FACT SHEET
PART 68 
NOTICE OF PROPOSED RULEMAKING


Background:  What is Part 68?
? Part 68 of the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) rules specifies the criteria 
for connection of customer premises equipment (CPE) to the telephone network.  CPE 
is equipment, such as telephones, faxes, modems, operating on a customer's premises 
to originate, route or terminate telecommunications over the Public Switched 
Telephone Network (PSTN).  The rules do the following: 
1. Establish technical criteria to ensure that CPE does not harm the telephone network 
or telephone company personnel. 
2. Establish a registration process to verify that equipment connected to the telephone 
network complies with the technical criteria.  
3. Require local telephone companies to allow CPE that is registered as Part 68 
compliant to be connected to their networks.

? The FCC currently certifies approximately 3,000 CPE applications per year.

? Prior to the adoption of Part 68 rules, telephone companies generally only permitted 
CPE supplied by themselves to connect to the telephone networks, giving the telephone 
companies monopoly control of the CPE market.

? At the time the Commission established its Part 68 rules, few entities outside of the 
local exchange carriers (LECs) had extensive knowledge about the interaction of CPE 
and the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), and there were no private 
standards-setting bodies or testing laboratories with expertise in CPE.  Given this 
market condition, the Commission established technical criteria to ensure that CPE 
would not harm the telephone network.  Telephone companies were required to permit 
connection of compliant CPE to their networks.  The Commission identified four types 
of harm against which the network has to be protected.
1. electrical hazards to telephone company personnel; 
2. damage to telephone company equipment;
3. malfunction of telephone company billing equipment; and,
4. degradation of service to persons other than the user of the terminal equipment, his 
calling or called party.

? The Commission's Part 68 rules assure that registered CPE can be freely connected to 
the telephone network, and has facilitated a vibrant, competitive market for CPE, 
reducing prices and resulting in a proliferation of new equipment and capabilities 
available to consumers.


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? In the years since the Part 68 rules were adopted, the marketplaces for both CPE and 
local exchange service have changed dramatically.  Vibrant competition has emerged 
in the CPE marketplace.  Basic voice telephones (virtually the only CPE that was 
available from the LECs at the time Part 68 rules were established) are now available 
from an array of suppliers in a myriad of styles with varied options for extremely low 
prices. 

? Part 68 does not regulate the quality or performance of CPE except as these factors 
relate to preventing telephone network harm.  Quality and performance factors are 
served by consumer protection laws and by the operation of the free market.


Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
? In the Notice of Proposed rulemaking, the Commission is considering proposals to: 
1. Streamline most elements of the process by which technical criteria are established 
for CPE that, once certified, LECs must allow to be connected to the telephone 
network. 
2. Make the certification processes more expeditious and more responsive to technical 
innovation, while preserving the Commission's core goals of preventing harm to 
the telephone network and ensuring access to the network for persons with 
disabilities.
3. Reduce governmental involvement in the setting of technical criteria and 
registration of CPE.
4. Promote the pace of new or competitive CPE deployment, and therefore increase 
the choices available to consumers.

? The proposals include suggestions based on a series of industry fora the Commission 
held in July 1999 to explore the extent to which regulations in Part 68, other than our 
disability access rules, may no longer be necessary as federal rules.