CALEA Broadband Coverage Order (2005)
The order that brought broadband and VoIP inside CALEA. It answered the question every IP provider had been asking since 1994 — does this apply to us? — and left a few it never came back to.
CALEA and Broadband Access and Services — First Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
The CALEA Broadband Coverage Order is a ruling of the Federal Communications Commission establishing that the CALEA statute governs not only traditional telecommunications carriers but facilities-based broadband Internet access providers and two-way interconnected VoIP providers. Facilities-based broadband Internet access is defined to cover all broadband platforms, including cable modem, wireline (DSL), wireless and satellite. Two-way interconnected VoIP is a VoIP service capable of transporting calls both to and from the public switched telephone network.
The FCC reached that result through CALEA's unique definition of "telecommunications carrier." For most FCC purposes the term is defined by the Communications Act of 1934. CALEA sets out its own definition, which contains a "substantial replacement provision": if the FCC finds that a service is a replacement for a substantial portion of the local exchange service, it may deem the provider subject to CALEA. The FCC ruled that both facilities-based broadband Internet access and two-way interconnected VoIP provide such a replacement.
The order also opened a Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking asking, among other things, whether CALEA should extend to one-way interconnected VoIP and whether a streamlined set of requirements should exist for small or rural providers. The FCC never followed the Further Notice with a report and order deciding those questions, so they remain unresolved. The D.C. Circuit upheld the order in American Council on Education v. FCC (2006).
The parts that matter to a provider.
Facilities-based broadband is covered
Providers of transmission or switching over their own facilities between the end user and the Internet — cable, DSL, fiber, wireless, satellite — provide a replacement for a substantial portion of local exchange service and are telecommunications carriers for CALEA purposes.
Interconnected VoIP is covered
A VoIP service that permits users to receive calls from and terminate calls to the PSTN. The information-services exclusion does not apply to it; the FCC noted that call-management and call-setup information available to a VoIP provider is unlikely to be available to a broadband provider.
The substantial-replacement provision
The legal hinge of the order. CALEA's carrier definition reaches beyond the Communications Act's, and the FCC used it to bring IP services inside the statute without reclassifying them as telecommunications services for any other purpose.
What it did not decide
One-way interconnected VoIP and streamlined obligations for small providers were put out for comment and never resolved. Establishments that merely provide Internet access to patrons — hotels, coffee shops, libraries — are not covered; the underlying provider is.
Does this apply to you?
Every facilities-based broadband Internet access provider and every interconnected VoIP provider in the United States, from national networks to the smallest ISP or hosted-voice provider whose service reaches the PSTN both ways.
First Report and Order, FCC 05-153
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Other primary documents.
CALEA Act of 1994
What CALEA (1994) requires, section by section — definitions, capability, security, safe harbor, enforcement — with the full text to download.
CALEA Capability Order (2006)
The 2006 FCC order that set the May 14, 2007 deadline, permitted Trusted Third Parties, required SSI filings and monitoring reports, and settled who pays.
ECPA (1986)
What ECPA did: extended the Wiretap Act to electronic communications and created the Pen Register Act and the Stored Communications Act — the tiers of process.
The Wiretap Act (1968)
The 1968 statute behind every Title III order: a general prohibition on intercepting communications, with a court-supervised exception on probable cause.
FISA (1978)
What FISA authorizes — foreign-intelligence surveillance of foreign powers and their agents under the FISA court — and what a FISA order means for a carrier.
USA PATRIOT Act (2001)
What the USA PATRIOT Act changed for communications providers: FISA, the pen-register statute, the Stored Communications Act and emergency disclosure.