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The National Emergency Number Association, APCO and AT&T together...

The National Emergency Number Association, APCO and AT&T together proposed revised E-911 location rules. In a Monday letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, the parties said they “worked together to develop technologically feasible compliance measurements that improve the ability…

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of providers to locate customers making calls to 9-1-1 from wireless phones.” The proposal doesn’t compete with a similar one (CD Aug 22 p2) made last week by Verizon Wireless, NENA and APCO, but covers different technologies. AT&T’s proposal relates to tracking via cellphone tower triangulation, whereas Verizon’s involves GPS tracking. The AT&T plan would measure wireless 911 location accuracy at the county level, said AT&T, NENA and APCO. However, “it is not technically feasible for carriers to meet the current accuracy standard in all counties using location accuracy technology currently available,” they said. “Any location accuracy rules that the Commission adopts for carriers that employ network-based solutions must be limited” to metrics and schedules in the group’s proposal, they said. AT&T and other carriers using network-based location solutions “may be expected to deploy handset-based solutions as an overlay to existing network-based solutions in order to meet the more stringent county-level requirements,” the group said. Their proposal would allow network-based carriers to “elect to use a system of blended reporting for their accuracy measurements,” or to report “based solely on the handset-based accuracy standards,” the group said.