[asterisk-biz] VoIP 9-1-1 failure - don't let it happen to you

[SIP]

The comments in that article, which, by the way, is not reachable at the 
URL you provided (you left off an l :
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/story/2008/05/05/rethinking-voip.html) 
show that people really still have no grasp on the technology used for 
VoIP or the difficulties in providing E911 service.

Some of the questions/suggestions given were things like: 

-Why can't we put GPS into VoIP phones like we do in cell phones? 
- Be like AT&T and the minute a phone changes locations (changes IPs), 
lock it out completely until the customer provides current location 
information or verifies he's at the old location.

Neither of which are terribly effective. GPS is rather unreliable 
indoors, and if you're truly on the move, having your phone stop working 
every time you switch APs until you reconfirm your location (which you 
may not even know) is, perhaps, a worthless solution.

The overall problem lies in the way people view VoIP as a replacement 
for telephones. Skype is VoIP, but its dependence on the computer puts 
it into a class of VoIP services such as those tied with other IM 
services that people simply don't EXPECT to behave like a phone. 
However, when you have a service which CAN be used with something like a 
phone, people then expect it to behave just like a phone in all ways. 
They've tied their awareness to a familiar paradigm, and they're unable 
to expand beyond that.

It's really fascinating from the standpoint of psychology.

When WiMax comes into play in a larger scale (assuming it ever becomes 
cost-effective), it will open up yet further avenues of misconception. 
Will my new WiMax-enabled GoogleTalk Communicator or AIM Handset have 
E911? I mean... it LOOKS like a phone, right? So it should have E911. Of 
course, if I'm outdoors, they might have GPS built in, but if I'm 
downstairs in the mall, with wifi repeaters all around to keep the 
signal strong, and just roaming from store to store, how would anyone 
ever know where to find me?

These are basic problems for which NO one has a solution. As many 
E911-capable VoIP services as there are these days, the simple fact 
remains that truly nomadic VoIP does not have the infrastructure yet to 
be able to handle E911. And the more flexible we make it, the less 
chance we will ever solve that problem without massive redesigns of the 
way IP is routed and handled.



Trevor Peirce wrote:
> Drew Gibson wrote:
>   
>> This call was one of the marginal cases and this is the question I was 
>> trying to ask. As with most emergencies, this situation was created by 
>> a combination of failures.
>>
>> Rightly or wrongly the current situation is that...
>>
>> 1. The customer expects the Telco to take care of 911 entirely, as 
>> they always have in the past.
>>     
> Indeed.  The VoIP provider should take a more proactive role to ensure 
> the customer understands that 911 address != billing address.  First, 
> the regulations require periodic reminders be sent to the customer to 
> keep their address current.  Second, it would be good practice for all 
> providers to offer to update 911 address at the same time when they are 
> processing a billing address update.
>   
>> 2. The VoIP provider expects the customer to update their 911 address, 
>> as the provider cannot strictly control location (except the cable 
>> providers such as Shaw Cable, through which the ambulance was 
>> correctly dispatched)
>>     
> As above.  Cable companies have a benefit that they attach their device 
> to your house so it cannot be moved without them coming out and doing it 
> for you.  Thus, they are allowed to route directly to a PSAP and use 
> E911.  VoIP is not allowed to do this per CRTC regulations.
>   
>> I'll leave it to the lawyers to apportion blame but, in the mean time, 
>> how is this disconnect being addressed by VoIP and 911 service providers?
>>     
> In my opinion the address not being updated is a very small factor of 
> the failure at hand.  The bigger failure is the lack of communication to 
> verify the caller's address or let them speak to the PSAP directly.  If 
> the caller did speak to the PSAP, or if the caller told the person on 
> the phone that the old address was correct, then the point of failure 
> shifts from the VoIP provider/911 termination partner to the caller.  
> However, it is my understanding that the address was not verified with 
> the caller and that the caller never spoke to the PSAP, and that is why 
> this happened.
>
> The current implemented system in Canada has room for improvement, but 
> the processes required by law does work fine and requires several stages 
> that would have prevented this failure if they had been followed by all 
> involved parties.  It will be interesting to find out the details of 
> what exactly went wrong.
>
> Because of this failure, here is today's article recommending against 
> VoIP services: 
> http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/story/2008/05/05/rethinking-voip.htm
>
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