Area code 867 is the area code in the North American Numbering Plan (NANP) for the three Canadian territories, all of which are in Northern Canada. The area code was created on October 21, 1997, by combining numbering plan areas (NPAs) 403 and 819. As the least populated NPA in mainland North America, serving about 100,000 people, it is geographically the largest, at , with Alaska a distant second. The numbering plan area is adjacent to eight provinces (Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Newfoundland and Labrador, Ontario, Saskatchewan, and Quebec) and one U.S. state (Alaska), as well as Greenland and Russia (across the North Pole), more jurisdictions than any other area code in North America. It is also one of four Canadian area codes without an overlay numbering plan, the others being 506, 709 (both of which are slated for overlays), and 807. The incumbent local exchange carrier for area code 867 is Northwestel, a subsidiary of BCE. Until 1964, the geographic area served today by 867 had up to five independent telephone companies, as well as Bell Canada. History In 1947, Alberta was assigned area code 403 in the first continent-wide telephone numbering plan by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T). When service became available from local telephone companies, Yukon and the west of the Northwest Territories were included in the Alberta numbering plan area. These companies were eventually merged into Canadian National Telecommunications, a subsidiary of the Canadian National Railway. CNT's operations in the territories became Northwestel in 1979. The eastern Northwest Territories were among the last areas of North America without telephone service. When the area code system was created, the region was nominally part of western Quebec's area code 514. In 1957, those non-diallable areas were nominally shifted to eastern Quebec's area code 418. Bell Canada introduced telephone service in the eastern Northwest Territories in 1958. As direct distance dialing was rolled out in this area in the 1970s, the eastern Northwest Territories and a large swath of northwestern Quebec were shifted to western Quebec's area code 819. Bell Canada sold its northern service territory to Northwestel in 1992. Until area code 867 was created, area codes 403 and 819 had been geographically the two largest in the North American Numbering Plan. Area code 403 spanned more than one ninth of the planet's circumference, and area code 819 spanned one eighth. Since the creation of area