The Illinois Commerce Commission deferred making any formal...
The Illinois Commerce Commission deferred making any formal judgments on state regulators’ role over Internet Protocol-to-IP interconnection. The ICC “has not determined that any provider has the right to exchange traffic with an incumbent local exchange carrier in IP format,”…
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said an arbitration proceeding judgment released late last week. The proceeding examined an interconnection request from Sprint to AT&T (http://1.usa.gov/13lGotV). “Indeed, the legal question of whether IP Interconnection can be compelled pursuant to Section 251 has not been decided by the FCC,” said the judgment. The ICC also does not yet have any rates, terms or conditions for this type of interconnection, it said. “While the Commission might or might not have the authority to order IP interconnection, this decision cannot be made until it is presented with an IP-to-IP interconnection proposal of sufficient detail to allow it to assess whether such a plan is technically feasible or otherwise comports with the requirements of the 1996 Act,” it said. The state regulator said it adopted language provided by AT&T to “allow this issue to be decided later.” In a May brief before the ICC (http://1.usa.gov/15baGyN), AT&T called Sprint’s characterization of IP interconnection “grotesquely misleading” and said there are distinctions between TDM and IP connections and pointed to the open questions on the federal and state level. In its proposed language, AT&T said Sprint “may propose to AT&T Illinois that the Parties amend the Agreement to provide for IP-to-IP interconnection (and/or to permit Sprint to deliver traffic to AT&T Illinois in IP format rather than in TDM format).” But the AT&T language also said it may still disagree with Sprint’s interpretation of IP interconnection obligations and that the ICC may have to address those issues then.