Still love your landline? Phone service providers are getting closer to phasing it out

More people who are still using telephone landlines will soon need to decide if they want to finally hang up on their service.

More people who are still using telephone landlines will soon need to decide if they want to finally hang up on their service. Just last week, AT&T applied for a waiver that would allow it to stop servicing traditional landlines in California. AT&T and Verizon previously stated they want to be fully operational on newer infrastructure within the next few years. That’s part of a sweeping move by phone service providers to replace older copper wire-based telephone systems lines, also known as Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS), with faster and more advanced technology that doesn’t work with landlines. Providers worldwide are shifting toward offering fiber optics and ethernet access and retiring older equipment, including the copper wires themselves. The process is also currently underway in France and the UK. Consumers will have to decide whether to give up their landlines or potentially face higher costs because of complex, expensive workarounds from the phone companies. The alternatives might not be as reliable as old-fashioned landlines either, and the process of switching the old equipment for the new could be a massive undertaking. “We’ve seen a precipitous decline in demand for telephone services provided over our copper networks,” an AT&T spokesperson told CNN. “We are focused on enhancing our network with more advanced, higher speed technologies like fiber and wireless, which consumers are demanding.”