An open letter to American broadcasters:

Whether serendipity or luck; we seem to be in an exceptional place. As the following article summarizes, it seems that we have the only combination of assets and technologies that make for effective Emergency Mass Communications. There are no practical alternatives.

 With NVISA and FEMA in the lab, and what we hear from several milieus about the interest and willingness to invest in public safety, we are at a tipping point.

 Acting as if our goal is to return TV to its bygone role as primary alerting and informing appliance is not helping. Smartphones dominate and “mobile first” is a respectable adoption strategy.

 Everything good and bad with emergency communications occurs at the user interface. No one is happy with the current brain-dead, inconsistently alerting everyone everywhere, test it until no one listens state of affairs.

 Sure, with 3.0 we have vastly better distribution and IP support, and presently broadcast news is uniquely the highpoint of electronic mass communications in crisis—but none of that matters without a national, universal, quality app and first-rate user experience.

 It’s time to ask Congress/FEMA/FCC… the people who represent and protect us from invasion to tornadoes… to build what saves lives and property with our 3.0/broadcast assets. Intentionally or accidentally, broadcasters have already done their part. We have coverage and a protocol begging to be used.

The field piece of development is probably best done in the "Switzerland" of PBS/CPB. The lab should be FEMA’s. The broadcaster’s role going forward is to make sure this works with and enhances our news and our other assets.

 Or maybe there is a better path?

Fred Baumgartner

This article originally appeared in The Spectrum Monitor and is the third in a series about NextGen Broadcasting:

Radio and public safety have always and forever been bound together. The lives radio has saved and the reduction in human suffering is colossal. The Spectrum Monitor (TSM) readers, especially first responders, know this in ways others do not.

Mass communications during an emergency has been broadcasting’s highest calling. For the most part, outside of weekly (or more often) testing of the Emergency Alert System (EAS), broadcast isn’t about emergencies—until it is. A major fire, hurricane, earthquake, tsunami, eruption, industrial accident, etc., does tend to completely consume broadcast media’s attention when it occurs. 

Historically, both amateur radio and broadcast justify their spectrum grants with the public role they play when things go badly. The FCC takes this very seriously, issuing more notices of violation and fines for EAS than any other infraction.

In 1990, AM radio was king, the World Wide Web was born, a radio telephone call needed an operator to assist, local TV news was an hour a day, and NOAA weather radio (NWR) was sparse. When EAS was launched in 1997, we were just learning that simply ringing the alarm bell was not enough, and frequently unintentionally deadly. Our world, threats and especially our behaviors have changed since then.

The Digital Era
Smartphones... Emergency Mass Communications (EMC) is smartphones. When people evacuate, they do not take their TVs with them. Only a very few scramble for their wind-up AM radio. People in danger take their purses/wallets and… phones.

The singular and growing dependance on smartphones for most human-to-human and human-to-machine interactions is fact.

Humans over the age of five have their smartphones with them at all times. If you need your phone to start your car, park, open a hotel room door, order a hamburger, shop, or your location is being tracked by friends, family and advertisers, you know the disconnected, helpless, empty feeling of having misplaced or discharged your phone.

There is some investigation that suggests that smartphone dependency has the unintended consequence of increasing milling time. AEA/AEI on the other hand, directly ties critical information to the alert, thus eliminating search time and one would think reduce milling saving lives.

Natural Hazards Center Director Dennis Mileti (1945-2021) defined and studied “milling” as EAS was being developed. It is human nature for people to want to validate and spread the word of an emergency following an alert. Milling wastes valuable time and is often fatal. 

It’s not all bad; spreading the word quickly is probably why survival rates are highest in tight/dense communities. Milling ends, and survival activities begin, when the crisis “becomes real,” to the participants. In a world of two-minute emergencies, there is no time to search or text, just time to act.

WEA predates the smart in smartphone. About five years into WEA, several emergency alerting apps made bids to intelligently fill the information gap. FEMA, the Red Cross, some schools, companies, and many local emergency management offices, and much of social media, offer many apps that residents can subscribe to… so many that there are posts and sites dedicated to advising which emergency apps and how many anyone should have on their phone. This fragmented EMC delivery.

By their nature, these apps address pieces of EMC, not the whole of EMC. The apps that focus on a few threats, where there is some intelligence (usually in the form of a local emergency management office or weather service) work well for their sphere of emergencies. The local or county emergency management office that invested in an app to deal with wildfires and has diligently marketed their app to citizens with the time and patience to download and the skills to configure the apps and maintain them, does well in their narrow circumstance. 

Social media that scrape other sources for the grist that they warp into the attention-grabbing notifications that fuel and package EMC in click bait, might be notably delayed, unreliable, and soaked in crowd sourced misinformation… but they do work.

Bottom line? The state of EMC is a fragmented mix of the ancient and many emerging apps.

Missing Platform
It seems logical that that EMC should use every distribution platform it can. Radio, TV, Wireless, and social media (for better or worse) are ubiquitous. Signage and sirens (the ones with voice message speakers being most useful). However, streaming and satellite don’t help and cable support ranges from nonexistent to rather mature and well developed.

Arguably, smartphone dependence is so domineering that no other platform is required. As our dependence on smartphones continues to increase, soon enough the people reached by broadcast radio, etc., will become insignificant. But, if life is precious, and not everyone has their smartphone on their person, and wireless isn’t 100% reliable, it makes sense to alert on all platforms simultaneously… if for no other reason than to alert people to check their phones.

In addition to smartphones, NextGen Broadcast’s AEA/AEI (Advanced Emergency Alerting and Advanced Emergency Informing) is a good fit for cable, satellite, and internet.

Smart is Good
Some think that technology constantly pushes intelligence to the edge. Nowhere does this make more sense than in EMC. In EAS, and WEA, the radio, TV or device is dumb. It simply makes noise or displays the messages that are broadcast to it and every other receiver. In EAS, there is “where, what, when” information encoded in the FSK signaling we hear at the start of every alert. 

This information allows EAS decoding receivers—a small brain is required—to activate when wanted. Most people might own an automatic NWS radio, but home EAS receivers are rare. The only people who directly receive an EAS activation are those watching or listening to a participating station where everyone gets everything because unlike AEA/AEI, EAS supersedes programming. 

This forces the broadcast station into a “Sophie’s choice” situation as to what alerts are passed on. Is a tornado on the edge of the coverage area worth interrupting the Dallas Cowboys game? WEA is somewhat better, but the practical installations are still challenged to effectively target EMC. Occasionally waking to a 2 AM Amber alert for an adjacent state is where the state of WEA is after 10-years.

For EMC, a smart, location aware device that is always with us is a godsend. The smartphone has already displaced weather radios… along with cameras, watches, cash… 

Want the same functions on a TV? There are only man-made barriers to this. Developing AEA/AEI on smartphones and gateways is fairly straightforward. These are well known mature and stable environments. Porting AEA/AEI to TVs is fairly easy for those TVs that have the memory, processing power, hooks, and storage to support it. Developing on multiple TVs from multiple manufacturers? … no one has that much money or patience.

Smartphones have an amazing user interface with incredible flexibility and full bidirectional connection. TV remotes are inflexible molded plastic devices with a few or many molded buttons. The best you can say about TV remotes is that navigating information is ugly. Some TVs use smartphones as a remote control (so called “second screen”). In this case, the TV becomes superfluous.

