Comcast internet customers have a new add-on option – xFi Advanced Security, an “artificial intelligence” security package designed to identify and block Wi-Fi intrusions and hack attacks on Internet of Things (IoT) equipment like lights, thermostats, smart meter apps, Wi-Fi equipped home appliances, security cameras, doorbells, voice enabled personal assistants, and garage door openers.

Comcast will sell the package for $5.99 a month (except for xFi Advantage customers, who get Advanced Security included at no additional cost), based on claims that hacker attacks on IoT devices are up 600% from 2016-2017.

xFi Advanced Security provides an added layer of protection for your entire network by preventing you from inadvertently accessing malicious sites, blocking remote access to smart devices from unknown or dangerous sources and monitoring activity in real time to detect when devices are behaving in unusual ways that could indicate a network threat.

Whenever a threat is detected, it’s automatically blocked and you are notified in xFi and given tips on how to resolve.

“As the digital world gets more complex, we wanted to make it simple and easy for our customers to protect their home networks. That’s why we developed xFi Advanced Security,” said Fraser Stirling, senior vice president of digital home, devices and AI for Comcast. “We want to give customers digital peace of mind for the devices they already own and the confidence to expand and evolve their connected homes knowing that every new camera, voice-assisted speaker or smart thermostat they add will be protected.”

AT&T customers with Samsung Galaxy 8 Active or LG’s V30 or V40 smartphones began noticing a new icon on their phones starting last weekend: an italicized 5GE, leading some to believe 5G wireless service has now reached AT&T’s network.

Not so fast, AT&T.

AT&T’s use of 5GE, which stands for “5G Evolution” in AT&T’s techie parlance, is another example of how wireless carriers exploit up and coming technology upgrades that are unprotected from overzealous marketing misuse. The actual 5G standard is different from 5GE, and customers using 5G on millimeter wave frequencies can expect very different performance in comparison to today’s 4G LTE experience. But with 5G being hyped in the media, AT&T is attempting to capture some of that excitement for itself.

The company’s marketing division managed to accomplish a speed and technology upgrade without spending millions of dollars on actual 5G network upgrades — just by changing an icon on customers’ phones and making them believe they are getting a 5G experience. In fact, 5GE is actually just the latest evolution of 4G LTE already known to Verizon customers as LTE-Advanced or LTE Plus on Sprint’s network — technology including carrier aggregation, 256 QAM, and 4×4 MIMO that has been in use on competing cellular networks in the U.S. since at least 2016. But just as Verizon customers saw significant speed improvements from Verizon’s updates to the 4G LTE standard, as AT&T deploys similar upgrades in each of its markets, customers should notice similar performance improvements.

AT&T claims 5GE is already live in 400+ markets with more to come. In the short term, the “upgrade” that was pushed to AT&T network devices last weekend only switched on the 5GE icon, which will mean little to AT&T customers already reached by 5GE and never knew it until this past weekend, and nothing to those still waiting for the upgrade to arrive.

Walter Piecyk, an analyst at BTIG Research, says AT&T’s latest spectrum deployments will matter more than whatever the company brands its latest upgrade, and could eventually allow AT&T to surpass Verizon Wireless in network performance.

AT&T’s recent effort to improve its network by deploying more wireless spectrum — up to 60 MHz in many areas, is not the 5G upgrade customers might expect, but it will deliver faster speeds and more performance on today’s smartphones.

AT&T calls its forthcoming actual 5G network 5G+, and the company is launching a modest but authentic 5G experience in limited “innovation zones” in Jacksonville, Fla., Atlanta, Ga., Indianapolis, Ind., Louisville, Ky., New Orleans, La., Charlotte and Raleigh, N.C., Oklahoma City, Okla., as well as Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Waco, Tex.

