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VOICE OVER IP (VOIP) AND ACCESS TO EMERGENCY SERVICES:
A COMPARISON BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND THE UNITED KINGDOM
J. SCOTT MARCUS, WIK-CONSULT GMBH
Regulatory experts tend to think of
the United States as the bastion of
market-based laissez-faire telecommunications economics and regulation,
and conversely to think of European
regulators as being notably more willing to intervene in markets. Recent
regulatory rulings relating to access to
emergency services 1 via voice over IP
(VoIP) show the United States to be
surprisingly interventionist and the
United Kingdom, by contrast, to be far
more liberal and temperate. What are
the elements of similarity and of difference between these U.S. and U.K.
policies?

THE UNITED STATES

In an order issued in May 2005, the
FCC required all VoIP providers that
are interconnected with the public
switched telephone network (PSTN) to
provide enhanced E-911 services [1].
This is a rather stringent standard
while basic 911 services merely require
connection to the appropriate public
service access point (PSAP), E-911
requires that the users callback number
and, in general, location be accurately
reported to the PSAP. The interconnected VoIP providers are effectively
required to route 911 calls through the
wired E-911 network.
The order notes that ...
[c]onsumers in many cases may not
understand that the reasonable expectations that they have developed with
respect to the availability of 911/E911
service via wireless and traditional wireline telephones may not be met when
they utilize interconnected VoIP services [2]. It mandates that E-911 service be provided for all users. Users
need not opt-in; moreover, they cannot
choose to opt out of coverage [3].
The order acknowledges that location cannot be reliably determined for
nomadic VoIP services. (This
nomadicity presents a key challenge:
many VoIP users are able to attach
their terminal adapter to any broadband connection, thus moving their
service and their telephone number to
a different location. The automated
systems that provide access to emer-

gency services do not generally anticipate that wired telephones might

move.) The order requires that the
user register a location; in general,
the first address at which service is
provided. The provider must also
enable the user to enter a new location; however, the order does not
specify the timeframe in which the
update must take effect.
Providers of interconnected VoIP
are given only 120 days to implement
E-911 access via the wired E-911 network.2 For providers of nomadic VoIP
service, this represents an apparently
insurmountable hurdle. They would
need access to the wired E-911 service
throughout the entire United States,
implying the need for contractual agreements, and physical and logical interconnection with a large number of
incumbent carriers,3 none of whom are
under any legal obligation to provide
it. 4 By obliging new entrants to use
these incumbent facilities, without creating any corresponding obligation for
incumbents to provide them, the FCC
has virtually guaranteed hold-up problems and non-price-based discrimination.
2

FCC initial guidance regarding implementation was strikingly harsh providers who
failed to fully comply within 120 days were
threatened with fines, cease and desist orders,
and revocation of any FCC licenses (FCC,
E911 Requirements for IP-Enabled Service
Providers, 51). The FCC guidance issued
November 7, 2005 does not mandate disconnection of existing customers, but still requires
that the provider discontinue marketing the service or accepting new customers wherever the
service is not fully in compliance. The rules for
notification of existing customers within 30 days
show a similar pattern of a Draconian initial
order, followed by some slight softening once it
became clear that the order was harsh to the
point of being unenforceable.
3

See the letter from Richard Rindler to Marlene

Dortch, Joint Motion for Limited Stay, WC
Docket Nos. 05-196 and 04-36, October 24,
2005. No third party offers a fully compliant
nationwide service.
4

911 in the United States, 112 or 999 in the

UK.

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VoIP providers are not necessarily classified

as carriers. They have no legal rights to interconnection, other than to tariffed services available to customers.

By obliging new entrants

to use these incumbent
facilities, without creating
any corresponding
obligation for incumbents
to provide them, the FCC
has virtually guaranteed
hold-up problems and
non-price-based
discrimination.
A SPECIFIC CONCERN
Access to emergency services is incredibly important. This cannot be stated too
strongly. To that extent, one can admire
the FCCs activism; nonetheless, many
aspects of the FCCs order are troubling.
Consider, for example, the requirement that the user-reported physical
location at which the service will first
be utilized be registered for emergency
access purposes. This is appropriate
if the users location cannot be reliably
ascertained in any other way, the user
must self-report; however, the order
fails to come to grips with the obvious
problems with this approach. First,
there is the risk that the user incorrectly reports his location. Second, there is
the risk that the user neglects to report
a changed location, or reports it incorrectly. Third, there is the matter of the
time lag between report and database
update.5
Beyond this, some VoIP providers
are unable to guarantee the reliability
of the underlying IP transmission network for the simple reason that they do
not provide the network.
All of this leads ineluctably to a conclusion that seems to have been obvious
to the Europeans from the outset: however much VoIP may look like normal
telephony, there are real differences. 6
5

This last is discussed but not resolved in 43

of the FCCs order.
6

At least, for some forms of VoIP.

