FCC asks appeals court to throw out E911 rules

The FCC has asked a federal appeals court to dump the enhanced 911 location accuracy rules, which were approved last November but have not yet been put into effect. The commission said that the public safety community supports a relaxed standard. Recently the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO) and the National Emergency Number Association (NENA) told the FCC that measuring the wireless E911 accuracy at the public safety answer point level was unworkable in practice and that compliance measurements should be accepted at the county level.

The mobile phone industry has lobbied for assessing E911 location accuracy by statewide average. However, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has said this method is too lax and would not protect consumers who make 911 calls on their cell phones.

For more:
- see this RCR story [1]

Related articles:
D.C. Court puts the brakes on E911 [2]
FCC Clarifies E911 [3] Accuracy Requirements