A US District Judge says he won't be reversing his ruling that keeps VoIP providers from being regulated in Minnesota. US District Judge Michael Davis is sticking to his guns despite kickback from two state agencies and Qwest, who would like to see providers like Vonage face telco-style regulations. As we mentioned late last year, the states are eager to sink their teeth into the potential tax revenue provide by the flood of new VoIP customers, and companies like Qwest hope to reduce the erosion of land-lines to the suddenly booming industry. States also hope that by regulating VoIP, they can ensure the reliability of E-911 deployments as the technology grows more popular.

According to CNET, Davis isn't backing down on his decision despite pressure from states, industry, and others.

The past few weeks have seen an increase in discussion over the FBI's own push to see VoIP regulated; the agency hopes to force the technology into adhering to the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) which requires all phone networks to be "wiretap ready". Despite discussion the past few weeks at Slashdot, TMCNet and our forums, the FBI's push started in earnest last year. In case the FBI can't force regulation upon VoIP providers, they've been working simultaneously with hardware vendors to include back door accessibility.