제로레이팅과 수직적 경쟁 제한: 국내 이동통신사의 자사 온라인 동영상 서비스와 디지털 음악 서비스에 대한 차별적 데이터 제공을 중심으로

This study focuses on the possibility that a mobile internet service provider’s zero-rating program on a specific content service can give economic benefit to users while limiting market competition and distorting a user’s choice. The result show that domestic mobile ISPs are showing stronger tendency of exclusive zero-rating for their services. Even when zero-rating was offered in partnership with competitive music services, zero-rating of mobile ISP has competitive edge by applying more favorable charging conditions to their own services. In addition, the competitive inhibition of the zero-rating depends on the structure of the CP market. Anti-competitive effects of the exclusive zero-rating appears to be limited in the effective competition structure of online video market in which there are alternative differentiated services. On the other hand, in the case of digital music services, the zero-rating of a particular service is likely to have a strong impact on small and medium-sized CPs, as it is the oligopolistic market structure dominated by top three providers. In order to clearly judge the anti-competitive effects and the restriction of the user’s choice of the zero-rating, information on the transaction conditions between ISP and CPs should be opened transparently.