Assuming the code isn’t written with the same process that gave us healthcare.gov and is more like the low friction apps you find while online shopping (and there is adequate intelligence behind it) AEA/AEI solves all the problems we’ve substantiated since EAS was adopted. 

First and foremost, AEA/AEI stops over-testing, over-alerting and mistargeting. Second is the availability of critical follow-on information. Having to search on an overloaded network for life and death information kills people. Language and disability access are no longer obstacles.

Bottom line? EMC is about smartphones. With a smart, well-designed, self-configuring, pre-installed app—AEA/AEI resolves the human behavior issues and user limitations—even the ones we inadvertently created.

UHF High Power
Smartphones on the wireless network have one serious, fatal, but resolvable limitation. In any medium to major crisis, the wireless network collapses.

While broadcast supports an infinite number of simultaneous users, common carrier wireless cannot support the flood of individual demands for information typical in an emergency. The capacity required does not exist. Intuitively, one would think that when the network chokes, the milling time increases dramatically and of course the lost information would have often been lifesaving. 

Wireless requires multiple towers with often single-thread interconnect. This wireless architecture is far more fragile than broadcast which tends to be hardened, staffed and secured with backup power and everything else. When a wireless carrier or a tower fails, the people it serves are disconnected. When a high-power UHF broadcaster fails… the receiver simply retunes to the next strongest signal of many.

UHF is vital. UHF is necessary for building penetration and its big service area. It also needs to be built into the smartphone. Qualcomm put UHF TV into cellphones a decade ago, but no one has been able to do acceptable AM or FM reception. TSM readers know well the laws of physics and the inferiority of VHF and MW transmission in an urban or indoor environment.

In an emergency, you want to “carpet bomb” the population with a multitude of resilient high power RF. Wireless is extremely useful as events evolve, but EMC distribution shouldn’t rely on a low power, countless single-points-of-failure system that can’t survive a “scraped earth event.” 

Further, the complex and exposed wireless network is vulnerable to cyber-attack and instabilities. Consider that AT&T, including Firstnet (the wireless service that AT&T contracts to independently serve first responders) failed nationally on Feb. 22, 2024 for hours. In July 2022, KDDI in Japan and it’s 39 million customers experienced, “…the biggest glitch in our history,” according to KDDI chief Makoto Takahashi, taking the entire system down for two full days. Rogers Canada has had multiple outages over the last three years impacting all of its Canadian customers. 

And it’s not just wireless carriers. CenturyLink took three states of their internet customers “off the air” pre-Covid.

The unfailing and simple architecture of broadcast makes it much less likely to fail or fall victim to cyberattack. There has never ever been a time or event where more than one broadcast signal didn’t survive.

Intelligence
EMC is only as good as the information disseminated.

“Rich media,” beyond simple text, audio and video, is valuable. Searchable data, maps and visuals are very useful, expected, and rare. Emergency management organizations generally have neither the staff, equipment, nor expertise to prepare much more than simple text alerts. 

TV news organizations are the American machine that aggregates information from all of the stakeholders, federal, state, and local governments, power companies, utilities, first responders, and the scene itself. Broadcast news can put cameras on the ground and in the air and put authorities in front of a microphone. Nothing new here. Broadcasters routinely forgo advertising revenues to cover major news of emergencies. However, legacy alerting is at best loosely attached to news.

Indispensably, broadcast news has the relationships to validate information.

NextGen AEA/AEI
Conelrad, EBS, EAS, WEA, sirens, signage, are or were all alerting systems under the control of broadcasters and to some degree emergency management, that could interrupt programming so that sometimes on-air talent or automated weather service speech synthesis can speak to the situation. 

AEA/AEI directly connects all of emergency management to a user’s smartphone where the decisions of what to alert for and in what manner are made under the user’s control. AEA/AEI can share information in the manner that we are used to, without pre-NextGen broadcasting’s analog era limitations.

NextGen AEA/AEI smartphones (and other equipped devices like TVs) periodically check for AEA/AEI messages in addition to alerts via native WEA. For the OTA part, there is a balance between battery life and urgency. When a pair of bits in the ATSC 3.0 bootstrap (the lowest most secure data path) indicate that there is a message, the smartphone grabs it and runs it through filters. 

The filter asks if this affects my location and if this is a situation where people should be notified or awakened. An Amber alert might wait until people wake up. An F-5 tornado in the neighborhood demands immediate attention.

No television station has to decide whether to interrupt programming, because AEA/AEI unlike EAS… doesn’t interrupt programming. On a TV, the video squeezes back, and there are three loud “attention” beeps with a text crawl. A viewer can dismiss, dig deeper… or grab the smartphone, which is doing the same things, and run for cover.

Every AEA alert is on every transmitter nearly simultaneously and goes to every phone without delay. Following the “in emergencies, all delivery methods are used” guidance, the internet and wireless are also useful paths. Ideally, the phone sees the same message from many places—and filters out the redundancies.

Where are We?
Both EAS and WEA have devolved into systems that neither broadcasters nor wireless providers have a positive incentive to maintain or improve. The public and emergency community complain about both. The last time we heard anything about EAS, broadcasters through the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) got Congress to force car manufacturers to continue support of AM radios, claiming that AM/EAS plays a critical role. 

The reality is somewhat nuanced. 

Today, “full service” radio stations are almost always AM/FM or FM only; only larger metropolitan areas support the necessary full-service station. While radio news operations have declined, TV and digital news has boomed. Radio on the dashboard is far more difficult and distracting to tune than the days of five buttons and a tuning knob. When you see “tune to 1610” traveler information signs while driving a rental car, you are unlikely to figure out how to listen safely without first pulling over.

My own experience is that I have not received a useful emergency message via my AM radio in many years. On the other hand, my cellphone has warned me of bad weather and with the help of the smartphone, I have navigated around hail, etc. at least a few times each year. AM radio used to do that, but not anymore—which is OK because the smartphone does this so much better—WEA messages are even displayed on my dashboard via the car/phone handsfree Bluetooth link.

As you might expect, most of broadcaster’s activities surround reducing their investment in EAS (including NAB and largely iHeart’s move to virtualize EAS to avoid replacing hardware), news and other staff intensive programming.

EAS does little good for broadcast news, sometimes interrupting live tornado coverage with a less informed and often delayed NWS issued tornado warning. Broadcasters, especially the ones that embrace the vision of a broadcast digital news operation that is ubiquitous, interactive, and low friction, do have motivation to develop AEA/AEI. 

It expands the news department’s reach and gives them a lower friction platform for disseminating information from the trivial to the ultra-critical. AEA/AEI builds on and can deepen a station’s relationship with its viewers. Unfortunately, EAS drives viewers and listeners away with constant false alarms, tests and untargeted use.

So Where is the NextGen EMC Application?
The broadcast app that supports AEA/AEI has yet to be written. There have been several starts, each of which stalled at the mockup stage. We’ve seen what it might look like, but not how it works.

Unfortunately, vaporware is impossible to demonstrate and very difficult to describe outside of abstractions. If you want to show emergency management, broadcasters, regulators, or the general population AEA/AEI, we will have to build it.

