In a resounding victory for the FCC, appeals court upholds net neutrality rules.

On Tuesday, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued a long-awaited, 115-page ruling on net neutrality, upholding the FCC’s reclassification of broadband Internet service providers as common carriers under Title II of the Communications Act. In a resounding victory for the FCC, the D.C. Circuit found that, despite the many, many legal challenges to the net neutrality rules, “none has merit.”

“The court’s decision upheld the F.C.C. on the declaration of broadband as a utility, which was the most significant aspect of the rules. That has broad-reaching implications for web and telecommunications companies that have battled for nearly a decade over the need for regulation to ensure web users get full and equal access to all content online,” writes Cecilia Kang in The New York Times. The D.C. Circuit’s ruling also bolsters other FCC initiatives: a less favorable ruling would have jeopardized the FCC’s recently proposed broadband privacy rules.

Broadband Internet service providers have pledged to appeal the ruling.