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And the user must inevitably accept some
responsibility for using a service that is
not absolutely identical to conventional
telephone service.
In this sense, the FCCs insistence
that VoIP completely meet the reasonable expectations that [consumers] have
developed is wrong-headed. These
expectations are no longer reasonable.
Consumers ultimately need to understand that they are dealing with a significantly different service.
This is not merely a matter of the
FCC institutionalizing the buggy whips
of the previous generation although
it is that, too. The more serious concern
is that if consumers fail to appreciate
the changed nature of these new services, a range of failure modes are
inevitable. To the extent that this feel
good ruling contributes to unrealistic
consumer expectations, it puts lives and
property needlessly at risk.

THE EUROPEAN UNION

The United Kingdom is a Member State
of the European Union; its regulation
operates within the European regulatory framework. Two major policy statements have emerged at the overall
European level: one from the European
Commission, and the other from the
European Regulators Group (ERG).7
The Commissions public consultation on VoIP [4] recognizes the social
value of efficient and effective access to
emergency services. In European regulation of electronic communications,
access to emergency services is viewed
as comprising two distinct capabilities[5]:
The automatic establishment of a
connection (at no charge to the user)
to the most appropriate service access
point (ambulance, police, and fire
service).
The ability of the service access point
personnel to determine the street
address of the caller with sufficient
accuracy to enable the dispatch of
ambulance/fire/police.
7

The European Union (EU) comprises 25

Member States, including the United Kingdom,
France, Germany, Italy and Spain. The European Commission could be viewed as the Executive Branch of the European Union it thus
has overall responsibility for coordinating
implementation of the European regulatory
framework for electronic communications. The
European Regulators Group (ERG) comprises
the National Regulatory Authorities (NRAs) of
the 25 Member States, plus the European Commission. The ERG seeks to harmonize regulation across the EU.

IEEE Communications Magazine August 2006

Ofcoms order recognizes

that there are a wide range
of VoIP offerings in the
marketplace, and that
consumers benefit from a
wide range of choices.
They seek to avoid
distorting the marketplace
by favoring one solution
over another.
The Commissions public consultation notes the importance of encouraging access to emergency services, but at
the same time observes that the technology to meet these needs efficiently
and reliably for nomadic VoIP users
does not yet exist [6].
At a philosophical level, the ERGs
Common Position on Voice over IP
speaks of the need to ... adopt a regulatory approach ... which will enable the
greatest possible level of innovation and
competitive entry in the market, whilst
ensuring that European citizens are
adequately protected. In particular this
should mean that any regulatory obligations on VoIP services are objective,
technology neutral, non-discriminatory
and transparent.
It reaches these specific conclusions
about access to emergency services:
Access to Emergency services is
extremely important for citizens, irrespective of how a voice service may
be classified for legal and regulatory
purposes.
From a public policy point of view it
is desirable that access to emergency
services is available from as wide a
range of electronic communications
services as possible.
VoIP emergency calls from fixed or
otherwise known locations should be
routed to the nearest emergency centre on the basis of the contractually
agreed physical address. ...
When calling the emergency number,
caller location information should be
provided to the extent technically
feasible.
In those cases where the caller location cannot be determined by the
VoIP provider (most likely in the
case of nomadic use of VoIP services), the end-user should be clearly
and unambiguously informed by the
VoIP provider about any restrictions

in routing emergency calls and providing caller location information and

the potential consequences.
The ERG rejects the notion that
VoIP services should necessarily be regulated just as traditional services were.
The ERG believes that if European
citizens are to realise the full benefits
of these innovations it is essential that
European citizens are empowered to
make informed choices about services
and should be given the freedom to
choose services that differ from traditional telephone services.

