[IP] more on FCC VoIP 911 order
Begin forwarded message:
From: DV Henkel-Wallace <gumby@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: May 22, 2005 12:22:33 PM EDT
To: N3jmm@xxxxxxx
Cc: David Farber <dave@xxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [IP] FCC VoIP 911 order
The implementation, both legal and technical, need not be complex nor
terribly expensive. It's the long term implications, as you say,
that could be bad.
Consider this implementation: the FCC mandates the following: every
DHCP client sold must accept a new location identifier. Every
commercial VOIP phone or service must get this info and pass it on
for E911 use. Every commercial dhcp server (e.g. in your cheapo
"cable router" box) ISP would be required to get this info from the
ISP (they have that info already anyway) and pass it onto its own
dhcp clients. Public access providers (e.g. libraries and cafe
hotspot operators) would be required to upgrade; the rest of us would
just do it automatically, accept for those of us who build our own
gear, relay our traffic over encrypted tunnels, etc.
Writing this up more formally would make for a short RFC. It would
cost the government nothing (although the taxpayers would still be
shouldering the bill as a sort of tax, but it wouldn't be a high one).
And the government already lays all sorts of burdens onto the ISPs.
I do see this as opening a can of worms since now law is poking into
protocols themselves, a barrier previously never breached. THAT
worries me more than anything else.
(By the way you could argue that protects VoIP services since it
cauterises a line of attack that some state PUCs (e.g. Texas) have
been trying to use to attack these services).
-d
From: N3jmm@xxxxxxx
Date: May 22, 2005 5:01:42 AM EDT
"Finally, the Commission stated its intention to adopt, in a future
order, an advanced E911
solution that includes a method for determining the customer’s
location without the customer
having to self report this information."
I suspect that this is impossible with the present structure of
Internet and that requiring it may have unforeseeen implications
not to mention cost.
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