From The Federal Register

Summary: The Notice of Inquiry (NOI) initiates a comprehensive proceeding to address how Next Generation 911 (NG911) can enable the public to obtain emergency assistance by means of advanced communications technologies beyond traditional voice-centric devices. The NOI seeks to gain a better understanding of how the gap between the capabilities of modern networks and devices and today’s 911 system can be bridged and seeks comment on how to further the transition to IP-based communications capabilities for emergency communications and NG911.

Effective Date: Submit comments on or before February 28, 2011. Submit reply comments March 14, 2011.

Addresses: Pursuant to SUBSEC 1.415 and 1.419 of the Commission’s rules, 47 CFR 1.415, 1.419, interested parties may file comments and reply comments. Comments may be filed using: (1) the Commission’s Electronic Comment Filing System (ECFS), (2) the Federal Government’s eRulemaking Portal, or (3) by filing paper copies. See Electronic Filing of Documents in Rulemaking Proceedings, 63 FR 24121 (May 1, 1998).

* Electronic Filers: Comments may be filed electronically using the Internet by accessing the ECFS: http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/ecfs2/ or the Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov.

* Paper Filers: Parties who choose to file by paper must file an original and four copies of each filing. If more than one docket or rulemaking number appears in the caption of this proceeding, filers must submit two additional copies for each additional docket or rulemaking number.

* Filings can be sent by hand or messenger delivery, by commercial overnight courier, or by first-class or overnight U.S. Postal Service mail. All filings must be addressed to the Commission’s Secretary, Office of the Secretary, Federal Communications Commission.

* All hand-delivered or messenger-delivered paper filings for the Commission’s Secretary must be delivered to FCC Headquarters at 445 12th St., SW., Room TW-A325, Washington, DC 20554. The filing hours are 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. All hand deliveries must be held together with rubber bands or fasteners. Any envelopes must be disposed of before entering the building.

* Commercial overnight mail (other than U.S. Postal Service Express Mail and Priority Mail) must be sent to 9300 East Hampton Drive, Capitol Heights, MD 20743.

* U.S. Postal Service first-class, Express, and Priority mail must be addressed to 445 12th Street, SW., Washington DC 20554.

For Further Information Contact: Patrick Donovan, Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, at (202) 418-2413, Federal Communications Commission, 445 12th Street, SW., Washington, DC 20554; or via the Internet to [email protected].

Supplementary Information
1. As recommended in the National Broadband Plan, this Notice of Inquiry (NOI) initiates a comprehensive proceeding to address how Next Generation 911 (NG911) can enable the public to obtain emergency assistance by means of advanced communications technologies beyond traditional voice-centric devices. In the telecommunications industry overall, competitive forces and technological innovation have ushered in an era of advanced Internet-Protocol (IP)-based devices and applications that have vastly enhanced the ability of the public to communicate and send and receive information. At the same time, our legacy circuit-switched 911 system is unable to accommodate the capabilities embedded in many of these advanced technologies, such as the ability to transmit and receive photos, text messages, and video. Accordingly, in this proceeding, we seek to gain a better understanding of how the gap between the capabilities of modern networks and devices and today’s 911 system can be bridged. We also seek comment on how to further the transition to IP-based communications capabilities for emergency communications and NG911.

II. Background
2. Since ATandT first made the digits “911” available nationally in 1968 for wireline access to emergency services, the American public increasingly has come to depend on the service. Today, the National Emergency Number Association (NENA) estimates that some form of 911 service is available to 99 percent of the population in 96 percent of the counties in the United States, and 240 million calls are made to 911 in the United States each year. “911” is as well known as any popular brand, and is what we routinely teach to children as the way to summon help from police, fire, and ambulance services. In more recent times, 911 has become increasingly important for homeland security, as the means for ordinary citizens–in some ways the true “first responders”–to report suspicious activity or summon emergency assistance for themselves and others in times of natural or man-made disasters. It should therefore come as no surprise that the American public has developed clear expectations with respect to the availability of 911 emergency services via certain classes of communications devices.