Within ATSC is the “I-team.” The only implementation effort under the ATSC umbrella is to develop AEA/AEI. In the I-team’s long history, they have only had access to BAs (aka "Broadcast Apps" installed on the smartphone by the broadcasters) that function on an EAS level, meaning that they have yet to experience a BA that does the advanced filtering functions, or supports rich media information dissemination. ATSC and their I-team have nothing close to a deployable AEA/AEI app.

As this is written, NVISA and FEMA have set up a NextGen Emergency Mass Communications laboratory in Maryland. This is all very good. For now, without an AEA/AEI app and mobile devices, all that can be done here is to play with TVs and basic prototype BAs able to do little more than alarm. When we do have a BA, this is the place to test it and make it work before it is released into the real world. FEMA has a test version of IPAWs very useful for this.

3.0 Enabled Smartphones
NextGen AEA/AEI depends on a smartphone running an AEA/AEI app that receives information via the wireless network when available, and information embedded in NextGen UHF Broadcast high power, big tower transmission when wireless access becomes impossible.

India seems to be the place where NextGen smartphones are taking off. Not so much in America.

Next Step
Without a BA and 3.0 chips in smartphones, we do not have resilient, intelligent EMC.

For broadcasters, what revenue potential there is in funding the BA is maybe from licensing what has never been licensed before (EAS is public domain) and/or betting that broadcast news can someday benefit from the AEA/AEI platform. It is also uncomfortable for broadcasters to depend on a competitor for a critical piece of broadcast architecture. 

There have been rumors of various players crafting a proprietary BA, usually more focused on monetization issues than AEA/AEI. So far, there is no AEA/AEI progress. There have been two efforts to cooperatively advance this endeavor within the industry. 

NAB Pilot’s effort ended quietly, apparently lacking broadcaster support and some member opposition to NAB supplying a universal “free” app. Later, NVISA invited broadcasters and vendors to cooperatively do such. NVISA (NextGen Video Information Systems Alliance) received no response from the major players.

As mentioned above, ATSC’s I-team dedicated to AEA/AEI implementation has no resources beyond the power of the regularly scheduled meeting. Also, ATSC is a standards organization, so as one would expect, implementation—as much as it is needed—is well outside ATSC’s tradition and resources.

AEA/AEI serves the public good. As a nation, we do invest in our security and safety. In 2006, Congress put $106 million into the Warning, Alert, and Response Network (WARN) Act. This funded Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) as well as other upgrades to EMC. More recently, congress has designated funds to upgrade EMC, in several different “buckets.” While AEA/AEI is likely the most important thing we should do, a lot more expensive and less important things seem to be on current agenda.

This is also close to the charter of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, who with PBS, have a history of nurturing similar technologies such as closed caption in the early 1970s. That lead to the passage of the Television Decoder Circuitry Act of 1990. PBS has been active in the EMC field with WARN, a system that backs up IPAWS (Integrated Public Alert & Warning System) internet delivery. There have been several NextGen proof-of-concept demos within public broadcasting for the benefit of first responders and EMC.

It is also better that there be just one AEA/AEI BA that operates in a manner where everyone everywhere can easily understand it and navigate. Competing BAs can create unnecessary friction. This is software and NextGen is “extensible,” meaning that the system can be updated and fine-tuned over time.

The bottom line is, that if we want reliable and powerful Emergency Mass Communications, FEMA and the FCC, if not congress, have to say so.

INDIANAPOLIS—SBE has notified its members that the IPAWS Required Weekly Test sent out on April 26 was transmitted with an incorrect signature and has provided details on what steps broadcasters may be required to do to address it.

FEMA’s IPAWS test or alerts include a signature certificate. Any message that does not have a correct signature should be ignored by an EAS device.

The RWT that was sent out on April 26 had a mismatch between the digest inside the message and the digest computed by receivers. All EAS devices should have rejected the test.

On a Sage Endec EAS decoder, if configured correctly the message would not have been logged. DasDec and Trilithic devices would have logged the test but would have an error message attached. All EAS units would have reported failed validations in a temporary log.

SBE says that users should check with their device manufacturer for the exact location of that file and the correct “signature validation” settings for the unit. It adds that all stations should check and correct any issues before the next test on May 3. Stations should also insert a note in the Station Log indicating the failed test and the reason for failure.

LYNDONVILLE, N.Y.—Digital Alert Systems has announced an update to its Federal Emergency Management Agency digital certificates that are used to authenticate messages from the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS). The company’s previous certificates were set to expire on Oct. 28.

Digital Alert Systems’ new IPAWS Certificate Authority credentials are for the One-Net and DASDEC Emergency Alert System/Common Alerting Protocol (EAS/CAP) encoder/decoders. CAs are designed to create a chain of trust between and EAS device and the IPAWS server. 

DAS encourages One-Net and DASDEC users in the U.S. to replace the expiring certificates to ensure devices continue to operate properly. All EAS participants are required by the FCC to configure their systems to reject all CAP-formatted EAS messages that include an invalid digital signature. In the event that the certificate is not updated, users could either receive an error message or the device might ignore valid IPAWS alerts.

DAS says that it is working with IPAWS on a process that would automate these kinds of updates in the future.

The new CA is available on the Digital Alert Systems website. 

WASHINGTON—Here’s news of interest to the alerting community, including those working in broadcasting.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency now makes available an archive of Common Alerting Protocol, or CAP, messages sent by alerting authorities through the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS) since mid-2012.

Check it out here. (Note that traditional “EAS only” alerts are not part of this.)

“FEMA leadership prioritizes hosting and publishing the datasets, which allows internal and external partners to understand IPAWS data, conduct analysis and to inform decisions to improve alert and warning,” FEMA stated in an announcement.

“Several stakeholders, including researchers, media, the public and those who have submitted FOIA requests, are now being directed to OpenFEMA for information.”

One of the people interested in this development is Ed Czarnecki, senior director of strategy and government affairs for technology manufacturer Digital Alerting Systems.

“This new IPAWS web archive of alerts should provide a very handy reference source of historical CAP alert data for a variety of users, including academics, policy researchers, the press and others,” he told TVT's sister publication Radio World.

“The IPAWS archive isn’t a real-time resource, and includes a 24-hour delay in archiving messages,” he noted. That delay is to reduce the risk of being confused with an active alert received from the live IPAWS feed.

“So it isn’t something for monitoring or compliance purposes. The new IPAWS archive will only show what CAP alert have been sent into the IPAWS system. It will not reflect which CAP messages have actually been received or processed by broadcasters. The archive will also only show the CAP messages that have been entered into IPAWS, and not any conventional EAS-only messages.”

He noted that for monitoring, aggregating and auditing alert messages at broadcast stations, companies like his own provide tools that aggregate real-time EAS and CAP alert data.

As described more specifically on the OpenFEMA site: “This data set contains recent, historic and archived IPAWS Common Alerting Protocol v1.2 messages from June 2012 to the present including date, time, event code … city, county, joint agency, police, law enforcement, Collaborative Operating Group (COG), state(s), locality, territory or tribe. It can be used to capture and analyze historic and archived messages.”

This is raw, unedited data from the IPAWS Alert Aggregator created by over 1,450 alert originators across the country.

Questions about the program can be emailed to OpenFEMA@fema.dhs.gov.

