Industry Players Speak Out Against FBI's CALEA Proposal

Two prominent industry groups, the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) and The VON Coalition, have each filed public comments with the FCC that are critical of the FBI's recent proposal to update the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) wiretapping law to cover VoIP and future packet-based communications.



Last month, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency filed a joint petition for rulemaking with the FCC arguing that legal wiretapping needs to be "technology neutral" and needs to apply to all telecommunications carriers equally. Specifically, the FBI is asking the FCC to rule that broadband access and broadband telephony are subject to CALEA; and to adopt rules that provide for the easy and rapid identification of future CALEA covered services. The petitionenvisions a new regulatory and enforcement scheme that imposes deadlines by which VoIP providers must implement CALEA intercept capabilities for their existing services. The FBI is also asking the FCC to confirm that carriers bear sole financial responsibility for CALEA implementation costs.



The FBI petition states: "The importance and urgency of this task cannot be understated. The ability of federal, state, and local law enforcement to carry out critical electronic surveillance is being compromised today by providers who have failed to implement CALEA compliant intercept capabilities. Communications among surveillance targets are being lost, and associated call identification information is not being provided in the timely manner required by CALEA." A copy of the 83-page petition is online at: http://www.cdt.org/digi_tele/20040310fbipetition.pdf



The Telecommunications Industry Association warned that the FBI petition raises numerous additional issues and might impede technological innovation. Specifically, TIA said the request to include future services in the packet-mode enforcement regime should be rejected. The TIA further questions the legal authority for assigning all financial responsibility for implementing CALEA to carriers, noting that earlier FCC rulings had expressed an expectation that CALEA costs would be recovered from law enforcement agencies when wiretaps are performed. TIA, which has led many standards development efforts under CALEA, said a critical factor that needs to be preserved is full industry participation in the process.



The VON Coalition is urging the FCC to dismiss the FBI petition, arguing that it is "unnecessary, would stifle innovation and delay consumer benefits without a commensurate increase in security." The VON Coalition believes that the FBI petition effectively expands the scope of the wiretap law to include broad categories of existing and future applications that Congress never intended. http://www.tiaonline.orghttp://www.von.org