In a money-saving maneuver, AT&T’s combined spectrum upgrades include 20 MHz of FirstNet first responder spectrum (prime 700 MHz spectrum shared with AT&T customers except during emergencies) it received in 2017, 20 MHz of AWS-3 spectrum (1755-1780 MHz for uplink operations and 2155-2180 MHz for downlink) it acquired for $18 billion in 2015, and 20 MHz of WCS spectrum (2300 MHz) it acquired from NextWave for $650 million back in 2012. All of this spectrum is expected to be activated at the same time as technicians work to upgrade each AT&T cell tower. This dramatically cuts AT&T’s costs and truck rolls for incremental upgrades.

AT&T calls its improved 4G LTE network “5G Evolution”

“We’re turning up not only the FirstNet spectrum that we got, but all of this other spectrum that we’ve acquired over the last few years,” AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson told investors at a December conference. “So as we climb these cell towers, we turn up the spectrum. By the time we get to end of 2019, we will have increased the capacity on AT&T’s network by 50%. I mean, you just have to pause and think about this. The entire AT&T wireless network capacity is going to increase over the next 14 months by 50%. I mean, that’s huge.”

Some areas have already received partial upgrades, others may find newly improved rural coverage as AT&T meets its commitments to the government’s FirstNet platform, which calls for more robust rural coverage. Some areas that never had AT&T coverage before may get it for the first time.

AT&T’s biggest competitor, Verizon, has commanded a lead in 4G LTE coverage from 2010 forward after utilizing a considerable amount of its available spectrum for the faster standard. But Verizon has not been a robust bidder for new spectrum recently, except for the millimeter wave frequencies it bought for its emerging 5G network. It has some additional unused AWS-3 spectrum it can use for expansion, but Piecyk believes Verizon may already be using those frequencies in many markets where it is likely facing a spectrum crunch.

While AT&T lights up 60 MHz of additional spectrum, Verizon is primarily depending on the ongoing conversion of 10-15 MHz of existing spectrum it now uses for 3G service to LTE each year. But the company is reportedly running out of frequencies in areas where data demand requires that extra spectrum the most.

The only short term solution for Verizon, which is not participating in marketing hoopla like 5GE, is to make its current spectrum more efficient. That means more cell towers sharing the same frequencies to reduce the load on each tower, improved antenna technology, and using newly available spectrum in the CBRS and millimeter wave bands to manage network traffic. Verizon may even use unlicensed shared spectrum to handle some of the load. Unfortunately, smartphones equipped to take advantage of these new bands are not yet available and may not be until 2020.

For AT&T, improved network performance is seen as a key to resume robust growth in new subscribers.  After Verizon dramatically improved its LTE network in 2014, AT&T stopped growing its lucrative post-paid phone subscriber base, according to Piecyk. Now it may be AT&T’s chance to turn the tables on Verizon.

This AT&T produced video helps consumers understand what 5G, beam forming, small cells, and coverage differences between 4G and 5G are all about. Notice the 5G trial speed test showed download speeds topping out at around 137 Mbps. (4:26)

(Image courtesy: Minnesota Public Radio)

Minnesota regulators slammed the performance of Frontier Communications in a highly critical 133-page report released Friday, describing a rogue phone company that appears to have knowingly violated at least 35 state laws and operating rules, while jeopardizing the lives and wellbeing of 100,000 Frontier customers in parts of northeastern and southern Minnesota and the Twin Cities metro area.

“Many of the issues reported by consumers show direct violations of Minnesota law and Commission rules, and indicate broad, systemic problems with Frontier’s service quality, recordkeeping and business operations,” the report concluded.

A year-long investigation by the Minnesota Commerce Department found ample evidence of Frontier’s terrible customer service, fraudulent billing, and its rapidly deteriorating and often decrepit landline network, sometimes left in disrepair for months or years with little regard for the safety of customers, workers, or the public.

As part of the investigation, seven public hearings were held last fall in Frontier’s Minnesota service area. The resulting report is based on more than 1,000 consumer complaints and statements, as well as Frontier’s responses to information requests by the Commerce Department.