WASHINGTON—Citing the COVID-19 pandemic, FEMA has announced that there will be no national test of the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System in 2020.

FEMA will postpone the next test to 2021 “out of consideration for the unusual circumstances and working conditions for those in the broadcast and cable industry,” the announcement reads. The organization notes that the issue lies in the reporting activities associated with the tests, saying that the systems are in place for rapid automatic transmission of the test message by broadcast and cable operators.

IPAWS is a national system for local alerting that provides authenticated emergency alert and information messaging to the public through cell phones and internet applications using Wireless Emergency Alerts, and to radio and television via the Emergency Alert System.

PLUS: IPAWS Guidelines for Coronavirus Shared by FEMA

FEMA is required to test IPAWS at least every three years. The last test for Wireless Emergency Alerts occurred in 2018. The last Emergency Alert System test was in 2019.

According to FEMA, more than 360 safety messages regarding COVID-19 have been sent out to residents across the country via WEA and EAS.

WASHINGTON—As the U.S. deals with the current coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, FEMA has shared how the Integrated Public Alert Warning System can be used to inform, alert or warn the public.

Describing it ultimately as “a matter of local judgement,” IPAWS—which can include EAS alerts for broadcasters and WEA alerts for wireless providers—can be used to convey health orders, detail curfew information, notify of assembly guidelines/restrictions and to advice of other COVID-19 related information.

With EAS alerts IPAWS users can send up to two minutes of information via text-to-speech or pre-recorded audio in English and Spanish. Updates have also been made to WEA alerts, in which groups can include a phone number and hyperlink as well as send a 90 second and 360 character messages in English and Spanish.

When planning to use IPAWS, it is encouraged that groups send messages to the IPAWS Lab to test the message as well as new IPAWS capabilities. There is also the IPAWS Message Viewer to verify that messages will be sent out and appear as intended. The IPAWS Lab can be contacted at fema.ipaws.lab@awtestlab.com.

Additional best practices that IPAWS highlights includes reminders that EAS uses event codes and that groups should be aware what events will be carried by local broadcasters. 

For more information, contact IPAWS@fema.dhs.gov.  

WASHINGTON—The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced that IPAWS-OPEN release 3.10 went live today, Dec. 18, offering several new enhancements, including support for 360-character alerts.

WEA, or Wireless Emergency Alerts, is used to send warnings about dangerous weather, missing children and other emergency situations to the public via their wireless phones and mobile devices.

The latest version of WEA also supports Spanish-language alerts, the ability to reach 100% of a targeted area without an overshoot of more than 1/10 of a mile as well as enhancements to the WEA test and public safety categories.

However, leveraging the enhancements requires more than an update to IPAWS, FEMA said. Wireless provides will need to update their networks nationwide, their customers’ phones and the software authorities rely upon to send alerts.

While the IPAWS Program Management Office (PMO) has tested and confirmed wireless providers can receive enhanced WEA messages from IPAWS, it will take time for wireless customers around the country to receive enhanced WEA on their phones, FEMA said.

IPAWS PMO also has confirmed that most of the software used by alerting authorities around the country has been upgraded and tested by FEMA; however, it is possible that not all of the alerting authorities are ready to write alerts taking advantage of the new WEA enhancements, FEMA said.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai issued his own statement about the WEA update:

“One of my key public safety priorities has been to ensure that America's emergency alerting system meets the needs of public safety officials and the communities they serve. With these improvements, Wireless Emergency Alerts are now an even more powerful tool for emergency managers to warn and protect the public. These improvements respond to input we've received from the public safety community and will help save lives.”

This is expansion of mobile services is part of the architecture for delivery information during emergencies that broadcasters also take part in.

More information is available by emailing FEMA IPAWS PMO.

WASHINGTON—EAS participants who are not able to update to the IPAWS certificate that was released on Oct. 28 by the applied deadline of Nov. 8 will not turn into the proverbial pumpkin when the clock strikes midnight, according to a Public Notice from the FCC.

In the notice from the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau of the FCC, it was revealed that there are specific guidelines regarding equipment readiness that will allow EAS participants to continue to operate without the impacted, required equipment for a period of 60 days after the Nov. 8 deadline.

The issue of this public notice came after FEMA and some EAS participants expressed concern over the time frame from when the update was made available and the deadline that was set, saying that it was not sufficient time. As a result, the FCC issued the public notice to inform EAS participants about Section 11.35(b) of the commission’s rules, which allow for operations to continue “without the defective equipment pending its repair or replacement for 60 days without further FCC authority.”

As a result, EAS participants unable to make the IPAWS update prior to Nov. 8 will have until Jan. 7, 2020, to do so. In the event that they are not able to meet that deadline, an informal request for additional time must be submitted to the FCC and explain what steps have been taken, the alternative procedures being used while equipment has been defective and when the defective equipment will be repaired or replaced.

The update, and the subsequent operation without proper equipment in the situation of an extension, only applies to Common Alerting Protocol-formatted alerts distributed by IPAWS; EAS participants must still monitor, receive and process legacy EAS alerts formatted in the EAS protocol.

More information can be found in the FCC’s official Public Notice.

LYNDONVILLE, N.Y.—FEMA has approved the release of the new Federal Bridge certificate bundle designed for DASDEC and OneNet CAP EAS devices to receive IPAWS messages. A deadline of Nov. 8 to install the certificate has also been announced.

This was revealed through an email from Digital Alert Systems’ Edward Czarnecki, the company’s senior director of strategy & government affairs, to Society of Broadcast Engineers members.

The certificate is needed to ensure proper validation of CAP alert message from IPAWS. It is a free update and it works with software versions 2.6, 3.x and 4.x.

“We are aware that Nov. 8 leaves very little time—however, the final confirmation from FEMA to release the certs to EAS users was given a few hours ago,” said Czarnecki.

DAS has posted the certificate on its website, included with instructions and download links.

WASHINGTON—It’s time for broadcasters to confirm that their stations are up and running with the latest in EAS updates.

As it stands today, EAS participants are required to not only receive Common Alert Protocol messages from IPAWS but also configure their systems to reject all CAP-formatted EAS messages that include an invalid digital signature. Now, an effort to maintain compliance with commonly accepted security standards, FEMA is also taking the next step of removing support for older methods by requiring the use of an updated TLS 1.2 protocol to access FEMA’s IPAWS server, said Sage Alerting Systems and the Society of Broadcast Engineers. 

TLS, or Transport Layer Security, is cryptographic protocol providing communications security over networks and is often used for internet communications.

To acquire and verify IPAWS CAP alerts, a broadcaster’s EAS alerting equipment must be upgraded with the TLS 1.2 update prior to Nov. 8, 2019.

The move is one of several rule changes put in place by the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to improve EAS security to ensure that messages are received smoothly and accurately.

According to Sage, the TLS 1.2 protocol is now part of a September 2019 update called Rev95. Certain ENDEC systems qualify for a free update; older systems will need to purchase an update via a distributor.

SBE cautioned in its blog that after the switchover on Nov. 8, older versions of the ENDEC software will not be able to receive CAP messages from IPAWS. “This will render the station in violation of FCC rules concerning EAS monitoring and logging,” SBE said.

