telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) (06/21/91)
This special announcement will be primarily of interest to our readers
in the New York area served by New York Telephone, but others will
find the letter from NY Tel to the Public Service Commission of
interest as well. All followups should go to Telecom Privacy. PAT]
Date: 20 Jun 91 17:09:40 GMT
From: John Cowan <cbmvax!snark.thyrsus.com!cowan@uunet.uu.net>
Subject: New York Telephone Caller-ID Letter
The text of an advertisement in {The New York Times}, 20 June 1991,
page D23:
STATE OF NEW YORK PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION June 7, 1991
PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION OFFERS PUBLIC AN OPPORTUNITY TO COMMENT ON
THE APPLICATION OF NEW YORK TELEPHONE COMPANY TO INTRODUCE CALLER
IDENTIFICATION SERVICE IN SELECTED AREAS OF NEW YORK STATE.
The New York Public Service Commission will convene a special hearing
before Administrative Law Judge John T. Vernieu to receive comments
from affected members of the public concerning the application of New
York Telephone Company to introduce Caller ID service:
Plainview, New York: June 27, 1991, 2:00 and 7:00 p.m.,
Cornell Cooperative Extension,
Nassau County, 1245 Old Country
Road, Plainview, New York 11803
Each of the sessions will continue until all persons wishing to
comment have been heard and will remain in session for at least one
hour.
The company proposes to introduce this service in Poughkeepsie,
Kingston, Newburgh, Beacon, and surrounding Mid-Hudson communities
initially and to expand it to other parts of the State gradually over
the next several years. Caller ID service automatically transmits the
telephone number of the calling party to the called party through use
of a display device provided by the customers. The company proposes
to make available to callers at no charge the option of not sending
forward the number of the telephone from which they are calling.
However, this option would require callers to dial a special (3-digit)
code each time a call is made, to prevent the transmission and
disclosure of the caller's telephone number to the called party.
The company has set forth its view on this matter in a letter to
members of the Commission. A copy of one such letter is attached, and
interested parties are welcome to address comments to its contents.
The Commission may ultimately adopt, reject, or amend any of the
proposals presented by New York Telephone Company and may order
increases or decreases in the rates which the company has proposed in
this proceeding.
It is not necessary to make advance appointments or to present written
material in order to speak. All statements will be made part of the
stenographic transcript in the case. Persons not wishing to speak may
nevertheless comment on the company's request in writing by mailing
their statements to Secretary John J. Kelliher at the offices of the
Commission, Three Empire State Plaza, Albany, New York 12223. Both
written and oral statements will become part of the official case
record and will be considered in the Commission's review process.
Disabled persons who may require special accommodations at the hearing
other than a sign language interpreter are asked to contact the
Commission's Compliance Officer at (518) 473-8869. Persons requiring
a sign language interpreter should call the Commission's TDD telephone
number (collect) in New York City at (212) 219-4292. These special
arrangements should be requested at least one week before the hearing
date.
In the near future, the Commission will also conduct evidentiary
hearings to determine whether, or to what extent, the company's
proposals are justified under legal standards. The testimony and
exhibits offered by the company in support of its proposals, when
filed, may be examined at the following locations:
Commission offices at Three Empire State Plaza,
Albany, New York 12223 and 400 Broome Street, New
York, New York 10013
Garden City Public Library, 60 7th Street, Garden City,
New York 11530
This matter will be heard in [italics] Case 91-C-0428 -- Proceeding on
Motion of the Commission to Investigate New York Telephone Company's
Proposal to Institute Caller ID Service. [end italics]
JOHN J. KELLIHER
[italics] Secretary [end italics]
[beginning of attachment]
[Bell logo]
New York Telephone
A NYNEX Company
1095 Avenue of the Americas
New York, New York 10036
Bailey M. Geeslin
Vice President-Regulatory and Planning
April 5, 1991
Commissioners
State of New York
Public Service Commission
Three Empire State Plaza
Albany New York 12223
Dear Commissioner:
Today we are filing a Petition for Reconsideration of the Order to
Modify or Suspend Tariff Filing of the CLASS and Caller ID services
tariff. I wanted to use this less formal forum to discuss some of the
concerns that led us to the decision to file for reconsideration.
