4-1-1 is a
telephone number
A telephone number is a sequence of digits assigned to a landline telephone subscriber station connected to a telephone line or to a wireless electronic telephony device, such as a radio telephone or a mobile telephone, or to other devices f ...
for local
directory assistance
In telecommunications, directory assistance or directory inquiries is a phone service used to find out a specific telephone number and/or address of a residence, business, or government entity.
Technology
Directory assistance systems incorporate ...
in
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
and the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
. Until the early 1980s, 4-1-1 and the related 1-1-3 number were free to call in most states.
In the United States, the service is common known as “information” although it official name is “directory assistance”. As a result, 4-1-1 is commonly used in Canada and the United States as a slang word for "information". In the 1982 song "
Jump to It" by American singer
Aretha Franklin
Aretha Louise Franklin ( ; March 25, 1942 – August 16, 2018) was an American singer, songwriter and pianist. Referred to as the " Queen of Soul", she has twice been placed ninth in ''Rolling Stone''s "100 Greatest Artists of All Time". With ...
, for example, the lyric is "We have a lot of fun, don't we, girl, dishin' out
The dirt on everybody and givin' each other the 411".
History
The 4-1-1 number has been used since at least 1930 in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
,
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
, and other large cities where
panel
Panel may refer to:
Arts and media Visual arts
* Panel (comics), a single image in a comic book, comic strip or cartoon; also, a comic strip containing one such image
*Panel painting, in art, either one element of a multi-element piece of art ...
and
crossbar
Crossbar may refer to:
Structures
* Latch (hardware), a post barring a door
* Top tube of a bicycle frame
* Crossbar, the horizontal member of various sports goals
* Crossbar, a horizontal member of an electricity pylon
Other
* In electronic ...
switching equipment installed by the
Bell System
The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over one hundr ...
was prevalent. However, in smaller Bell System cities as well as almost all areas served by
GTE
GTE Corporation, formerly General Telephone & Electronics Corporation (1955–1982), was the largest independent telephone company in the United States during the days of the Bell System. The company operated from 1926, with roots tracing furth ...
and other companies where
step-by-step
Step by Step may refer to:
Film and television
* Step by Step (1946 film), ''Step by Step'' (1946 film), an American film directed by Phil Rosen
* Step by Step (2002 film), ''Step by Step'' (2002 film), a Belgian film directed by Philippe Blasba ...
equipment was the norm such as
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
, 1-1-3 was used until at least the 1960s, and in some cases (the
Pacific Northwest
The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though ...
, for example) until the mid-1980s.
In Canada and the United States, directory assistance was historically a local function, and most companies updated listings at their directory assistance centers frequently, sometimes daily. When
long-distance
Long distance or Long-distance may refer to:
*Long-distance calling
* Long-distance operator
* Long-distance relationship
* Long-distance train
*Long-distance anchor pylon, see dead-end tower
Footpaths
* Long-distance trail
*European long-d ...
numbers were needed, prior to the full introduction of direct-dialed long-distance service, callers would call either 4-1-1 or "0" (
Operator) and request a free long-distance connection to the directory assistance center in the distant city.
In 1962, direct-dialed long-distance directory assistance became available. The number in cities with panel and crossbar switching equipment was
area code
A telephone numbering plan is a type of numbering scheme used in telecommunication to assign telephone numbers to subscriber telephones or other telephony endpoints. Telephone numbers are the addresses of participants in a telephone network, rea ...
-555-1212, whereas in cities with step-by-step equipment the number was 1-555-1212 (or 112-555-1212) for numbers not local but in the same area code and 1-area code-555-1212 (or 112-area code-555-1212) for numbers in other area codes. In some area codes, the directory assistance center was able to serve the entire area code, but in many, the operator in the principal city of the area code dialed would connect the caller onward to a more local directory assistance center for the most up-to-date information.
After the introduction of
local exchange competition, most telephone companies outsourced directory assistance service to nationwide call centers. This has blurred the distinction between 4-1-1 and 555-1212. For
regulatory reasons, where telephone service is provided by traditional local-exchange carriers, the
local carrier will determine how to handle 411, the chosen local toll (intra-
LATA
Lata (Hindi: लता) is a Hindu/Sanskrit Indian female given name, which means "creeper" and "vine". Lata may refer to:
Notable people named Lata
*Lata Bhatt (born 1954), Indian singer.
*Lata (born 1975), Musician.
*Lata Mangeshkar (1929–20 ...
) carrier will determine how to handle 555-1212 calls for area codes within the LATA, and the chosen
long-distance carrier for inter-LATA) calls will determine how to handle other area code-555-1212 calls. For service provided by cellular and
VoIP
Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...
carriers where the customer does not have a choice of local toll or long-distance carriers, all calls may be handled the same way.