For Gorman-Redlich systems, the SBE reported that stations operating with E-prom V 9.5.8 will remain compliant with the changes. For Digital Alert Systems DASDEC/One-Net systems, those units operating with software versions 3.1 or 4.0 will remain compliant.

In addition to the CAP format changes, the SBE said the FCC also recently changed EAS rules to refine the time window within which an alert message is valid and added a new false EAS alert reporting rule.

WASHINGTON—The next national EAS test is coming up in two weeks The date was set earlier, as we've reported; and now FEMA and the FCC are highlighting it in public announcements.

This year's test focuses on national alerting in the absence of internet.

The nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System will take place on Wednesday, Aug. 7. It will be sent to radio and television stations beginning at 2:20 p.m. EDT.

"The test is being conducted through FEMA’s Integrated Public Alert and Warning System," the FCC stated. "This year, the test message will originate from designated radio stations, known as Primary Entry Point stations, which participate in a component of IPAWS called the National Public Warning System. All other radio and television stations, cable, wireline service providers and direct broadcast satellite service providers should subsequently receive and broadcast the test message."

It noted that this test will not include a message on cell phones via Wireless Emergency Alerts. 

"This year’s test will evaluate the readiness of the national alerting capability in the absence of internet connectivity. The test will be approximately one minute long, have a limited impact on the public with only minor interruption of radio and television programs, and will be similar to regular monthly EAS tests. Both the audio message and text crawl should be accessible to people with disabilities." 

Stations must report how it went to the commission by filing ETRS Form Two on the day of the event, by midnight Eastern time; and then post-test data is due via Form Three by Sept. 23. Those forms become available in the commission's online system at the time of the test. Filers can access it through the FCC website using their registered FCC username associated with their FCC registration numbers.

WASHINGTON—The National Advisory Council (NAC) took a good hard look at the nation’s emergency alerting system and issued a set of 14 recommendations at its last session designed to identify areas of concern and opportunities for improvement.

The report, called “Modernizing the Nation’s Public Alert and Warning System” and issued on Feb. 15, broke its primary proposals into five themes related to IPAWS and emergency alerting:

• Improving Alerting Authorities’ Ability to Transmit Effective Alerts;
• Improving Public and Congressional Understanding of Emergency Alerting;
• Optimizing Technology;
• Identifying and Adopting Current and Future Technologies; and
• Initiating Cross-Functional Management and Administration of IPAWS

Each recommendation also included a timeline for estimated implementation of these new priorities and a checklist of things to consider.

There are a few clear themes that pop up across all 14 proposed themes. One of those is that it’s vital for the alerting community to establish a series of best practice procedures across all levels of the emergency alerting strata. Another is that there needs to be an additional effort placed on educating the public about alerting and how individuals should respond in case of an emergency.

For example, the top recommendation under the theme “Optimizing Technology” is that FEMA must lead the development of a comprehensive standard set of communication tools—be they visual images, pictograms, transcripts or captioning—so that a diverse population can easily understand an alert.

This is even more important as populations become increasingly diverse; it’s paramount that IPAWS ensure that people with disabilities and those with limited English proficiency receive and comprehend alerts in a timely manner, the report said. The report noted that uneven distribution of alerts in various languages was an issue during the 2018 Northern California wildfires.

“Local agencies, which originate most alerts, vary widely in their capacity to generate alerts in languages other than English,” said California’s Office of Emergency Services. That fire destroyed 18,000 structures and killed 86 people. “In many cases, this capability varies depending on which language-skilled staff happens to be on duty when an alert is required.” The report proposed, as an example, that FEMA develop a nationwide, standardized hazard symbol set for use by alert originators and for public outreach.

The report also proposed that FEMA develop a policy for redundant alert origination as noted in the section “Identifying and Adopting Current and Future Technologies.”

“Considering that a jurisdiction’s primary alerting capability can be compromised and/or fail during a catastrophic event, alternate alert origination is a critical life-saving capability,” the report said, pointing to the malfunctioning of the part of the alert system in Texas during Hurricane Harvey and the damage caused to the communications infrastructure in the Caribbean islands during Hurricane Maria. In the later case, emergency management officials were unable to issue a WEA alert to notify residents of where to find shelter, food and water.

The complete report includes details on estimated implementation time and key considerations for each proposal, such as staffing needs and equipment requirements.

WASHINGTON—Two messages seem to have been transmitted loud and clear after the most recent EAS/WEA national alert test. One, that participation in national EAS tests is a priority. And two, that participants are committed to sending the alert in both the English and Spanish languages.

It was back in October that the Federal Emergency Management Agency conducted another nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System and the first ever nationwide Wireless Emergency Alert, which was delivered to mobile devices.

At 2:18 p.m. Eastern on Oct. 3, FEMA sent a WEA test message to WEA-capable wireless devices throughout the United States and territories; immediately following, FEMA conducted a live test of the EAS to EAS participants. That message was transmitted in English and Spanish and included both a text message and audio.

All participating mobile service providers were required to participate in the WEA portion of the test, while all EAS participants — including thousands of radio stations, TV stations and cable providers —were required to participate in the EAS piece.

According to results recently released by the FCC, 95.5% of EAS participants successfully received the National Periodic Test code used for the test, while 91.8% successfully retransmitted the test. Those numbers are consistent with the participation levels observed in the 2017 nationwide EAS test.

Of the 2,621 television broadcasters who were 2018 test participants, 89.3% of those received the test (thumbs up to those 2,340 stations). Of those, 84% went on to successfully retransmit the alert. Both of those numbers are down an average of 1 percentage point from the receive/transmit levels in 2017.

Kudos to cable system operators who had the highest percentage of reception and transmission in the 2018 test. Of the 2,792 who were supposed to receive and transmit the test, 97.8% of those participated in the test. More than 91% of those cable MSOs then went on to retransmit the alert.

There were slight improvements in other areas. Nearly 91% of test participants who filed their Form Three (which gives detailed data to the FCC on what happened after the test) reported no complications in receiving the test, up from 89% in 2017. A total of 89% reported no complications in retransmitting the test, a figure up slightly from 88% in 2017.

This year, a significantly larger number of test participants reported to have retransmitted the Spanish language version of the alert. In 2018, 756 test participants retransmitted the alert as it was generated through the IPAWS system, up from only 207 participants in 2017.

This time around, transmission of the test to mobile devices made a lot of headlines. This was the first nationwide test of the WEA system and though data is still coming in, the FCC has determined that the test did at least successfully demonstrate that a WEA can be delivered nationwide.

But there were a few cases of inefficient reception.

Through local emergency management agencies, news reports and feedback from the FCC’s Public Safety Support Center (PSSC), the FCC and FEMA found that approximately 72% of respondents reported receiving the WEA test message. Of the 361 responses that were filed voluntarily with the PSSC, approximately 61% reported no problems in receiving a WEA. The remaining 39% either did not receive a WEA or received one that had issues, such as receiving multiple messages or having problems with the tone or vibration cadence.

Mixed reports came from news agencies across the country.

In the Pacific Northwest, subscribers with several networks, including AT&T and T-Mobile, reported being unable to download data or use their apps for hours after receiving the presidential test alert.

In other cases, participating wireless providers did not successfully deliver the WEA test message at all, while other users indicated that WEA receipt was uneven — some individuals received the alert while others in the same region did not. One journalist revealed that, in the case of his two personal phones, one received the alert twice, while the other did not receive the message at all.