In many cases, Frontier left health-compromised customers using landline-based health/safety monitoring services without phone service for over a month, putting cost-saving measures ahead of the safety of customers that need reliable phone service the most. The investigation also found “that orders for new telephone or internet access service, being a new source of revenue for Frontier, and a sales commission for the customer service representative, take priority over repairs of internet or phone.”

The report also blasted Frontier’s shoddy customer service department, described as “shocking” in the report. In dozens of complaints, customers reported correcting service problems was often a nightmare.

Decrepit Network Facilities Falling Off Poles and Drowned in Ditches

Frontier wireline pedestal in Kelsey, Minn., knocked over and submersed in ice water. (Image courtesy of: Mr. and Ms. Ulshafer)

Waterville, Minn. residents that have experienced frequent outages for years were given every excuse in the book by Frontier officials, at one point blaming a mouse in a central office for chewing through their phone lines. Frontier customer Harry Tolzman chronicled years of Frontier’s apparent ineptness in providing reliable phone and internet service to his rural part of Minnesota. His testimony to Minnesota regulators, reproduced in part below, explains a lot of what the report found wrong at Frontier Communications these days:

“[One day, Frontier] decided that they needed to rebury the telephone cable that was — that ran from Elysian to our rural route Waterville, so they contract[ed] with an outfit out of Indiana, Direct Line Communications Underground Burying, who in turn sublets to another company called Premier Underground. So one day these guys show up from Indiana and they needed to bore underneath State Highway 60 to get the cable from across the highway to our residence, which was on the north side of the highway. So they came out and they bored underneath the highway and they ran the cable and then they got into a big argument with the local technician as to where the cable was to run and so they got mad and left.

The next day another outfit, same, Premier Underground out of Indiana, shows up, and they were supposed to connect the cable from the highway down to the closest junction box, which is about 100 yards from my place to the road and it’s another 100 yards from the road to the nearest junction box. So they started in with their plow and they plowed up to the house and they hit some tree trunks and the plow would jump out of the ground.

Finally they got up to the house where I had decorative rock and they say, well, we can’t dig here so we’ll just lay it on top of the rock. And then wherever it jumped out of the ground because of a root, it’s buried about one inch below the ground, in other places it’s 8 or 10 inches, where it should be. So anyhow, they said that’s the best we can do. Then they went across the road to make the connection to the nearest junction box, and they went right down the shoulder of the road about three feet off the blacktop and they were going down the road with their plow. And lo and behold, the state highway department drove by and happened to see them going right down the shoulder of the road. And so they questioned them, and lo and behold they didn’t have a permit to bury this cable.

So the next day a guy shows up and he hooks up his pickup to the cable and he pulls it all out. And the local technician comes out and he lays a temporary line on top of the ground over to where they had plowed underneath the road, and he made the connection so we could get our telephone service back. And they said they would be back to re-bury it in the proper right-of-way position as soon as they had the proper permits. That was two and a half years ago. And this cable is laying in the road ditch, and meanwhile the state highway department came along and they mowed the road ditch and they cut the cable. So they replaced the cable again. And then another time a snowmobile took the cable out. So that cable still lies there strung between the sumac bushes so that they can’t mow it when they mow the road ditch.

And I keep calling these people to get this fixed and they keep telling me, well, they don’t have the permit yet. So I called the highway department in Mankato and they say there’s been no application for a permit to re-bury your cable. In the interim, I had opened up a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission, which is located in Washington, D.C., and they in turn responded to me. And Frontier had the gall to tell them that they had investigated the above statements and offered the following resolution. Upon the investigation, Frontier showed that the line was repaired as of August 11, 2017, Frontier will be burying the line on August 31, 2017. Frontier spoke with Mr. Tolzman and advised him of the above information. They had the gall to tell them it was fixed and that same problem is still there, the cable lies between the bushes. So whenever we have moisture or rain, we’ll be out of service for our landline phone. And it’s just very frustrating to have to call and get a customer service rep many states away that runs his routine check and tells you, well, the problem is not on their end, it’s in your house, and yet it’s never been a problem within the house.”

