911 Through VoIP Can Be That Bad
Sunday May 4, 2008
Little Elijah died this week before being able to receive medical treatment when he had a cardiac arrest during the night. An ambulance did come when Elijah's aunt called 911, but too late. It was in fact the second ambulance sent. The first one would, according to Elijah's mother, be on time to save the toddler's life had it not been sent to the wrong address by the 911 VoIP service of their service provider. Read more on this event here.
Following this, the whole world seems to be pointing a finger at VoIP and its limitations for what happened. How would things be different had the 911 call been made through traditional PSTN rather than VoIP? With traditional landline, there is a physical and geographical address attached to any phone line, and it is the same as the billing address; so there is very little chance that there is inconsistency. On the other hand, a VoIP number has only an IP address attached to it. The geographical address of the person may change any time without actually requiring that IP location to change. What happened in Elijah Luck's case clearly illustrates the limitations of VoIP 911: The Luck family moved from Calgary to Mississauga some time back. They notified the VoIP service provider, Comwave about that, and their record was updated on the database. But they ignored whether, unlike with PSTN, they had to separately update the 911 address, which could be different from the billing address. That's how the ambulance was sent to Mississauga while they were waiting in despair in Calgary.
E911 has been made compulsory to be offered along with VoIP Services in the US recently; and we are further expecting that something be done to address the perils that VoIP 911 could entail. This time, the solution should come from technical rather than legal minds.
Meanwhile, if you are considering whether to abandon VoIP for your safety, relax. Just make sure your address is well updated in all instances; and then, you can always enjoy the benefits of VoIP while keeping your traditional phone line. Many services allow that.
Following this, the whole world seems to be pointing a finger at VoIP and its limitations for what happened. How would things be different had the 911 call been made through traditional PSTN rather than VoIP? With traditional landline, there is a physical and geographical address attached to any phone line, and it is the same as the billing address; so there is very little chance that there is inconsistency. On the other hand, a VoIP number has only an IP address attached to it. The geographical address of the person may change any time without actually requiring that IP location to change. What happened in Elijah Luck's case clearly illustrates the limitations of VoIP 911: The Luck family moved from Calgary to Mississauga some time back. They notified the VoIP service provider, Comwave about that, and their record was updated on the database. But they ignored whether, unlike with PSTN, they had to separately update the 911 address, which could be different from the billing address. That's how the ambulance was sent to Mississauga while they were waiting in despair in Calgary.
E911 has been made compulsory to be offered along with VoIP Services in the US recently; and we are further expecting that something be done to address the perils that VoIP 911 could entail. This time, the solution should come from technical rather than legal minds.
Meanwhile, if you are considering whether to abandon VoIP for your safety, relax. Just make sure your address is well updated in all instances; and then, you can always enjoy the benefits of VoIP while keeping your traditional phone line. Many services allow that.
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