We start with the strongly held view that Caller ID is a service that
is valuable to individual consumers, to society and to New York
Telephone Company. We believe that there is a strong policy need for
this service to be available in New York.
We also understand that the method of deployment that maximizes its
service value introduces privacy issues. On the other hand, methods
that eliminate the privacy issues debilitate the service value.
Therefore, there is a need to strike a balance. We believe that the
balance point is critical and there is not a safe direction in which
to err.
The current balance of privacy between calling and called parties is
the result of technology, not social policy. In early telephone
service, all calls were placed through operators, who identified the
caller to the called person. Party-line service, which three-quarters
of American telephone customers had in 1950, provided a check on the
anonymity of the caller, since outgoing calls could not be depended
upon to be private. By the 1960s, telephone technology tipped the
balance in favor of the caller when direct-dial, single party
telephone service became widespread, as did annoyance calls.
Technological change, which caused the imbalance, now can help improve
it, in the form of Caller ID.
The Public Service Commission has recognized how privacy expectations
have changed over time, as indicated in the eighth Telecommunications
Privacy Principle: "Privacy expectations may change over time
requiring, in some instances, changes in telecommunications services.
At the same time, changes in telecommunications technology services
and markets may lead to changes in customers' privacy expectations."
We believe that this may, indeed, be one of those times when changes
in telecommunications technology may lead to changes in our customers'
privacy expectations. It is New York Telephone's desire to work in
close cooperation with our customers and in identifying how to achieve
the best balance between the privacy of the calling party and the
called party. We are firm in our belief that this balance can best be
struck by Caller ID with per-call blocking only (offered at no
charge).
The privacy value offered by Caller ID to our customers is vastly
diminished by the intrusion of the all-call blocking option to all
customers and presumptive all-call blocking to all non-published
service customers. For example, more than one-third of New York
Telephone's New York City customers are non-published. This could
mean that subscribers to Caller ID could have the validity of the
service pre-empted so often as to call to question its usefulness.
Conversely, Caller ID with only per-call blocking [underscore]
enhances [end underscore] the privacy level of the called party
because it offers the called party the certainty of knowledge that
when an incoming call is accompanied by a "P" or "Private" on the
Caller ID display unit, the calling party made a conscious effort to
block passage of his or her number to the called person. Customer
surveys have indicated that this critical piece of information
provides the option for Caller ID subscribers to decide to
[underscore] not [end underscore] answer these calls. If, however,
one-third of all potential calls sends out a "P" automatically, this
privacy decision-making capability is essentially voided.
From the point of view of non-published service subscribers who don't
respond to opportunities to select a blocking option, their privacy
decision-making capabilities will also be abrogated. By mandating
that these subscribers shall be defaulted to all-call blocking status,
they would be placed in a position different from all other customers.
Certainly, an opportunity would be offered to check off a preference
for per-call blocking. But this type of "negative check-off" tends to
elicit a "no action" response on the part of most customers, leaving
many customers with a service they don't really want, but simply don't
take the time or action to reject.
What are the privacy implications of per-call versus all-call blocking
options? Per-call blocking maintains the privacy status of calling
parties by permitting them to make individual decisions on when to
block the passing of their phone number. At the same time, it
increases the level of privacy for called parties by giving control
over their telephones in making individual decisions on whether to
answer a particular call.
On the other hand, all-call blocking may not address a privacy issue
so much as a convenience issue. Some maintain that non-published
service customers should not have to dial the *67 blocking code all
the time to block passing of their number. The amount of time it
takes to dial *67 for per-call blocking is the same as that to dial an
area code. This would not seem to be a great inconvenience.
Customer surveys in other states support the joint research we
recently concluded with the Commission's staff. Survey results,
including a very recent study in Tennessee, show strong opposition to
blocking options. Of particular interest is the fact that 41 percent
of Caller ID residential customers in Tennessee have non-published
service.
