​Netflix’s agreement over the weekend to pay Comcast for smooth broadband service is raising eyebrows Monday among consumer advocates who worry that consumers will end up paying higher rates as the concept of Net Neutrality fades away.

Saying that the deal makes the concept of Net Neutrality “obsolete”, the Washington Post‘s Timothy B. Lee wrote that “it’s hard to see a practical difference between this deal and the kind of tiered access that network neutrality advocates have long feared.”

Netflix consumers have been complaining for weeks about slower playback speeds and interrupted streaming, so the company needed to come up with a solution to make sure there was enough broadband capacity available to satisfy people binge-watching “House of Cards” or “Breaking Bad.”

No one is talking about the terms of the deal. But sources familiar with the agreement told Re/Code that it was a transit agreement, rather than a “peering” one, which meant money is likely changing hands.

Re/Code also reported that the deal has been in the works for months, and was not prompted by a recent Supreme Court case that threw out the FCC’s Net Neutrality rules. Neither, was it spurred by Comcast’s recent announcement that it would acquire rival Time Warner Cable.

Both companies insisted that the deal wasn’t about giving Netflix “preferential treatment,” but rather would ensure that Netflix had “a more direct connection.”

Craig Aaron, of the Internet rights group Free Press, wondered to The Guardian whether Comcast had been deliberately slowing Internet speeds to extract payment from Netflix.

“As a consumer, you are in the dark here,” he said.

Read More: Re/Code, Los Angeles Times, Guardian

Brief Take: With viewers continuing to flock to streaming service to watch their favorite shows, Netflix’s deal with Comcast raises serious concerns for some consumer advocates about the creation of a multi-tiered Internet that could hamper access to programming in the future.

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