A Frontier installer draped a new line across this customer’s residential propane tank, and then left. (Image courtesy: (Image courtesy: Mark Steil, MPR News)

As Stop the Cap! reported in 2018, Frontier’s network infrastructure in Minnesota was literally falling off utility poles. Customers reported Frontier technicians used trees as makeshift utility poles, strung phone cables across yards and fields, unburied, and in one case, draped a phone cable over the customer’s propane tank. Despite months or years of complaints, Frontier repeatedly failed to repair infrastructure it knew or should have known was in disrepair, and in several documented cases, Frontier technicians dealt with the loudest complaining customers by swapping line pairs with a satisfied customer, silencing the complaining customer while giving their troublesome or failing line to another customer without their knowledge.

Company officials also lobbied Minnesota officials hard over the summer of 2018 to limit the scope of the investigation into its business practices in the state, claiming at one point that anything short of a gag order forbidding customers from complaining at public hearings about the performance of Frontier’s DSL service would “violate federal law” and “create false expectations and confusion for customers.”

“Holding public hearings directed to internet access service complaints would not be constructive because the Commission would be precluded from taking action concerning internet service rates or service quality using any information it may collect during the public hearings,” Frontier claimed.

Customer Service Hell

Elizabeth Mohr’s testimony described an experience typical of many Frontier complaints. When Mohr complained about the poor quality of her Frontier DSL service, which came nowhere near the 12 Mbps she was offered, Frontier unilaterally disconnected her service without notice, leaving her without phone service for 12 days. The company “lost” five of the six repair tickets assigned to Mohr’s disconnect complaint. Frontier later refused to reactivate her DSL service, claiming it had “no ports available,” despite the fact taxpayers helped subsidize the expansion of internet access in her neighborhood.

“We found it took us 47 of our hours on the phone with Frontier to get service, even though they sent us a flier that said you should be able to call and get it,” Mohr testified. “So 47 hours on the phone of our time, six tickets, five of which were closed with no answer. They never showed up.”

Frontier’s bad customer service isn’t a new experience for Mohr either.

“You can get better service from them but you have to be willing to put up a fight. I have been hung up on, probably in the last 13 years, probably 200 times,” Mohr said. “When I would call and say, I have an issue with your network, they wouldn’t believe me. Between my husband and myself, we have 20 years of network administration. We could ping to their system and tell them where the problem was failing and they wouldn’t believe us, and they would hang up on us. So clearly, Frontier has a problem.”

Shellie Metzler of Finlayson claimed she has to be placed on a waiting list to have her phone line repaired — something more in common with East Berlin in the 1970s than the United States in 2019. She waited over a year for repairs for her basic Frontier landline and DSL service, repeatedly being told in over 20 hours of phone calls with the company “there were no lines available.”

The wait was not worth it. After service was installed, Ms. Metzler reported, “I could not hear when on the phone because of the static. Also, each time the phone rang, the internet would go offline.”

Like many Minnesotans, Metzler is still paying for broadband internet service she is not receiving. Metzler was sold Frontier’s Broadband Ultra 12 Mbps DSL service.

“I am receiving, if lucky, 1.2 Mbps,” Metzler reported. “Last week within two days the internet dropped over 100 times. Dropped service and slow internet speeds are everyday occurrences. I should not be charged for the 12 Mbps because I have never had it. I should not be charged for the 6 Mbps because I do not get that either.”

The report also had little positive to say about Frontier’s customer service department:

Subscribers received inaccurate information and expressed great frustration when dealing with Frontier’s customer service personnel, even characterizing the service as being rude and/or unhelpful. Customers also said Frontier’s customer service representatives would often refuse to transfer the customer to a supervisor or the supervisor would fail to return their call as requested.

Many customers reported that contacting Frontier was anything but convenient, describing long hold times prior to speaking with a customer service representatives. Also, several consumers reported that they believed Frontier representatives were unqualified, untrained, or otherwise provided them with inaccurate information. In some cases, representatives yelled at customers and accused them of being rude or inappropriate.

