded constantly. However there is no existing tariff with truly unlimited internet. Usually after a transfer of 5gb the speed is being limited to 64 kbit/s. Internet via UMTS and HSDPA is being offered by all major German cell phone network operators.

Germany has very slow, expensive, and limited mobile internet. Offerings from mobile providers throw Germany back to 2004 or 2005 by other European standards, and by the quality of service. You will find faster, cheaper and better service anywhere in Europe, but also in third world countries in any continent, excluding Sudan and North Korea. There are still plans with 300Mb monthly traffic, slow and expensive. Mobile internet is not up to Germany's standards.^{[citation needed]}

History

Until 1995, Deutsche Telekom (DTAG) was a government corporation linked with Deutsche Bundespost. As a government run and owned corporation, Deutsche Telekom was the monopoly ISP until its privatization in 1995, and the dominant ISP thereafter. Until the 21st century, Deutsche Telekom controlled almost all Internet access by individuals and small businesses.

Bildschirmtext (BTX) was one such service offered by Deutsche Telekom as an alternative to the Internet, but was discontinued by 2001.

See also

• Internet censorship in Germany