AT&T Wireless may have to pay up to $2.2 million in fines for breaking E911 emergency services directive rules. Under the directive, operators are obliged to provide facilities that can locate emergency callers if necessary.
The operator requested an extension over a year ago, to give it time to upgrade its TDMA networks to GSM. AT&T led the FCC to believe that as soon as the new networks were up and running it would provide the locator service. However, it turns out that AT&T has been distributing GSM handsets that do not have location capabilities.
The US telecoms regulator, FCC, is saying that AT&T has missed deadlines for the introduction of the service – and broken other rules – and must therefore pay the fine.