Frontier’s Repairs: ‘Like Placing a Band-Aid on a Hemorrhage’

Frontier’s “High Speed” 21st Century Network fantasy claims extend back to 2010 when former CEO Maggie Wilderotter was telling customers Frontier was loaded with fiber.

The state investigation also uncovered evidence that Frontier often “repairs” poor service for a complaining customer by swapping the bad line pair with another customer with good service who is not likely to complain when their service suddenly deteriorates:

Frontier’s practice is that, when one customer is out of service [or is receiving impaired service] and requests repair, in order to restore service to that subscriber, Frontier disconnects, without notice, the service of another subscriber, and “swaps” the other subscriber’s working lines or cards for the non-working line or card of the subscriber whose service is being restored.

A typical example is the public comment of Debra Boldt of Glen, Minn., who lives on a lake with some summer residents. Ms. Boldt reported that to restore service to one neighbor, Frontier switches non-working lines with the working line of a summer resident who may not know their service is disconnected until they next visit; and, when that person complains, Frontier will then switch the working line from a different resident.

Similarly, Tom Grant testified at the Lakeville public hearing that Frontier technicians have told him, “they basically move cards or switches to be able to solve the problem for that individual customer, while knowing full well that that creates havoc for others that reside on that same node.”

Wayne Nierenhausen testified that technicians have told him: “[W]hen they get a complaint, there’s some kind of card within that box that’s a quarter-mile from my house that they will change to basically whoever made the complaint to get faster speed, but then when another call is made, they’ll switch that card out, put it to whoever made the complaint, and then put the old card back in.”

Customer service problems particularly affect the elderly and infirm, who are the most likely to still have landline service.

The report also heavily criticized Frontier for covering up problems by miscoding trouble reports and service outages to avoid drawing regulator attention. Outages impacting regulated basic phone service were frequently classified as unregulated internet outages, coded as being the fault of the customer, or trouble tickets were closed before repairs were completed. Closing trouble tickets prematurely also extends an extra benefit to Frontier — the company will not credit customers for extended outages if the original trouble ticket is closed.

As a last resort, if Frontier deems repairs too costly, customers are told to “live with it.”

Medically Necessary Phone Service Repairs Ignored

The report also found Frontier’s unwillingness to expedite repairs for customers with serious medical issues were “shocking” because customers were often not informed service representatives have no authority to request a medical-related expedited repair, and notes placed on customer accounts by those representatives are routinely ignored. The company admitted the only way a customer can be flagged a medical priority customer is if a doctor certifies annually, in writing, there is a medical need to maintain reliable phone service:

A letter/document must be received from the customer’s physician annually certifying that a medical emergency exists and that phone service is essential, and that the letter or document must contain the following:

• State registration or license number of physician.
• Name and address of seriously ill person.
• Name, signature of licensed physician or public health official (nurse or physician’s assistant) certifying illness or medical emergency and date.
• Optional – Any services beyond local exchange service that may be necessary to reach customer’s doctor and that absence of such services would be a serious risk of inaccessibility of emergency medical assistance.

Customers are instructed to mail or fax the documentation to:

Frontier Correspondence
PO Box 5166
Tampa, FL 33675
Fax: 1- 888-609-9919

Billing Controversies

Frontier used to mail checks refunding credit balances to departing customers. Today they mail gift cards, occasionally with no balance on them.

The report also found many “direct violations” of Minnesota law and rules from the company’s billing practices. Customers reported Frontier misrepresented its “vacation rate,” offering discounted phone service during seasonal disconnects at vacation properties. Instead, many customers report being billed normal rates and were refused credits, even when the company admitted the problem was theirs and would be fixed.