But we must interject our primary and most urgent objection to
all-call blocking -- an objection that has been joined in by emergency
response agencies across the country. In addition to diminishing the
value of Caller ID, all-call blocking compromises the ability of
police, fire, and other emergency service providers to determine the
source of the call, thus impeding responses in emergencies and
increasing false alarms.
All-call blocked callers to fire, police, or medical agencies
(non-E-911) calling in an emergency would be likely to forget to
"unblock" their telephone number. Customer focus group interviews in
New York also indicated a concern that children, currently taught to
dial 911 or the police direct dial number to summon help, would not
remember to or be able to disengage the line blocking feature in an
emergency. From a public safety point of view, per-call blocking is
clearly the best option.
The debate over privacy issues raised by the opportunities offered by
Caller ID clearly centers around achieving a balance between the
privacy rights of the calling party and the called party. From the
outset, the industry position had been to offer Caller ID without a
blocking option. New York Telephone decided to break with the
industry position by providing a solution -- per-call blocking -- that
we feel balances the privacy rights of the calling and called parties
alike.
That position is now becoming the industry norm with local operating
companies across the nation. As discussed in detail in our petition
for reconsideration, we do not believe there are any legal or tariff
impediments that would prevent New York State from adopting this
balanced approach to Caller ID.
We believe that this solution best meets both the privacy expectations
and service needs of our customers. I hope that the petition for
reconsideration serves as a basis for you to change the order to allow
this service to achieve its potential value. I would be more than
happy to meet with you at your convenience, if this would be helpful.
Very truly yours,
[Signature of Bailey M. Geeslin]
Identical letter addressed to: cc: Margery Baker
Commissioner Harold A. Jerry, Jr. William Cowan
Commissioner James T. McFarland Daniel Rosenblum
Commissioner Gail Garfield Schwartz Lisa Rosenblum
Commissioner Henry G. Williams Richard Stannard
---------------
Follow-ups to this TELECOM Digest SPECIAL REPORT should be directed to
the Telecom Privacy Mailing List (telecom-priv@pica.army.mil). Thanks.cyberoid@milton.u.washington.edu (Robert Jacobson) (06/23/91)
Re the comments of Mr. Bailey M. Geeslin, Vice President-Regulatory, in his whine to the New York State Public Service Commission why the Commission should dispense with per-line blocking requirements: > We believe that this may, indeed, be one of those times when changes > in telecommunications technology may lead to changes in our customers' > privacy expectations. When haven't the telephone companies and their suppliers looked to technology to change their customers's habits and ways of thought? One thing after another, whether successful (Princess phones) or not (videophones), some telco's can't resist telling us how we should change our lives for the better. Revenue gains are always incidental, of course. > But we must interject our primary and most urgent objection to > all-call blocking -- an objection that has been joined in by emergency > response agencies across the country. In addition to diminishing the > value of Caller ID, all-call blocking compromises the ability of > police, fire, and other emergency service providers to determine the > source of the call, thus impeding responses in emergencies and > increasing false alarms. > All-call blocked callers to fire, police, or medical agencies > (non-E-911) calling in an emergency would be likely to forget to > "unblock" their telephone number. Customer focus group interviews in > New York also indicated a concern that children, currently taught to > dial 911 or the police direct dial number to summon help, would not > remember to or be able to disengage the line blocking feature in an > emergency. From a public safety point of view, per-call blocking is > clearly the best option. This has GOT to be bogus. Isn't SS7 and associated services fully reprogrammable, so that 911 calls get special treatment regardless of line-blocking for usual calling? If not, we as ratepayers are getting rooked twice over, once for an expensive service and again when it's able to be used only in conjunction with the collection of personal ID for marketing purposes. And if the emergency threat is so great, where are all the police, fire department, hospital, and insurance services to make the point? How come so many are in opposition to the proposition that the service makes things better? Company-conducted focus groups are hardly the last word on expertise. Buggers. Bob Jacobson