3. The availability of this critical service is due largely to the dedicated efforts of State, local, and Tribal authorities and telecommunications carriers, who have used the 911 abbreviated dialing code to provide access to increasingly advanced and effective emergency service capabilities. Indeed, absent appropriate action by, and funding for, states, Tribes, and local jurisdictions, there can be no effective 911 service.

4. At the same time, new voice communications technologies have posed technical and operational challenges to the 911 system, necessitating the adoption of a uniform national approach to preserve the quality and reliability of 911 services for such communications technologies. This was first recognized following the introduction of commercial mobile radio services (CMRS) in the United States, when the Commission in 1996 established rules requiring CMRS carriers to implement basic 911 and Enhanced 911 (E911) services.

5. In 1999, Congress continued this recognition when it enacted the Wireless Communications and Public Safety Act (911 Act) to promote and enhance public safety through the use of wireless communications services. The 911 Act directed the Commission to designate 911 as the universal emergency assistance number for wireless and wireline calls, and to establish a transition period for areas of the country where 911 was not yet available. In 2000, the Commission adopted an order which established 911 as the universal emergency telephone number in the United States. In 2003, the Commission revised “the scope of [its] enhanced 911 rules to clarify which technologies and services will be required to be capable of transmitting enhanced 911 information.” In adopting rules tailored to specific services, the Commission clarified, inter alia, the following matters: (1) Telematics service providers offering interconnected CMRS voice calling service may have an E911 service requirement and need to coordinate with the underlying wireless carriers, so that, regardless of the legal relationship between them, E911 requirements can be met; and (2) resold and prepaid mobile wireless service providers must meet 911 rules to the extent the underlying licensee has deployed the necessary technology for E911 service. The Commission declined, however, to impose E911 requirements on: (1) Telematics-only services providers, reserving the right to revisit E911 obligations in the future, (2) manufacturers of disposable phones or personal data assistants (PDAs) that contain a voice service component, and (3) multi-line telephone systems, except for the Commission’s monitoring of states’ progress on implementing E911 for those systems.

6. The next significant step in the evolution of 911 followed the introduction of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services in the United States. In this regard, in 2005, the Commission established rules requiring interconnected VoIP service providers to supply E911 capabilities to their customers as a standard feature from wherever the customer is using the service.

7. While the Commission and the 911 industry acted to enable 911 service availability for wireless and VoIP providers, today’s 911 system remains reliant on increasingly antiquated analog or digital circuit-switched facilities. It is thus not capable of supporting certain functionalities made possible by a transition to broadband IP-based communications technologies–functionalities that have become commonplace in other communications systems. At the same time, the introduction of these new technologies has created the potential for development of and transition to NG911 to take advantage of the enhanced capabilities of IP-based devices and networks.

8. In the last few years, there have been several important efforts to address the need for a transition to a NG911 network. In the New and Emerging Technologies 911 Improvement Act of 2008, Congress tasked the National E9-1-1 Implementation Coordination Office (ICO) to develop “a national plan for migrating to a national [Internet Protocol] IP-enabled emergency network capable of receiving and responding to all citizen-activated emergency communications and improving information sharing among all emergency response entities.” The ICO, managed jointly by the Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and the Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), released its migration plan in September 2009. In March 2010, NENA released a handbook to serve as a guide for public safety personnel and government officials responsible for ensuring that Federal, State, and local 911 laws and regulations effectively enable the implementation of NG911 systems. Specifically, the NENA Handbook provides an overview of key policy, regulatory, and legislative issues that need to be considered to enable the transition to NG911. The NENA Handbook states that “it is critical that State regulatory bodies and the FCC take timely and carefully scrutinized action to analyze and update existing 9-1-1, PSTN, and IP rules and regulations to ensure they optimize 9-1-1 governing authority choices for E9-1-1 and NG9-1-1 and foster competition by establishing a competitively neutral marketplace.”

–This is a summary of a Federal Register article originally published on the page number listed below–

Notice of inquiry.
CFR Part: “47 CFR Part 20”
Citation: “76 FR 2297”
Document Number: “PS Docket No. 10-255; FCC 10-200”
Federal Register Page Number: “2297”
“Proposed Rules” 

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