Customers also report steep late fees for online payments made before the due date, because Frontier reserves the right to take at least five days (and sometimes more) to process online payments, and does not always honor the date of payments initiated by customers. Many others reported Frontier continued to bill closed accounts for months despite cancelling service. One customer who refused to pay several hundred dollars in new charges on his closed account had his credit ruined after Frontier reported him delinquent. A subsequent agreement to pay off the outstanding bills on the closed account in return for getting negative information removed from his credit report was later refused by Frontier… after the company cashed his check.

Customers who pass away while being Frontier customers had better share their account passwords with surviving relatives. As Tabitha Odegaard discovered after her father in law passed away in November 2017, Frontier will not cancel service for deceased customers without a proper account password. Odegaard told regulators she was still paying for service on behalf of her father-in-law in 2018.

Customers that plan to cancel service might be better off removing auto-pay from their account and not paying their last bill until a final bill is generated. Receiving refunds for cancelled service is a hit-or-miss affair at Frontier, according to the report. Customers must wait at least 90 days for a refund to arrive. Most customers end up with a gift card covering any credit balances, but some report their gift card arrived with a zero balance, or did not arrive at all. In such cases, customers have to wait an additional two months before a replacement card will be issued. One customer reported his refund took seven months to arrive, after getting a gift card with no balance on it. Other customers report only getting a credit balance on their monthly bill for their closed account, with no refund, gradually depleted by ongoing billing fees, taxes and surcharges that accrue each month. The credit balance runs out while waiting for a refund that never arrives.

Report Recommends Fundamental Changes and Frontier Responds

The report recommends that Frontier be required to refund or credit customers for service outages and unauthorized charges; add staffing to improve customer service; and increase investments in infrastructure and equipment.

Frontier responded with a written statement, reading in part:

“Frontier strongly disagrees with the assertions in the Department of Commerce’s initial comments and is reviewing the Department’s filing with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission. Frontier and its employees work hard to provide reliable, affordable telecommunications services to approximately 90,000 customers in Minnesota, many in rural communities where no other provider will invest in providing service. Frontier recognizes we experience service issues and delays from time-to-time with some of our customers. We are an ethical company committed to our customers and the Minnesota communities we serve. We take this matter seriously and will respond appropriately before the Public Utilities Commission.”

Minnesota Public Radio reported in October 2018 that Frontier has slashed its technical workforce by 50% in Minnesota over the last five years. (4:08)

Windstream announced this week it was ditching EarthLink, the internet service provider it acquired in 2017 that has been around since the days of dial-up, in a $330 million cash deal.

Trive Capital of Dallas, Tex., is the new owner of the consumer-facing ISP, which today primarily serves customers over some cable broadband and DSL providers.

EarthLink launched in 1994, when almost everyone accessed online services over dial-up telephone modem connections using providers like AOL, CompuServe, Prodigy, and MSN. EarthLink rode the Dot.Com boom and secured funding to build its own multi-city, dial-in access network, allowing customers to reach the service over local, toll-free access numbers. This allowed EarthLink to be among the first ISPs in the country to offer unlimited, flat rate access for $19.95 a month at a time when some other providers charged in excess of $12 an hour during the business day to use their services.

EarthLink grew to become America’s second largest ISP, reaching 4.4 million subscribers in mid-2001 — still dwarfed by 25 million AOL customers, but well-respected for its wide-reaching availability over more than 1,700 local dial-in numbers around the country. But 2001 was as good as it would get at EarthLink.

The newly inaugurated administration of George W. Bush and its deregulatory-minded FCC Chairman Michael Powell quickly threatened to derail EarthLink’s success.

One of the most important steps in setting up a new business is company registration. While it may be tempting to try to navigate this process on your own, there are many benefits to using Acclime’s business registration services in Singapore.

As EarthLink’s balance sheet increasingly exposed the high wholesale cost of the company’s growing number of DSL and cable internet customers, executives calmed Wall Street with predictions that EarthLink’s wholesale costs would drop as networks matured and the costs to deploy DSL and cable internet declined. The phone and cable industry had other ideas.