The FCC and FEMA said in a joint release that they will continue to analyze the results and release more detailed findings when available.

LYNDONVILLE, N.Y. — As providers of Emergency Alert System/Common Alerting Protocol equipment, Monroe Electronics — and its Digital Alert Systems subsidiary — are advising users of their OneNet and DASDEC EAS/CAP systems to download the latest Integrated Public Alert and Warning System Certificate Authority (CA) credentials file.

Users must install these new digital CA credentials, recently issued by The Federal Emergency Management Agency — the administrator of IPAWS — in order to replace the previously issued version, which is set to expire on June 24.

Maintaining the most recent CA credentials is essential to ensuring that OneNet and DASDEC EAS/CAP encoders and decoders continue to operate properly. These devices use these digital certificates to validate the authenticity of IPAWS sourced Common Alerting Protocol alerts.

IPAWS users who fail to update their equipment before June 24 could see the error message: “Event Log: Digital Signature VERIFICATION ERROR : Signer UNTRUSTED! Check for correct CAP decoder CA file.;”

This is because FEMA uses digital CA certificates to create a “chain of trust between Emergency Alert System devices and the IPAWS servers.” According to FEMA IPAWS is an internet-based system that enables federal, state, and local authorities to issue critical public alerts and warnings. It’s accessed through software that meets IPAWS system requirements.

“We have been advised there will be several certificate and policy changes through the end of 2018 that will necessitate some certificate updates during this period,” said Ed Czarnecki, senior director of strategy and government affairs for Monroe Electronics and Digital Alert Systems.

Czarnecki added, “We’re constantly evaluating and updating our systems to stay in step with IPAWS, and since assisting customers is our top priority, we are actively working on new methods of managing government certificates with an improved path forward.”

All OneNet and DASDEC customers using the IPAWS system must have the latest digital certificates in place to assure the validity of the communications chain of trust, which prevents a “man in the middle” attack by only processing the messages that are authenticated through the IPAWS system.

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WASHINGTON—The numbers are in from the September 2017 National EAS Test, and they reveal a falloff in performance by television broadcasters when compared to the previous year.

A report issued last week by the FCC’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau tabulates and analyzes reports submitted by various media, including radio, TV broadcast, cable TV, IPTV and wireline, about their test performance.

TV broadcasters were “the least successful participants” in the nationwide test, the report said. It found 88.6 percent of TV participants successfully received the alert, and 83.5 percent successfully retransmitted it. The 2017 TV performance “shows a significant decrease as compared to 2016 when 97.3 percent successfully received the alert and 85.3 percent were able to retransmit,” the report said.

[Read: Hawaii False Alarm Illustrates Importance Of EAS]

Overall, 98.5 percent of participants successfully received the test alert compared to 95.4 percent in 2016. Nearly 92 percent of participants successfully retransmitted the test alert, up from 85.8 percent in the previous national test, the report said.

FEMA, in coordination with the FCC and the National Weather Service, conducted the nationwide test, which was the third of its kind, on Sept. 27, 2017. While intended to test the overall effectiveness and reliability of the system, special emphasis was given to testing FEMA’s Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS), which acts as the gateway to disseminate Common Alerting Protocol-formatted EAS alerts, it said.

A total of 58.1 percent of participants reported first receiving the test over-the-air as opposed to via the internet from the IPAWS server, up from the 56.5 percent reporting over-the-air test reception in 2016. Participants that receive the test over the air are not able to deliver CAP-formatted digital audio, Spanish and text files, which provide greater accessibility for non-English speakers and those with disabilities, the report noted.

[Read: Initial Results Of 2017 National EAS Test Show Improvement]

There are about 22,922 EAS participants in the United States and its territories. Of those, 19,738 unique test filings were submitted, a participation rate of 76.2 percent. Several factors, including severe weather, wildfires and the aftermath of hurricanes, contributed to the falloff in participation from 2016 when 21,365 unique filings were submitted, according to the report.

TV broadcasters had the lowest participation rate in 2017 with 68.5 percent; cable TV, IPTV and wireline showed significant increased participation of 74 percent, up from 52.9 percent in 2016; and the participation rate for radio achieved 78.5 percent, it said.

Overall, the 2017 FCC defined the test was as a “success” and a demonstration that the EAS system has strengthened since the 2016 test, the report said. Signs of improvement include increased success of low-power FM stations in receiving and retransmitting alerts; a better understanding of EAS roles; a higher rate of configuring equipment to monitor IPAWS; higher retransmission rates with no complications; and fewer complications, the report said.

LEAWOOD, KAN.—When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in August 2005, WWL – at the time a Belo station — managed to stay on the air due in large part to the efforts of Rick Barber, its director of technology and broadcast media when the storm struck.

But despite building a transmitter building on 14-foot concrete columns to get above sea level, installing a 1MW generator with a 1,500 gallon feed tank and installing an additional 10,000 gallon tank as a reserve, to stay on air Barber and a well-armed cadre of private security personnel hired by Belo had to transport fuel – a scarce and valuable commodity in the wake of the hurricane — to top off the generator’s tanks.

[Read: All 50 States, D.C., Opt In To FirstNet]

While Katrina is ancient history, Belo is no more and Barber has left the station, the problem of picking up the pieces after a major calamity, like a hurricane, earthquake or terrorist attack, to maintain vital, potentially lifesaving communications with the public remains.

However, with the signing of the 2018 Omnibus Spending Bill on March 23, things may be getting better for broadcasters who must grapple to stay on air in the aftermath of an emergency.

Tucked into the 2,232-page spending bill was the SANDy Act, which aims to protect the nation’s communications networks by giving radio and TV broadcasters, cable and satellite providers and wireline and mobile telephone service companies priority access to otherwise restricted areas in an emergency to make repairs and maintain service.

“Television and radio broadcasters have been trying to get priority access written into federal law since at least Hurricane Katrina, when stations were lifelines but diesel fuel deliveries to keep their generators running were blocked,” said John Lawson, executive director of the AWARN Alliance.

“The bill covers a range of communications infrastructure, but priority access for broadcast facilities may have the greatest positive impact for recovery,” said Lawson, who also serves on FEMA’s National Advisory Council Integrated Public Alert and Warning System Subcommittee.

Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, authored the SANDy Act and led bipartisan negotiations aimed at its passage. New Jersey was among the states that suffered communications disruptions caused by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012.

In the Senate, the bill was backed by Senators Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), John Thune (R-S.D.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).

NAB issued a statement lauding the bill’s passage. “NAB is grateful that this bipartisan bill acknowledging the lifeline role of local broadcasting in times of emergency is now the law of the land,” said NAB EVP Communications Dennis Wharton in the statement.

WASHINGTON—To ensure the nation continues to adopt the best standards and operating procedures when it comes to emergency alerting, the Federal Emergency Management Agency recently announced the names of 31 individuals that will be serving on the IPAWS subcommittee, which is part of FEMA’s National Advisory Council.

The first IPAWS subcommittee meeting will be held Aug. 8 and 9 in Washington, and will meet up to four times per year (two in person and two by video conferencing).

