May 12, 2005Cellphone Hangup: When You Dial 911, Can Help Find You?As More People Go Wireless, Patchwork of Call Centers Slows LocaterSystemUpgrade Money Spent on BootsBy ANNE MARIE SQUEOStaff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNALIn November 1993, Jennifer Koon, under attack by a vicious assailant,dialed 911 from her cellphone. But the dispatcher in upstate New Yorkcould only listen helplessly for 20 minutes as the 18-year-old, unableto give her exact location, was beaten, driven to an alley and shot todeath. The technology wasn't available to find her.Almost 12 years later, more than half of the U.S. still lacks thetechnology to find cellphone callers in distress. Though the federalgovernment is spending billions of dollars annually on homelandsecurity, the 911 system that Americans rely on to report an emergencyhasn't benefited.With the explosive growth of wireless technology, more than a third ofthe 190 million calls placed to 911 each year now come from cellphones.Even as some of the nation's biggest cellular carriers face a Decemberdeadline to upgrade their systems for 911 calls, many emergency-callcenters won't be able to receive the data. Virtually all of thenation's 6,000 call centers can locate land-line phones, but only 41%of them can locate cellphones, public-safety officials say. And thesituation is getting worse with the growing popularity ofInternet-based phone services -- some of which can't access traditional911 service.No federal agency has the authority to drive the local, state andfederal governments, as well as dozens of wireless and local-phonecompanies, toward a solution. The cellular industry initially reactedslowly because of costs and liability concerns. Public-safety officialsestimate it would take $8 billion and at least four more years tomodernize the nation's 911 system for wireless calls. And that doesn'tinclude the costs of updating the system to handle Internet phoneservices.Meanwhile, cash-strapped states have diverted funds earmarked...

In many locations the ATT CallVantage service works exactly likeE911 (Enhanced 911) because the phone exchange is limited to asingle PSAP (i.e. the local emergency response system).

When You Dial 911, Can Help Find You?

May 12, 2005 103 Replies

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Jer 21 years ago

Why wouldn't dialing 100 get me anywhere? Don't they do interdigit timing like all the telcos do?

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David L 21 years ago

Infone is great! I highly recommend Infone. It's more like a concierge service with all the extras they provide and cheaper than VZW's pathetic info service, that has failed me a couple of times, when I needed it most. Wrong number and couldn't find the right city:(

The Infone operater will stick with you until every lookup possibilty is exhausted.

They also give directions and a bunch of other included services. They spend, IIRC, up to 15 minutes helping to find the correct number/info.

The only hassle is setting up credit card billing, since they operate outside your carrier's billing system. But it's worth the one time setup inconvenience. They use to offer 5 free lookups. I got 10 but that's no longer available.

Ther's also an Infone 800 CS number that doesn't cost if you need to work out a billing problem.

- David

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Ivor Jones 21 years ago

[snip]

Possibly, if anything was allocated to 100, but it isn't..!

Ivor

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Earl F. Parrish 21 years ago

Don't you think that if someone keeled over in a library, a regular landline will be available? When you are in a public place, you do not have the only telephone around. If I have an emergency in a hotel, I am going to use the house phone even if it costs $5.00 to make a call.

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