On Feb. 4, 2026, the president of the Antwerp Enterprise Court ruled in a case between Proximus and Telenet. The key question: may a telecom operator use the terms \u2018fiber\u2019 or \u2018fiberglass\u2019 in advertising if the connection to the customer's home is (partly) via a coaxial cable? The court's answer is clear: no, unless very strict conditions are met. The unsubtle use of \u2018fiber\u2019 for a hybrid network is a misleading trade practice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The dispute is between two telecom giants with different infrastructures. The plaintiff, Proximus, is rolling out a Fiber to the Home (FTTH) network, where the fiber optic cable runs inside the customer's home. The defendant party, Telenet, has a Hybrid Fiber Coax (HFC) network. In this, the network consists largely of fiber, but the \u201clast meters\u201d (from the street cabinet to the home) consist of the classic coax cable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Proximus took offense to Telenet's marketing campaigns in which terms such as \u201cfiber,\u201d \u201cfiberspeed\u201d and \u201cfiber that you already have\u201d were used. According to Proximus, this creates the unjustified impression that Telenet customers have a full fiber connection, which differs in quality (including upload speed and stability) from a coax connection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The president of the Antwerp Enterprise Court ruled in favor of Proximus in the verdict of Feb. 4, 2026. The court ruled that the use of the term \u2018fiber\u2019 (or compositions and translations) for products that do not run over a full fiber network is misleading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The court imposed a cease-and-desist order on Telenet. The provider may no longer use the term \u2018fiber\u2019 in product names or descriptions for non-FTTH products unless:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Attached to this injunction was a penalty payment of up to \u20ac1,000,000.00<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This ruling is an example of the application of the Code of Economic Law (CEL)<\/a> on unfair business-to-business (B2B) market practices. Although Proximus is not a consumer organization, the court relied on consumer deception (Art. VI.97 CEL) as the basis for unfair competition (Art. VI.104 CEL).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Deception about the nature of the product<\/strong> The court confirmed that in the perception of the average consumer, the term \u2018fiber\u2019 refers one-to-one to a network consisting 100% of fiber to the customer's home. Labeling a hybrid network (HFC) as \u2018fiber\u2019 deceives the consumer about the nature and main characteristics of the product (art. VI.97, 1\u00b0 and 2\u00b0 CEL).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The \u2018decoy practice\u2019 <\/strong>An interesting aspect in the legal reasoning is the rejection of the \u2018fiber check\u2019 as a defense mechanism. Telenet argued that customers could check what technology was available through their website. However, the court ruled that this nuance comes too late in the decision-making process. At that point, the consumer has already been mentally \u201cseduced\u201d by the promise of fiber. This exhibits characteristics of a decoy practice: the customer is brought in with a misrepresentation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Context and precedents<\/strong> The court also referred to previous opinions of the Jury on Ethical Practices (JEP), which had already ruled in 2011<\/a> and 2025<\/a> that the term \u2018fibernet\u2019 requires clarification. Telenet's argument that speeds differ little in practice for consumers was rejected. Indeed, marketing-wise, speed is presented as \u201cblissful,\u201d so the technological underpinnings are indeed an essential factor in the purchase decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\nLegal analysis and interpretation<\/h3>\n\n\n\n