CPNI Guidelines | Southern Linc

Southern Linc Customer Proprietary Network Information Guide

Federal law governs the use of Customer Proprietary Network Information ("CPNI"). SOUTHERN COMMUNICATIONS SERVICES, INC. D/B/A SOUTHERN LINC ("Southern Linc") uses CPNI in accordance with federal law and as stated in this Guide. Federal law defines CPNI as:

Information that relates to the quantity, technical configuration, type, destination, location, and amount of use of a telecommunications service subscribed to by any customer of a telecommunications carrier, and that is made available to the carrier by the customer solely by virtue of the carrier-customer relationship; and
Information contained in the bills pertaining to a telephone exchange service or telephone toll service received by a customer of a carrier.

For example, CPNI includes information such as the type of services that you receive and your use of those services, including, for example, call patterns and call volume. CPNI does not include information derived from non-telecommunications services we offer you.

Under federal law, you have a right, and we have a duty, to protect the confidentiality of your CPNI. We may use, disclose or transfer certain CPNI without your prior consent:

to protect (a) our rights and property, (b) you and our other customers, and (c) other carriers from fraudulent, abusive, or unlawful use of, or subscription to, our services;
to protect the integrity of our network;
to provide or market service offerings among the categories of service to which the you already subscribe; for the provision of customer premises equipment,
for billing, collection, and rendering services to you; and
to law enforcement or other government officials in connection with an investigation or prosecution of possible unlawful activity, or as otherwise required by law.

We may also engage unaffiliated third parties to assist in billing and collections, administration, surveys, marketing, service delivery and customization, maintenance and operations, network security and fraud prevention. Before sharing CPNI with unaffiliated third parties in any other way, other than as immediately described above, we will first notify you of your rights under the law, describe how we intend to use the CPNI, and give you an opportunity to opt-out of (or opt in to when required by law) such usage.

We will not use CPNI to market telecommunications services to you that are outside of the category of service to which you currently subscribe without your prior consent, and we do not share CPNI with affiliates or third parties for their use in marketing their services to you. If we seek to market telecommunications services outside of the category of services to which you already subscribe, then we will notify you at that time of your right to choose not to be a part of any such marketing campaign and give you an opportunity to opt out of (or opt in to when required by law) such campaign.

If you call or write to request any call detail information, we will send the requested information, if available and to the extent permitted by federal law, to the primary address of record for the account. If you want us to send call detail information to a third-party, you must submit your request in writing and sign a written release that (1) we approve upon receiving from you, or (2) we provide you upon receipt of your written request. Except as otherwise set forth in this Guide, we will not release any call detail information during any call initiated by you or any third-party. If the person listed as the "care of" contact for an account requests any call detail information in person, we will provide the requested call detail information, if available, to the "care of" contact if he or she presents a valid government issued ID with photograph and the ID matches the name of the "care of" contact for the account. You may incur a one-time charge if fulfillment of your request for call detail information requires us to research and provide you with more than one copy of a single month's bill. We may not be able to provide you with call detail information beyond the information listed in your current and past bills.

Under certain circumstances, federal law permits us to establish individualized authentication and information delivery procedures for business and government customers who have a dedicated account representative, but only if we agree to those procedures and the customer has executed, in advance, a new customer agreement, that explicitly establishes the specific authentication and information delivery procedures to be followed with respect to the customer's account. In the event of a conflict between the procedures described in this Guide and any customer agreement, the terms and conditions of the customer agreement will govern to the extent permitted under federal law. Business and government customers who would like to establish authentication and information delivery procedures that differ from the procedures set forth in this Guide should contact their dedicated account representative.

Our network knows the location of your phone or wireless device whenever it is turned on. If you dial 9-1-1, we may provide the network location of your phone or wireless device to (i) a public safety answering point, medical service provider, or emergency dispatch provider; (ii) a public safety, fire service, or law enforcement official; or (iii) a hospital emergency or trauma care facility. Under the law, we are also permitted to disclose the network location of a phone or wireless device without your prior consent (i) to a service user's legal guardian or members of the user's immediate family in an emergency situation that potentially involves the risk of death or serious physical harm; (ii) to database management service or information providers solely to assist in delivering emergency services; or (iii) to a government entity if we reasonably believe that an emergency involving immediate danger of death or serious physical injury to any person requires or justifies immediate disclosure of a device's location on the network. Also, if you elect to purchase, from us or any third party, any optional service that requires use or disclosure of location information in non-emergency situations, your decision to purchase the optional service constitutes your affirmative consent to the use and disclosure of location information as necessary to provide the service.

We will not disclose CPNI except as otherwise set forth in this Guide. Where we seek your consent to disclosure in advance, we may, depending upon the service, obtain your consent in a number of ways, including (i) in writing; (ii) verbally; (iii) online by clicking a button; (iv) through the use of a dialing string or button on a wireless device or handset; or (v) at the time of initiation of service when consent is required by the terms and conditions for that service. Your consent may also be implied by the nature of a request by you to us.

We may from time to time change this Guide with or without notice, so please check it regularly for any changes or updates. In addition, if you have any questions regarding this Guide, you may contact us at .