Verizon Threatens To Disconnect NJ Landline Customer Unless They Switch To Fiber

(.sanden.)

Copper wire is expensive and old-fashioned. Phone companies don’t want to maintain or use it anymore. Still, some customers like their reliable old land-lines, and the law creates certain obligations for phone companies to provide and maintain them. But Verizon is apparently so sick and tired of providing plain old telephone service that they’re threatening to disconnect customers who don’t “voluntarily” upgrade to fiber A.S.A.P.

Local media outlet NJ TV News is reporting that a resident in northern New Jersey is receiving disconnection threats from Verizon. It’s not that she hasn’t paid her bills; it’s that Verizon just isn’t interested in providing her phone service anymore — unless she lets them come run fiber to her house.

The customer received a letter dated May 15 saying that “services will be suspended on or after 45 days from the date of this letter, if you do not allow Verizon reasonable access to your premises … to move your service to our fiber-optic network.”

“Once your service is suspended,” it continued, “you will only be able to call 9-1-1 and our customer service number … 14 days after being suspended, Verizon service at your address will be disconnected.”

The customer contacted the NJ Division of Rate Counsel, a state-level agency that represents consumer interests in dealing with utility companies (including cable and telecom services). The division has filed a petition with New Jersey’s Board of Public Utilities, asking the Board to investigate the letter.

The director of the Division, Stefanie Brand, told NJTV News she thought the letter was “pretty heavy-handed,” and added, “We were shocked. We thought this was clearly a violation of a bunch of state statutes and certainly Verizon’s obligation to be the provider of last resort.”

The AARP has also become involved, with the organization’s interim state director telling NJTV News, “Where Verizon gets the chutzpah to take such rude and inappropriate steps with their own customers is completely beyond belief and it’s completely unjustifiable. The people of New Jersey need to be able to live by the rule of law and not the rule of Verizon’s corporate fiat.”

Verizon’s “get lost” attitude toward copper-wire landline subscribers — those who connect to plain old telephone service, as the FCC calls it — is nothing new.

The company started pushing hard on New York and New Jersey area subscribers in 2012. Later that year, when Hurricane Sandy damaged or destroyed cables in the region, Verizon took it as an opportunity to not replace them at all and just do away with the lines instead.

By 2013, AT&T and Verizon were accused of cutting off copper-wire DSL customers without warning, to force FiOS and Uverse upgrades. In 2014, Verizon was accused of deliberately neglecting their copper-wire network in order to force consumers to upgrade to fiber. And not even a month ago, the union representing telecommunications workers publicly accused Verizon of failing to meet their network maintenance obligations.

The eventual transition off of copper wire and onto an entirely data-based network is basically inevitable. About 18 months ago the FCC approved trials that would lead to the end of copper landlines, and late in 2014 the commission proposed a set of guidelines for consumer protection as the IP transition continues.

The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities has recently signed an agreement with Verizon to slowly transition the state from copper to fiber, and to phase out and deregulate the old lines. However the Division of Rate Counsel is disputing the agreement, and the state agencies are still fighting it through in court.

Customers may be wise to be wary. Verizon in particular has also been called out recently for their total failure to meet their promises for FiOS rollout coverage. And the company has said more than once that they are basically done building out that network, and have no plans to expand any further. That explicitly includes New Jersey, despite promises the company made to wire the whole state with fiber broadband.

Verizon Threatens to End Service If Customers Don’t Switch to Fiber-Optic Network [NJTV News]

by Kate Cox via Consumerist

Court Tosses Truck Owner’s Parking Citation Because Of A Missing Comma

(SarahMcGowen)

It pays to read everything carefully — or rather, you might not have to pay a fine if you’re as sharp-eyed as one Ohio woman. She ended up having a parking citation tossed by an appeals court, all because she noticed there was a comma missing in the local law.

As anyone who has ever written a sentence knows, punctuation is of the utmost importance. And in one Ohio village, English teachers are likely sighing and shaking their heads at a grammar mishap involving the local law on parking regulations.

The Columbus Dispatch reports that the 12th District Court of Appeals overturned a parking violation [PDF] for a woman living in West Jefferson. She’d been convicted in municipal court for leaving her pickup parked on a village street for more than 24 hours.

But she pointed out that the municipal ordinance prohibited “any motor vehicle camper, trailer, farm implement and/or non-motorized vehicle” from daylong parking.

Her truck, she said, is not a motor vehicle camper. It is a motor vehicle, which would’ve been covered if the law had a comma where it should’ve.

The village argued that it was just a typo and therefore didn’t invalidate her violation. The trial court upheld that view, saying that when reading the ordinance in context, it unambiguously applied to motor vehicles and “anybody reading [the ordinance] would understand that it is just missing a comma.”

Grammar won the day, however, after the court sided with the truck owner.

“If the village desires a different reading, it should amend the ordinance and insert a comma,” Judge Robert A. Hendrickson wrote.

Oh, snap.

Justice Insider: Missing comma gives judges pause [Columbus Dispatch]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

FBI Investigating String Of Internet Cable-Cutting Attacks In California

(Louis Abate)

If you live in the Sacramento area and experienced shoddy Internet service yesterday, there’s a chance it wasn’t your provider’s fault. Federal investigators say someone has been attacking high-capacity Internet cables for a least a year, with the most recent attack occurring on Tuesday.

USA Today reports (warning: link has video that autoplays) that the FBI is investigating at least 11 physical attacks on Internet cables around Sacramento and the San Francisco Bay area, some of the assaults dating back at least a year.

The latest issue occurred in the early hours of June 30 around Sacramento, disrupting service for businesses and residential customers.

According to FBI agents – who declined to say just how much the latest attack affected customers – someone broke into an underground vault and cut three fiber-optic cables belonging to service providers Level 3 and Zayo.

A spokesperson for Wave Broadband, which connects to the affected service providers, confirmed to USA Today that the latest cord-cutting situation impacted an unspecified number of customers in the Sacramento-area. The company characterized the attack as “coordinated,” and is working with Level 3 and Zayo to restore service.

JJ Thompson, CEO of Rook Security, a security consulting and services provider in Indianapolis, tells USA Today that the attacks showcase the vulnerability of Internet infrastructure.

While fiber-optic cables are often bundles of thin cords, they are generally protected by strong, flexible conduit, meaning cutting the lines would require tools and planning.

“When it’s situations that are scattered all in one geography, that raises the possibility that they are testing out capabilities, response times and impact,” Thompson said. “That is a security person’s nightmare.”

USA Today reports that backup systems in the area helped lessen the significance of the attack on Tuesday. Many people may have noticed slower email or issues with videos loading, but overall service may not have been completely disrupted.

“When it affects multiple companies and cities, it does become disturbing,” an agent tells USA Today, adding that the first known attack occurred in July 2014. “We definitely need the public’s assistance.”

FBI investigating 11 attacks on San Francisco-area Internet lines [USA Today]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist