VoIP providers must support CALEA

The FCC has adopted a second order requiring facilities-based broadband Internet access providers and interconnected VOIP providers to provide law enforcement agencies with all of the resources of the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). The Commission has set May 14, 2007 as the CALEA compliance deadline for all these providers, and requires them to submit interim reports. Carriers can use trusted third parties to meet the deadline. However, the Commission may take separate enforcement action against carriers that fail to comply with the act. In addition, the FCC finds that a national surcharge to recover CALEA costs is not in the public interest and wants carriers to pay these costs.

Applying the same compliance date to all providers will eliminate any possible confusion about the applicability of the deadline, avoid any skewing effect on competition, and prevent migration of criminal activity onto networks due to delayed compliance dates.

For more on FCC's second order:
- read FCC's release (pdf)

PLUS: The FCC announced last August that it required certain broadband and VoIP providers to accommodate lawful intercept mandates by the spring of 2007. Sonus and Verint Systems, a security and enterprise business intelligence software solutions provider, have teamed up to address this service provider requirement. Release