In North America, all areas formerly using 1-1-3 have been converted to using 4-1-1, and 1-1- is now reserved for
vertical service code
A vertical service code (VSC) is a sequence of digits and the signals star (*) and number sign (#) dialed on a telephone keypad or rotary dial to enable or disable certain telephone service features. Some vertical service codes require dialing of ...
s. Outside North America, "1-1-N" numbers are still in use, for these and other services. In most European countries, "1-1-N" numbers are related to emergency services and
112 112 may refer to:
*112 (number), the natural number following 111 and preceding 113
*112 (band), an American R&B quartet from Atlanta, Georgia
**112 (album), ''112'' (album), album from the band of the same name
*112 (emergency telephone number), t ...
is the
emergency telephone number
Most public switched telephone networks have a single emergency telephone number (sometimes known as the universal emergency telephone number or the emergency services number) that allows a caller to contact local emergency services for assista ...
of the
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...
and some non-EU countries across the world.
The relationship between 4-1-1, 1-1-3, and long-distance dialing
Direct-distance dialing (DDD) was first introduced in areas with common-control switching (
panel
Panel may refer to:
Arts and media Visual arts
* Panel (comics), a single image in a comic book, comic strip or cartoon; also, a comic strip containing one such image
*Panel painting, in art, either one element of a multi-element piece of art ...
and
crossbar
Crossbar may refer to:
Structures
* Latch (hardware), a post barring a door
* Top tube of a bicycle frame
* Crossbar, the horizontal member of various sports goals
* Crossbar, a horizontal member of an electricity pylon
Other
* In electronic ...
) in the 1950s. These areas had used 4-1-1 for directory assistance, and because of the ability of common-control switching to analyze the initial digits of a number in a "
sender
A sender was a special type of circuit in 20th-century electromechanical telephone exchanges which registered the telephone numbers dialed by the subscriber, and then transmitted that information to another exchange. In some American exchange desi ...
" before routing the call, these areas did not require the dialing of an initial "1" to initiate a
long-distance call
In telecommunications, a long-distance call (U.S.) or trunk call (also known as a toll call in the U.K. ) is a telephone call made to a location outside a defined local calling area. Long-distance calls are typically charged a higher billing rate ...
. There was no ambiguity, because the initial assignment of
area code
A telephone numbering plan is a type of numbering scheme used in telecommunication to assign telephone numbers to subscriber telephones or other telephony endpoints. Telephone numbers are the addresses of participants in a telephone network, rea ...
s always used either a "0" or a "1" as the second digit, and the second digit of local numbers was never a "0" or a "1" because of the use of two-letter plus 5-digit local numbering, with the letters only on digits 2-9 of the dial.
Areas with
step-by-step
Step by Step may refer to:
Film and television
* Step by Step (1946 film), ''Step by Step'' (1946 film), an American film directed by Phil Rosen
* Step by Step (2002 film), ''Step by Step'' (2002 film), a Belgian film directed by Philippe Blasba ...
equipment processed the call one digit at a time as dialed by the caller, and thus needed a common prefix to distinguish long-distance dialing from local calls. The Bell System design choice was "1", but since "1-1-3" was in use for directory assistance, along with other "1-1-" codes ("Repair" was 1-1-4)., changes had to be made in the step-by-step areas. Initially, "1-1-2" was used temporarily as the prefix in most of these areas. To simplify long-distance calling, it was desirable to change this to a "1". Some areas converted immediately to 4-1-1 for directory assistance and 6-1-1 for repair. Other areas retained 1-1-3 by installing what were known as "double-header" trunks, which actually connected the call to the long-distance equipment and then "snatched it back" if the second digit was also a "1".
The conversion proceeded as follows in Springfield, Massachusetts:
Directory assistance data
The services of
directory assistance
In telecommunications, directory assistance or directory inquiries is a phone service used to find out a specific telephone number and/or address of a residence, business, or government entity.
Technology
Directory assistance systems incorporate ...
queries is often outsourced to a
call centre
A call centre ( Commonwealth spelling) or call center (American spelling; see spelling differences) is a managed capability that can be centralised or remote that is used for receiving or transmitting a large volume of enquiries by telephone. ...
who specializes in that function. Historically, when a single carrier provided most of the telephone services for a region, the data used to satisfy the search could exclusively come for that carrier's subscriber rolls. Today, when the market is fragmented amongst many carriers, the data must be aggregated by a
data aggregator Data aggregation is the compiling of information from databases with intent to prepare combined datasets for data processing.
Description
The United States Geological Survey explains that, “when data are well documented, you know how and where to ...
specializing in directory listings, such a
LSSi The
data aggregator Data aggregation is the compiling of information from databases with intent to prepare combined datasets for data processing.
Description
The United States Geological Survey explains that, “when data are well documented, you know how and where to ...
distributes the data to the 4-1-1 services either on a "live" basis, actually servicing each query, or by periodically transferring large swaths of listings to the call center's systems for local searching.
The
data aggregator Data aggregation is the compiling of information from databases with intent to prepare combined datasets for data processing.