Among the subcommittee’s responsibilities are providing recommendations for new alerting protocols and operating procedures for the nation’s public alert and warning system, as well as submitting a recommendation report on the overall system to the NAC. Any subcommittee report will be submitted to other government agencies, including the House and Senate committees on homeland security.

NAC itself is tasked with advising FEMA’s administrator on all aspects of emergency management.

The new club of 31 members joins eight federal leaders and five members from the NAC to create a total group of 44 that include broadcasters, emergency management agencies, emergency response providers and consumer advocate groups, among others.

In addition to expected representatives like state officials and emergency management agencies, a FEMA selection panel requested participation from national tribal organizations, organizations representing individuals with disabilities, those representing individuals with limited English proficiency and the elderly (although only one organization is included from the later three: a representative from a center for the deaf/hard of hearing in North Carolina).

The subcommittee will also include chairman of the Federal Communications Commission or someone that Chairman Ajit Pai designates to serve.

It was back in September 2016 that FEMA called for applications to this subcommittee as part of its modernization efforts. The committee will disband by April 2019.

When contacted by Radio World, one new committee member, Ed Czarnecki with Monroe Electronics, said he’s most looking forward to the collaborating with colleagues across the government and within different industries to further advance the capabilities of FEMA IPAWS.

The complete IPAWS subcommittee list: 

State and Local Governments; Emergency Management Agencies; Emergency Response Providers
Samantha Brear, Alert Iowa Program Manager and E911 Program Planner
Iowa Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management

Benjamin Krakauer, Assistant Commissioner, Strategy & Program Development
New York City Emergency Management

Francisco Sánchez, Liaison and Public Information Officer
Harris County (Texas) Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management

Art Botterell, Senior Emergency Services Coordinator
California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services

Michael Sprayberry (NAC Member), Director
North Carolina Emergency Management, North Carolina Department of Public Safety

Gerard Dio (NAC Member),(Retired) Fire Chief
Fire Department City of Worcester (Mass.)

Federally Recognized Indian Tribes and National Indian Organizations
Robert Deleon, Emergency Manager /Emergency Operations Director 
Gila River Indian Community 

Michael Fila, Emergency Manager/Public Health Officer
Office of Emergency Management, Cocopah Indian Tribe

Communications Service Providers 
Thomas Crane, Senior Solutions Consultant 
Everbridge Inc.

Don Hall, Government Solutions Director 
OnSolve LLC

Vendors, Developers and Manufacturers of Systems, Facilities, Equipment and Capabilities for the Provision of Communications Services
Edward Czarnecki, Senior Director, Strategy and Government Affairs 
Monroe Electronics Inc.

Harold Price, President
Sage Alerting Systems Inc.

Mark Demski, Senior Client Services Manager 
WebEOC Intermedix Corp.

John Lawson, Executive Director 
AWARN Alliance

Hutch McClendon, CEO and President 
Advanced, Computers and Communications LLC

Third-Party Service Bureaus
Richard Strack, Chief Engineer
Boise State Public Radio

Broadcasting Industry, Including Public Broadcasting
Suzanne Goucher, President and Chief Executive Officer 
Maine Association of Broadcasters

Sam Matheny, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer 
National Association of Broadcasters

Dana Golub, Senior Director, Public Programs 
Public Broadcasting Service

Commercial Mobile Radio Service Industry 
Brian Josef, Assistant Vice President Regulatory Affairs 
CTIA

Cable Industry 
Craig Saari, Principle Video Engineer II 
Charter Communications

Andy Scott, Vice President of Engineering
NCTA – The Internet & Television Association

Satellite Industry
John Archer, Vice President and General Manager Operations 
Sirius XM Satellite Radio

Steven Hill, Chief Executive Officer
Satellite and Broadcast Communication Association

National Organizations Representing Individuals With Disabilities; Blind, Deaf and Hearing-Loss Communities; Individuals With Access and Functional Needs; Elderly
Donna Platt, Emergency Preparedness Coordinator 
North Carolina Division of Services for the Deaf and the Hard of Hearing

Bryen Yunashko, Owner 
Access256 Productions LLC

Consumer or Privacy Advocates
Harold Feld, Senior Vice President 
Public Knowledge

Organizations Representing Individuals With Limited-English Proficiency
Lillian McDonald, Managing Director Emergency Response Services 
Twin Cities PBS

Jacqueline Nguyen, Senior Project Specialist 
CalOptima

Other Stakeholders and Interested and Affected Parties
Dennis Mileti, Professor Emeritus, Director of the Natural Hazards Center 
University of Colorado at Boulder

Frank Mark Lucia, Independent Telecommunications Professional, and Consultant 
Georgia Tech Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center

Tafaimamao Tua-Tupuola, Director of University Center for Excellence on Developmental Disabilities
American Samoa Community College

Darrell Darnell, Senior Associate Vice President for Safety and Security 
George Washington University

Dr. Meloyde Batten-Mickens(NAC Member), Interim Chief/Director of Public Safety 
Simmons College

Capt. William “Brett” Bailey (NAC Member), Investigations Commander 
Tulsa Police Department

Jeanne-Aimee DeMarrais (NAC Member), Senior Director U.S. Emergencies
Save the Children

Senior Federal Leaders (or Their Designees)

The Deputy Administrator for Protection and National Preparedness of the Federal Emergency Management Agency 
The Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission 
The Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of the Department of Commerce 
The Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information of the Department of Commerce 
The Under Secretary for Science and Technology of the Department of Homeland Security 
The Under Secretary for the National Protection and Programs Directorate 
The Director of Disability Integration and Coordination of the Federal Emergency Management Agency 
The Chairperson of the National Council on Disability

This story originally appeared on TVT's sister publication Radio World. 

WASHINGTON—Three specific alerting systems are getting the spotlight in an upcoming webinar that will be hosted by the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS). On March 15 the IPAWS Unique Alerting System Webinar will take place, offering three product demonstrations from unique alerting system vendors SOCIFI, Safety Labs and Alert FM.

The webinar will be broken up into three 20 minute segments with each company demonstrating their product’s integration with IPAWS and its ability to pull an alert from the IPAWS Alert Feed. Mark Lucero, IPAWS chief engineer, will host the webinar.

Users can log in to participate in the webinar by clicking on this link. To access closed captioning services, click this link and use the event number 3212856.

An audio version of the webinar will be available by phone by calling 1-650-479-3207 and using the access code 664 660 868. The webinar will also be recorded for future viewing.

The IPAWS Unique Alerting System Webinar is scheduled for March 15 at 12 p.m. ET.

LYNDONVILLE, N.Y.—Monroe Electronics and its Digital Alert Systems subsidiary will take part in the Thursday, Oct. 6, webinar from IPAWS. Monroe will participate as an IPAWS Alert Origination Service Provider and will offer a live technology demonstration of its DASEOC integrated CAP/EAS origination platform.

Following FEMA’s updates on the IPAWS-OPEN authentication platform, Monroe will offer its demonstration that has been adopted by a reported nine state emergency management agencies, as well as counties across the U.S. The demo will showcase the latest features of the DASEOC alert origination platform, specifically its interoperability with FEMA’s IPAWS. These features include providing a single interface for broadcast EAS and mobile phone alerts to Wireless Emergency Alerts; multilingual alert origination; monitor incoming CAP alerts locally, regionally or nationally; email notifications of alerts.

