High-Speed Internet Without a Phone Line Connection

DSL is a broadband Internet type that requires a home or business be connected to telephone lines. This is because DSL works by transmitting data across traditional cable telephone lines and wires. DSL does not require that the phone lines at the customer's address be activated, however. Put another way, a customer must have telephone lines, but need not have telephone service.

Cable Internet service and fiber-optic Internet service are frequently confused, perhaps because both operate by transmitting data across a network of cables. This confusion is at times perpetuated by cable Internet providers, such as Comcast, who have some limited, fiber-optic portions of their network. Cable Internet, however, transmits this data across cable television wires and lines. Fiber-optic Internet, in contrast, uses a specially constructed network of fiber-optic cables. Neither cable Internet nor fiber-optic Internet require a phone connection or phone lines.

Satellite Internet and wireless Internet are similar, but distinct, technologies. Each enables a user to access the Internet without a wired connection, so telephone lines or active telephone service are not necessary. Satellite Internet allows users to access the Internet by connecting to a provider's satellites orbiting the Earth, while wireless Internet uses a radio link between the user's computer and the provider's location, much like cellular phones.

The development of Internet-access technologies is ongoing. One technology that recently emerged from research and begun implementation in certain areas in Internet over power lines. This form of Internet access, as it sounds, transmits data across power lines, just as DSL uses phone lines and cable Internet uses cable television lines. Internet over power lines does not require either telephone lines or telephone service.