In telecommunication

Telecommunication

Telecommunication is the transmission of information over significant distances to communicate. In earlier times, telecommunications involved the use of visual signals, such as beacons, smoke signals, semaphore telegraphs, signal flags, and optical heliographs, or audio messages via coded...

s, a facility is defined by Federal Standard 1037C

Federal Standard 1037C

Federal Standard 1037C, titled Telecommunications: Glossary of Telecommunication Terms is a United States Federal Standard, issued by the General Services Administration pursuant to the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act of 1949, as amended....

 as:

1. A fixed, mobile, or transportable structure, including (a) all installed electrical and electronic wiring, cabling, and equipment and (b) all supporting structures, such as utility, ground
   Ground
   Ground may refer to:* Earth's surface* Soil, a mixture of clay, sand and organic matter present on the surface of the Earth and serving as substrate for plant growth and micro-organisms development...
   
    network
   Telecommunications network
   A telecommunications network is a collection of terminals, links and nodes which connect together to enable telecommunication between users of the terminals. Networks may use circuit switching or message switching. Each terminal in the network must have a unique address so messages or connections...
   
   , and electrical supporting structures.
2. A network-provided service to users or the network operating administration.
3. A transmission
   Transmission (telecommunications)
   Transmission, in telecommunications, is the process of sending, propagating and receiving an analogue or digital information signal over a physical point-to-point or point-to-multipoint transmission medium, either wired, optical fiber or wireless...
   
    pathway and associated equipment.
4. In a protocol
   Communications protocol
   A communications protocol is a system of digital message formats and rules for exchanging those messages in or between computing systems and in telecommunications...
   
    applicable to a data
   Data
   The term data refers to qualitative or quantitative attributes of a variable or set of variables. Data are typically the results of measurements and can be the basis of graphs, images, or observations of a set of variables. Data are often viewed as the lowest level of abstraction from which...
   
    unit, such as a block
   Block (telecommunications)
   In telecommunications a block is one of:* A group of bits or digits that is transmitted as a unit and that may be encoded for error-control purposes....
   
    or frame, an additional item of information
   Information
   Information in its most restricted technical sense is a message or collection of messages that consists of an ordered sequence of symbols, or it is the meaning that can be interpreted from such a message or collection of messages. Information can be recorded or transmitted. It can be recorded as...
   
    or a constraint encoded within the protocol to provide the required control.
5. A real property
   Real property
   In English Common Law, real property, real estate, realty, or immovable property is any subset of land that has been legally defined and the improvements to it made by human efforts: any buildings, machinery, wells, dams, ponds, mines, canals, roads, various property rights, and so forth...
   
    entity consisting of one or more of the following: a building, a structure, a utility system
   System
   System is a set of interacting or interdependent components forming an integrated whole....
   
   , pavement, and underlying land.

In Canada

Under Canadian federal and Québécois provincial law, a telecommunications facility, for the purposes of determining whether GST

Goods and Services Tax (Canada)

The Goods and Services Tax is a multi-level value added tax introduced in Canada on January 1, 1991, by then Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and his finance minister Michael Wilson. The GST replaced a hidden 13.5% Manufacturers' Sales Tax ; Mulroney claimed the GST was implemented because the MST...

 applies, is defined by §123(1) of the GST Act to be "any facility, apparatus, or other thing (including any wire, cable, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic system, or any similar technical system or any part thereof) that is used or is capable of being used for telecommunications". This is a very broad definition that includes a wide range of things from satellites and earth station

Earth station

A ground station, earth station, or earth terminal is a terrestrial terminal station designed for extraplanetary telecommunication with spacecraft, and/or reception of radio waves from an astronomical radio source. Ground stations are located either on the surface of the Earth, or within Earth's...

s, to telephones and fax machines. The consequence of its application is that even a simple LAN

Local area network

A local area network is a computer network that interconnects computers in a limited area such as a home, school, computer laboratory, or office building...

connector jack can be considered to be a telecommunications facility in Canada, for tax purposes.