FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler is seeking to shake up the Pay-TV market with a new rule that would give consumers more choice in what set-top box they use to access video services.

Senior FCC officials said Wednesday the rule would allow consumers to select their box from among competing devices, effectively leveling the playing field between cable companies and other set-top box-makers. Officials said the proposal will not only help lower cable bills for consumers by eliminating the need for costly box rentals, but will also foster innovation through the sharing of key information streams between Multichannel Video Programming Distributors (MVPDs) and creators.

The officials said there is nothing in the proposed rule that would prevent MVPDs from developing their own applications and solutions to be more competitive in the marketplace.

In a Tuesday op-ed in Re/code, Wheeler said the proposed rule would provide a much-needed update to open market regulations that are “woefully out of date and based on 20-year-old technology.”

“You can now choose which smartphone or tablet you want to use,” Wheeler wrote. “Similarly, you’ve been able to choose your own cable modem and Wi-Fi router for years. Should pay-TV continue to be an exception? I believe, and Congress has made clear, the answer is no.”

“The proposal is about one thing: Consumer choice,” he continued. “You should have options that competition provides.”

According to the FCC, the average U.S. household currently pays $231 each year for a set-top box rental, totaling a collective $20 billion in annual lease fees. Since 1994, the commission said, the cost of set-top boxes has risen 185 percent while the cost for computers, TVs and phones has dropped 90 percent.

To foster more competition in the pay-TV marketplace, Wheeler’s solution proposes that three core information lines be opened to developers: service discovery, to provide information about what programming is available to the consumer, including channel listings and the video-on-demand lineup; entitlement information about what a device is allowed to do with content; and content delivery information about the programming itself.

In an effort to allay industry concerns, senior FCC officials stressed on Wednesday that the proposed rule would not disrupt any of the current contracts between MVPDs and their subscribers, content providers or advertisers.  Further, officials said all copyrights and licensing agreements will remain in place, and copyrighted content will be “protected from piracy much as it is protected under the existing CableCARD regime.”

The proposal does not mandate the use of a single security system, but instead gives MVPDs leeway to use at least one openly licensed content protection system. This strategy, officials said, will give MVPDs the ability to determine whatever level of content protection they deems sufficient without impeding on the introduction of new protection systems.

Senior FCC officials said Wednesday the timing for the proposed rule is ripe since technology has moved beyond the CableCARD and many MVPDs are moving to IP-based systems where a CableCARD will no longer work.

The officials said the new rule will also help accommodate demand from consumers who want to want easy access to a wide variety of content on a wide variety of devices by fostering the creation of new, innovative interfaces that can integrate pay-TV with steaming services in one device.

The rule would not require consumers to have, purchase or upgrade their set-top box, officials said, but would simply allow them more options should they wish to shop around.

Operators and programmers, however, were not soothed by the FCC’s reassurances.

On Wednesday, a group of 47 industry companies formed the “Future of TV Coalition” in protest, claiming that the proposed rule – which it called “AllVid” –  is a “one-size-fits-all tech mandate that would harm consumers” and the “ultimate example of the government trying to fix something that isn’t broken.”

“Unprecedented innovation has given viewers more choices for services, devices, and programming than ever before,” Bright House Networks president Nomi Bergman said. “American consumers have never had more freedom to find and watch the shows they love in different ways – from a la carte, to smaller packages, to traditional or new Internet providers and above all the burgeoning marketplace for streaming devices and video apps.  But AllVid would slam the brakes on this progress and harm consumers.”