North American Network Operators Group
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Re: How relable does the Internet need to be? (Was: Re: ConvergedNetwork Threat)

  • From: Laurence F. Sheldon, Jr.
  • Date: Thu Feb 26 11:38:30 2004 
Roland Perry wrote:
In article <[email protected]vizzavi.
net>, "Pendergrass, Greg" <[email protected]> writes

if you want to call an ambulance you DON'T use the internet
And you also need a way to persuade the Ambulance Service not to terminate their calls via VoIP, or send dispatch instructions via public-IP over GSM (or whatever) to their vehicles.
I think we will need also to make it illegal (to control the liability
issues) to need emergency assistance in a place whose only link
is via "public-IP".  (I hear that there are places in Papua New Guinea
that are being brought "on-line" where everything (EVERYthing) else is
stone-age-standard.)
Or the IP bits need to be assured as "good enough" that it doesn't matter.

It's perhaps three years since I heard that there was real possibility of some of the above. That stable door may be more open than you think.