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Good practice Imported

Sorenson Video Relay Service — FCC-Funded ASL Video Interpreting

United States of America · Salt Lake City · See the United States of America profile · See the Salt Lake City profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 30% 88/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Sorenson VRS (Salt Lake City, USA) lets Deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans call hearing users via live ASL interpreters, funded by the FCC's TRS Fund — the dominant US provider, fined $34.6M in 2024 for illegal data retention.

70 %+
Historical share of US VRS call minutes handled
$34.6M
FCC CaptionCall privacy-violation settlement (2024)
4,000+
Interpreters trained in 2024 (2024)
Sorenson Video Relay Service — FCC-Funded ASL Video Interpreting

Details

Promoter
Sorenson Communications, LLC
Period
2000/2003–present
Keywords
deaf & hard-of-hearing, telecommunications relay, sign language interpreting, accessibility

Context

Sorenson Communications, founded in 2000 in Salt Lake City, has offered FCC TRS-Fund-compensated Video Relay Service for American Sign Language users since 2003, and describes itself as the largest US VRS provider and largest private employer of ASL interpreters.

Results

Sorenson historically handled over 70% of US VRS minutes and reported delivering 30,000 hours of interpreter training to 4,000+ interpreters in 2024. The record includes real governance caveats: a 2014 Chapter 11 bankruptcy, current private-equity ownership, and a July 2024 FCC settlement of $34.6M (including a $5M penalty and $12M in Fund reimbursement) after CaptionCall unlawfully retained users' call content and submitted inaccurate reimbursement claims.

Implementation

Implementation detail (cost, timeline, staffing, conditions for success) is not yet available for this practice.

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