THE UNITED KINGDOM

Ofcom, the U.K. regulatory authority,
has just produced a new ruling on VoIP
[7]. In it, Ofcom described its objectives
as ...(in so far as is possible) (i) enabling
innovation in a technological neutral
way, (ii) ensuring consumers are well
informed, and (iii) ensuring maximum
availability of [emergency] services [8].
Ofcoms order recognizes that there
are a wide range of VoIP offerings in
the marketplace, and that consumers
benefit from a wide range of choices
[9]. They seek to avoid distorting the
marketplace by favoring one solution
over another. At the same time, there
are real differences among the offerings
access to emergency services is easier to achieve with some offers than with
others. They carefully refrain from
requiring service providers to do things
that they simply cannot do.
For VoIP-based providers of publicly
available telephone services (PATS),
Ofcom has announced its intent to
enforce PATS obligations, including an
access requirement for emergency services, beginning some six months hence;
however, not all VoIP providers are
PATS. To the extent that a VoIP service does not provide the access to
emergency services that would be
expected of a traditional voice service,
Ofcom looks to the provider to inform
and educate the consumer.
Ofcom convened a working group of
stakeholders to determine best practices as regards information for VoIP
users. The group agreed that not all
voice services will raise the same concerns and issues for consumers (since
some services may fully or partially
meet consumer expectations more easily than others). For this reason the
group was clear that a one-size-fits-all
code of practice was not appropriate.
Instead, the group concentrated on
developing principles and practical
measures, in the format of a code,
which providers could use to ensure
their consumers are clearly informed of

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the differences between traditional and
VoIP services. Ofcom is imposing this
code of conduct on all providers of
voice services to the public.
Ofcom also considered a range of
related issues, including network reliability. In a carefully crafted decision,
they removed inappropriate obligations
for network reliability from providers
who could not reasonably achieve them
(e.g., service providers who do not operate a network). Instead, they chose
...to encourage adoption of a formal
risk assessment methodology, which
considers which are the most likely failure modes of the service, and takes
whatever steps might reasonably be
taken to mitigate the risks associated
with these failure modes. The aim is to
promote a responsible approach to network integrity issues, but without specifying the precise solution [10].

COMPARISONS
The U.S. and U.K. rulings may appear
to be superficially similar, and in fact
contain common elements; nonetheless,
they are in reality poles apart.
The European approach, as exempli-

fied by the U.K. and ERG proceedings, is

that consumers must be free to make an
informed choice of services that differ
from those available today. 8 The U.S.
position is in effect to mandate traditional
services, and to preclude consumer choice.
The European position embraces
consumer education. The U.K. ruling
places consumer rights and consumer
education front and center they even
went so far as to conduct market
research and focus groups. The FCCs
order buries it in 4849.
To the extent that VoIP functions
differently from traditional telephony,
the FCC treats the differences as a
defect. In fact, these very differences
can dramatically enhance consumer welfare, and can foster new emergency
response capabilities [11]. The nomadicity that interferes with emergency access
is the very property that made VoIP
8

Section 6.1 (quoting from Ofcoms 2004 ruling): It is not desirable for all voice services to
be required to offer the same features as traditional telephone services and we should instead
enable consumers to make informed decisions.

As VoIP gains in popularity,

all countries will confront
these issues. Ofcoms ruling
provides appropriate
signposts going forward.
phones invaluable to New York City
during the days and weeks following
September 11, 2001. The New York City
government capitalized on the flexibility
provided by VoIP phones in replacing
the emergency center that was lost when
the World Trade Center collapsed.

CONCLUDING REMARKS
As VoIP steadily gains in popularity, all
countries will confront these same
issues. It is the Ofcom ruling that provides appropriate signposts going forward. Regulation should serve to:
Impose reasoned and proportionate
mandates, on realistically achievable
schedules, where solutions are
straightforward
Make systematic progress in dealing
with issues such as nomadicity that
are not straightforward
Avoid needless regulatory barriers to
competitive entry, innovation, and
consumer choice
Ensure that consumers are informed
and educated and about the implications of dealing with services that are
profoundly different from those that
existed in the past, and thus enabled
to make informed decisions

REFERENCES
[1] FCC, In the Matters of IP-Enabled Services/
E911 Requirements for IP-Enabled Service
Providers, June 3, 2005.
[2] Ibid., 48.
[3] Ibid., 47.
[4] The Treatment of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) under the EU Regulatory Framework, June 14, 2004, pp. 1315.
[5] EU, Universal Service Directive, doc. L
108/51, Apr. 24, 2002, article 26.
[6] The Treatment of [VoIP], op. cit., p. 14.
[7] Regulation of VoIP Services: Statement and
Further Consultation, Feb. 22, 2006.
[8] Ibid., p. 14.
[9] Ibid., Sec. 2.26, p. 8.
[10] Ibid., Sec. 4.22.
[11] S. Crawford, The Ambulance, The Squad
Car, and the Internet, Berkeley Tech. L.J.,
forthcoming.

BIOGRAPHY
J. S COTT M ARCUS ([email protected]) is a
senior consultant for WIK-Consult GmbH. He
served as Senior Advisor for Internet Technology
at the FCC (US) from 2001 to 2005. He is coeditor of this column. The opinions expressed
are solely his own.

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IEEE Communications Magazine August 2006