Heartland Institute which for some reason thinks of itself as “know it all” says that The Federal Communications Commission ruled on May 19 that Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephony service providers must make E911 service accessible to their customers within 120 days. Unfortunately, since the ruling calls for VoIP providers to implement technology that does not exist, it’s difficult to see what good the ruling will do. Not sure who this fellow, Steven Titch came up with this, but few phone calls to companies that are in the business of e911 (Intrado for one) would prove the technology does exist. Oh wait, we don’t have to take these guys seriously do we… here is why!!!
There are a lot of reasons why VoIP clients can’t originate calls to E-911 centers and pinpoint the location of the caller.
Intrado’s solution is a bit of a hat trick based on user registration information and a base assumption that the user is at a fixed, predetermined location. Neither of those are really legitimate assumptions in all cases.
Intrado has call delivery accuracy issues for wireline, wireless and now for VoIP. Do a Google for Intrado and misrouted.
There will be IP to IP and IP to TDM and IP to analog (CAMA) based e-911 solutions in the next 12 months, and some of them may even get the call on the dispatch lines, not the PSAP’s regular administrative lines.
I can’t speak to the theory or base assumptions that make up the Heartland Institute’s position paper, but what I read in the closing paragraph is a lot closer to your well stated position regarding the aging TDM network infrastructure than your comments indicate.
“Intrado’s solution is a bit of a hat trick based on user registration information and a base assumption that the user is at a fixed, predetermined location.”
This is no different than Phase 1 (all you get in more than half the coutry) E-911 for Cellular — it just gives the address for the tower and which antenna face if it is sectored. Not much help if you are in a rural area where towers are 10+ miles apart. E911 for anything other than POTS is many years from living up to the public’s expectations. Sometimes I make the mistake of caring about what the FCC says and then I feel stupid . . .