Just as they have fought to protect their voice monopolies over the past 100 years, incumbent local exchange carriers ("ILECs") now seek to extend that monopoly to high speed Internet access and other advanced services into the new millennium," said H. Russell Frisby, Jr. President of CompTel. "As Congress grapples with legislation that would stifle competition in the market for local broadband services, the law of the land remains unmistakably clear: monopoly networks must give way to competitive choice for ALL types of services."

The FCC’s Advanced Services Order, released in August of 1998, clarified that "the obligations of Sections 251 and 252 of the Act apply to advanced services and the facilities used to provide those services." Accordingly, the Commission held that ILECs are obligated:

1. to provide interconnection for advanced services;
2. to provide access to unbundled network elements (UNEs) used to provide advanced services; and
3. to offer for resale all advanced services that they generally provide to subscribers who are not telecommunications carriers.

The ILECs have claimed that advanced services are outside the scope of Sections 251(b) and (c) and have asked the FCC to make findings based on the technology used rather than the characteristics of the service provided. "Advanced services clearly fall under the categories of telephone exchange service or exchange access, or both," said Frisby. "Attempts by the ILECs to claim that they do not do so are misguided and disregard the breadth of services made possible by advanced telecommunications capabilities."

"Congress intended the 1996 Act to be forward-looking and to encompass new services and new technologies yet to be developed. The ILECs’ insistence on pigeon-holing services as either replicas of POTS services or "something else" is out of step with the purpose and meaning of the Act," Frisby added.