Description
The United States Geological Survey explains that, “when data are well documented, you know how and where to ...
collects the data from the rolls of many telecommunication carriers. Some carriers such as
Vonage
Vonage (, legal name Vonage Holdings Corp.) is an American cloud communications provider operating as a subsidiary of Ericsson. Headquartered in Holmdel Township, New Jersey, the organization was founded in 1998 as ''Min-X'' as a provider of resi ...
do not send their customer rolls to the aggregator. Their customers can get their listings in the directory assistance database using a free service such a
ListYourself.net
Landline telephone directory assistance
4-1-1 landline service has been historically provided by local telephone companies, including those of the former
Bell System
The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over one hundr ...
or subsequent
Regional Bell Operating Companies
The Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOC) are the result of '' United States v. AT&T'', the U.S. Department of Justice antitrust suit against the former American Telephone & Telegraph Company (later known as AT&T Corp.). On January 8, 1 ...
(RBOCs). Telephone carriers since that time may provide the 4-1-1 calls to the customer free of charge and
se ad supported or a customer retention modelmeaning unknown]
Since the 1984
Bell System divestiture
The breakup of the Bell System was mandated on January 8, 1982, by an agreed consent decree providing that AT&T Corporation would, as had been initially proposed by AT&T, relinquish control of the Bell Operating Companies, which had provided loc ...
, the
RBOC
The Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOC) are the result of '' United States v. AT&T'', the U.S. Department of Justice antitrust suit against the former American Telephone & Telegraph Company (later known as AT&T Corp.). On January 8, 198 ...
s in the United States have priced 4-1-1 use higher to an average of US$1.25 per call, compared to $0.50
CAD
Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computers (or ) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. This software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve co ...
in most of Canada, providing opportunities for competing services in the United States, such as ad-sponsored
1-800-FREE-411
1-800-FREE-411 is an American service offering advertising-supported directory assistance, operated by Marchex.
Service
Callers dial 1-800 (888 or 866)-FREE411 73-3411from any phone in the United States to use the toll-free service. Sponsors cov ...
.
Wireless telephone directory listings
In addition to the local and long-distance directory services, there is also a "Wireless 411 Service". As specified by the industry, the service will give wireless subscribers the choice of including their wireless phone numbers in directory assistance services.
Consumers can opt in to listing their name and cellphone number with directory assistance services, such as 411. The information is currently not published in print or online directories. Additionally, the information is not added to, or otherwise shared with, marketing lists or telemarketing firms.
The service will allow any
landline
A landline (land line, land-line, main line, home phone, fixed-line, and wireline) is a telephone connection that uses metal wires or optical fiber telephone line for transmission, as distinguished from a mobile cellular network, which uses ...
or wireless phone user to call 4-1-1 and be connected to the wireless listing of a subscriber who has chosen to participate in the service. Carriers who make up the industry LLC creating the service include
Alltel
Alltel Wireless was a wireless service provider, primarily based in the United States. Before acquisitions by Verizon Wireless and AT&T, it served 34 states and had approximately 13 million subscribers. As a regulatory condition of the acquisition ...
(now absorbed by
Verizon Wireless
Verizon is an American wireless network operator that previously operated as a separate division of Verizon Communications under the name Verizon Wireless. In a 2019 reorganization, Verizon moved the wireless products and services into the divi ...
),
AT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile tel ...
,
T-Mobile, and Sprint Nextel
Sprint Corporation was an American telecommunications company. Before it merged with T-Mobile US on April 1, 2020, it was the fourth-largest mobile network operator in the United States, serving 54.3 million customers as of June 30, 2019. The co ...
(now absorbed by T-Mobile).
Withdrawal of 4-1-1 services
In the United States cellular market, AT&T announced its withdrawal of 4-1-1 service for its wireless phone customers, effective November 1 2022. AT&T also announced it will discontinue landline 4-1-1 services in 21 states starting January 1st, 2023.
See also
*
800-The-Info
800-The-Info (or 1-800-843-4636) was a toll-free directory assistance (DA) and information service provided in the United States by Verizon. 800-The-Info was subsidized by businesses that purchase advertising space on the service. Callers did not ...
*
Bing Mobile
Bing for mobile (formerly ''Live Search Mobile'') is a search tool for handheld mobile devices from Microsoft as part of their Bing search engine. It is designed for mobile device displays. Bing Mobile is built into Windows Mobile and Windows Pho ...
*
GOOG-411
GOOG-411 (or Google Voice Local Search) was a telephone service launched by Google in 2007, that provided a speech-recognition-based business directory search, and placed a call to the resulting number in the United States or Canada. The servi ...
*
Speech recognition
Speech recognition is an interdisciplinary subfield of computer science and computational linguistics that develops methodologies and technologies that enable the recognition and translation of spoken language into text by computers with the m ...
*
Tellme Networks
*
N11 Code
References
Further reading
2006 survey from Tellme Networks, Inc. about 411 usageThe Kelsey Group report on wireless voice search(10/2006)
{{N11_codes
Directory assistance services
Three-digit telephone numbers