The Digital Britain report and the Digital Economy Bill are still the cause of significant debate within the mobile broadband industry. Although some discussion focuses as to whether wireless broadband prices will fall as mobile broadband becomes more popular, it is the policy of disconnection as punishment for those who download files illegally and breach copyright legislation which has stirred up the greatest public interest.

Petitions, protests and political showdowns have surrounded the plans to cut off repeat file sharing offenders, but it seems that in practice, enforcing these measures against mobile broadband customers could be much more difficult than anticipated.

It has emerged that industry experts recognise the threat posed to home broadband users, whose online activities are easily traceable back to their own property thanks to the process by which IP addresses are assigned. However, since mobile broadband users all access the web via a single public IP address, targeting anyone individually for downloading copyrighted material would be completely impossible.

It is weaknesses and loopholes like this that have virtually destroyed public confidence in the viability of the Digital Economy Bill. It seems that wireless broadband prices are set to continue their downward trend as many more people sign up for mobile broadband and mobile data use becomes far more common for mobile phone owners as well.

Although protests currently surrounding the bill are aimed to protect the rights of households with multiple users, with the misdemeanours of a single member possibly resulting in a suspension of broadband service affecting everyone under the same roof, there is a possibility that the anonymity offered by mobile broadband could result in a file sharing exodus to the wireless platform. In the past, file sharing over mobile broadband was infeasible because of stringent data limits, but with providers such as Orange offering uncapped services between 12pm-6pm the chance of increased file sharing activity is growing.