Under intense lobbying by the Baby Bell phone companies, the FCC voted in 2003 to eliminate a requirement that forced phone companies to allow competitors fair and reasonable access to dial-up infrastructure and networks. The cable industry had never lived under similar guaranteed access rules, a point frequently made by telephone company lobbyists seeking to repeal the guaranteed “unbundled” access requirements. Lobbyists (and industry funded researchers) also claimed that by allowing competitors open access to their networks, it created a hostile climate for investors, deterring phone companies from moving forward on plans to scrap existing copper wire networks and invest in nationwide fiber to the home service instead.

Both the FCC (and later the courts) found the industry’s argument compelling. EarthLink protested the move was anti-competitive and could give the phone and cable company an effective duopoly in the business of selling internet access. Others argued the industry’s commitments to build out fiber networks came with no guarantees. FCC Commissioner Michael Copps warned that Americans would pay the price for the FCC’s unbundling decision:

I am troubled that we are undermining competition, particularly in the broadband market, by limiting — on a nationwide basis in all markets for all customers – competitors’ access to broadband loop facilities whenever an incumbent deploys a mixed fiber/copper loop. That means that as incumbents deploy fiber anywhere in their loop plant — a step carriers have been taking in any event over the past years to reduce operating expenses — they are relieved of the unbundling obligations that Congress imposed to ensure adequate competition in the local market.

[…] I fear that this decision may well result in higher prices for consumers and put us on the road to re-monopolization of the local broadband market.

Blinky, EarthLink’s mascot, was featured in instructional videos introducing customers to “the World Wide Web” and how to buy books on Amazon.com

In the end, the industry got what it wanted during the Bush Administration, and was also able to effectively wiggle out of its prior commitments to scrap copper networks in favor of fiber optics. Phone companies were also able to raise wholesale prices on providers like EarthLink. In 2002, EarthLink paid about $35 per month to phone companies for each subscriber’s DSL connection, for which the ISP charged customers $49 a month. Financial reports quickly showed EarthLink started losing money on each DSL customer, because it could keep only about $14 a month for itself. The cable industry was slightly more forgiving, if companies voluntarily allowed EarthLink on their emerging cable broadband networks. In general, cable operators charged EarthLink $30 a month for each connection, which gave EarthLink about the same revenue it earned from its dial-up business.

An even bigger threat to EarthLink’s future came when phone and cable companies got into the business of selling internet access as well, usually undercutting the prices of competitors like EarthLink with promotional rates and bundled service discounts.

EarthLink’s subscriber numbers dropped quickly as DSL and cable internet became more prevalent, and customers defected to their providers’ own internet access plans. Attempts by EarthLink to diversify its business by offering security software, web hosting, email, and other services had limited success in the residential marketplace.

By the mid-2010s, EarthLink primarily existed as a little-known alternative for some cable broadband customers and DSL users. But beyond initial promotional pricing, there was no compelling reason for a customer to sign up, given there was usually little or no difference between the prices charged by EarthLink and those charged by the phone or cable company for its own service. EarthLink’s competitors, including AOL and MSN, also saw subscriber numbers start to drop for similar reasons, especially when their customers dropped dial-up access in favor of broadband connections. This was strong evidence that companies that do not own their own networks were now at a strong competitive disadvantage, held captive by unregulated wholesale pricing and no incentive for phone or cable companies to treat them fairly.

In 2017, Windstream paid $1.1 billion for EarthLink, primarily to consolidate fiber-optic network assets and improve its business services segment. After more than a year, Windstream realized EarthLink’s residential ISP service had little relevance to them.

“People paid $5 to $10 a month for email,” Windstream spokesman Chris King told Bloomberg News. “It was not a strategic asset for us.”

With subscriber numbers still dropping to around 600,000 today, Windstream decided the time was right to sell.

“This transaction enables us to divest a non-core segment and focus exclusively on our two largest business units. In addition, it improves our credit profile and metrics in 2019 and beyond,” said Tony Thomas, president and CEO of Windstream.

An EarthLink television ad from 2004. (1:00)