April 19, 2005
New York is among the states thought to be looking closely at marketing claims made by Vonage and other Internet telephone companies. Texas sued Vonage last month, claiming it does not adequately disclose that does not provide enhanced 911 service.
911 calls from Vonage and many other Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) providers are not routed directly to emergency dispatch centers with a read-out displaying the caller's location. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott filed his suit after a Houston-area caller allegedly failed to get through to 911 to report that her parents had been shot during a robbery.
An Abbott spokesman said other states have expressed interest in the case New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's office has confirmed that it is looking at the issue "in greater detail."
VOIP providers have been growing rapidly but the 911 issue is likely to become a major stumbling block, many analysts think.
Tapping into the existing 911 networks is costly and technically challenging. One of the attractions of VOIP service is that it is as portable as a laptop -- a customer can access his local number from anywhere on earth through the Internet. Thus, a caller whose account corresponds to a 213 Los Angeles number could actually be in Hong Kong or London.
Local phone companies have not been eager to give VOIP providers easy access to the 911 system, which is usually owned by the local Bell company and financed largely by the 911 surcharge paid by landline and, in most states, cell phone customers.
In most cases, this means the VOIP companies wind up routing 911 calls to administrative numbers at the emergency call centers. In theory, the administrative operator should route emergency calls to the 911 dispatcher but the system is not foolproof as it relies on human intervention.
States are blocked from regulating -- and taxing -- Internet telephone by the Federal Communications Commission. But as the Texas lawsuit demonstrates, that doesn't stop attorneys general from suing the VOIP companies on consumer protection issues.
