The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has announced plans to improve the information about cellphone coverage that is communicated to the public.
On Friday, the agency said a public consultation has led it to introduce a new approach for how wireless service providers (WSPs) report data on their cellular networks to the CRTC, which is then provided to Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) for its National Broadband Map.
This new standard incorporates three different signal strength thresholds to measure whether WSP connectivity would be of a sufficiently adequate quality to support the following services:
- Level 1: Emergency calls and public alerts
- Level 2: Voice or video calls of at least 3 megabits per second (Mbps) and data upload speeds of at least 1Mbps
- Level 3: Data download speeds of at least 10Mbps and data upload speeds of at least 2Mbps
The CRTC is also setting out other aspects of the standard, including the frequency of when WSPs should report the data, the technology they use to report and the process for providing updates or amendments to coverage. The agency will begin requiring WSPs to report on Level 1 standards in the next Annual Facilities Survey in early 2027, with Level 2 and 3 reporting to be carried out in subsequent surveys.
Building on that, the CRTC will allow Canadians to report locations where the coverage map doesn’t reflect their experience, which should also help improve the accuracy of coverage maps.
With this new approach, the CRTC says Canadians will be able to get more detailed information about coverage in a given area to make it easier to compare service options. Additionally, the regulator says these standards will make it easier for both it and ISED to validate submitted data and generate more accurate coverage maps accordingly.
Source: CRTC
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