The IPAWS webinar is scheduled to take place at noon on Oct. 6 and does not require prior registration. To launch the webinar, attendees can go through the Webex interface, or dial into 1-650-479-3207 and enter access code 665100168.

WASHINGTON—Think you have ideas to make the nation’s alerting system better? Here’s your chance.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has put out call for applicants who wish to serve on a new Integrated Public Alert and Warning System subcommittee to the National Advisory Council.

This subcommittee, as mandated by the IPAWS Modernization Act of 2015, will develop and submit recommendations on improving the IPAWS system to the NAC. Among things it is expected to consider are common alerting and warning protocol, standards, terminology and operating procedures for a national public alert warning system.

IPAWS is a way for federal, state, local, tribal and territorial alerting authorities to alert and warn the public about emergencies using the familiar Emergency Alert System, the newer system of Wireless Emergency Alerts, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Weather Radio.

The IPAWS subcommittee is expected to be made up of officials from FEMA, the FCC, Homeland Security, the NOAA, the Department of Commerce and the National Council on Disability. Members will be selected from the following disciplines: Local, state and tribal government officials; emergency managers and first responders; vendors, developers and manufacturers of communications systems; broadcasting, cable or satellite industry officials; national organizations for the disabled, elderly, or limited English-speakers; and consumer privacy advocates.

The subcommittee is expected to meet four times a year, twice in person and twice via webinar.

Interested applicants can submit a résumé to the Office of the National Advisory Council by email, mail or even fax. Applications will be accepted until Oct. 6, with subcommittee appoint terms beginning in 2017; they will run until the termination of the IPAWS subcommittee in April 2019.

For information, visit www.fema.gov/national-advisory-council.

WASHINGTON—Regulators have set the date of the second nationwide test of the digital Emergency Alert System. The Federal Communications Commission’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau along with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is conducting the all-hands EAS test Sept. 28, 2016, at 2:20 p.m. Eastern Time.

A secondary test date is scheduled for Oct. 5, 2016, if necessary. EAS participants must be prepared to participate in a test on both the primary and alternate test dates. All EAS participants are required to participate in this nationwide test. 

The nationwide test will assess the reliability and effectiveness of the EAS, with a particular emphasis on testing FEMA’s Integrated Public Alert and Warning System, or IPAWS, the integrated gateway through which common alerting protocol-based EAS alerts are disseminated to EAS participants—virtually all U.S. broadcast licensees, some cable headends and various and sundry other TV distributors.

The test message will clearly state that the alert is only a test of the EAS. FEMA’s alert will be transmitted in English and Spanish and include both audio and the text of the test message, which can be used to populate an accessible video crawl.

These improvements are intended help ensure that all members of the public, including non-English speakers and individuals with disabilities, will receive emergency information. The test will provide an opportunity to evaluate this and other measures that the FCC has adopted to address issues identified in the first nationwide test of the new IPAWS-based EAS platform, conducted Nov. 9, 2011at 2 p.m. ET.

The results of this second nationwide EAS test will be captured and analyzed using the EAS Test Reporting System (ERTS). All EAS participants are reminded that they are required to register with the reporting system and must complete the filing of ETRS Form One on or before Aug. 26, 2016.

EAS participants are instructed to file the “day of test” information sought by ETRS Form Two at or before 11:59 p.m. EDT on Sept. 28, 2016.

EAS participants are further instructed to file the detailed post-test data sought by ETRS Form Three on or before Nov, 14, 2016.

Organizers encourage EAS participants to take steps, in coordination with their State Emergency Coordination Councils, in preparation for this test, such as:

· Reviewing and, if necessary, updating state EAS plans;

· Ensuring that a copy of the EAS Operating Handbook is located at normal duty positions or EAS equipment locations and is immediately available to operators;

· Reviewing the EAS Operating Handbook for the actions to be taken by operators upon receipt of the test alert and tailoring any actions as necessary that are specific to the EAS participants’ facilities;

· Ensuring that EAS equipment operates in compliance with the commission rules, such as being capable of receiving and processing the national periodic test code and the “six zeroes” national location code;

· Upgrading EAS equipment software and firmware to the most recent version;

· Updating ETRS Form One filings to reflect changes to identifying information;

· Manually synchronizing EAS equipment clocks to the official time provided by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, if an EAS participant’s equipment does not automatically synchronize to an Internet time source.

Members of the public and interested stakeholder organizations that are in position to observe test results in their communities can provide useful feedback on the improvements to the EAS, any problems observed, or any other complications in the delivery of the EAS message during the nationwide test by reporting their observations to the Public Safety Support Center.

Also see.... the July 18 Public Notice from the FCC.

July 18, 2016 “Pubcasters Share EAS Successes, Press for Change”
“Smartphones with activated FM chips capable of receiving free over-the-air emergency broadcasts could serve as lifelines to people facing dangerous situations, especially if the powergrid is down or cellular service becomes overloaded or disabled.”

WASHINGTON—The upcoming regional IPAWS EAS test that involves California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, North Dakota, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming has been pushed back to June 15. Previously scheduled for a week earlier, the move was done in response to Cascadia Rising, a separate exercise meant to explore a major earthquake along the Cascadia Subduction Zone.

For more information, read the full story on TV Technology’s sister publication Radio World.

WASHINGTON—Before a regional test of IPAWS/EAS on June 9, the IPAWS Program Office of the Federal Emergency Management Agency has announced it will host three webinars to help the nine participating states to prepare. The webinars will begin on May 12 with a non-technical information conference call targeted for broadcast managers, program directors, system operators/managers and emergency management personnel. The remaining two webinars are technical webinars designed for engineers and technicians. Similar webinars were offered prior to other regional tests.

The nine states participating in the June 9 regional test are California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Wyoming and Washington.

For more information, read the original story on TVT’s sister publication Radio World.

The author is broadcast chair of the Wisconsin State Emergency Communications Committee.

WASHINGTON—In February the annual EAS Forum, sponsored by the National Alliance of State Broadcasters Associations and the National Association of Broadcasters, was held in Washington. In attendance were officials from the Federal Communications Commission, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Weather Service. A number of pertinent EAS issues were discussed.

NEXT NATIONAL EAS TEST
FEMA announced that the next nationwide EAS test will be conducted on Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2016 at 2:20 p.m. EDT.

This test will use the National Periodic Test (NPT) event code and the National location code, 000000. FCC rules becoming effective on July 30, 2016 require that all EAS Participants immediately relay this test.

Results of the test must be reported by each EAS Participant into the FCC’s Electronic Test Reporting System, which the FCC stated in the meeting they are targeting for launch in June. EAS Participants will then have 60 days to enter their initial data described in the EAS rules, in advance of the national test.

STATE EAS PLANS
In the current EAS Notice of Proposed Rulemaking released on Jan. 29, 2016, the FCC proposes to have all State EAS Plans submitted online. In the meeting, the commission stated that they want State Emergency Communications Committees to continue to submit updated State EAS Plans, and if the online plan proposal is adopted they will ingest the current plan files into the online portal.

The NPRM proposes to widen the scope of State EAS Plans by including details on state use of Wireless Emergency Alerts, highways signs and social media. The FCC clarified that it doesn’t intend to require all states to implement these alerting methods, but wants to leave room for innovation by states that want to do so. The FCC also noted that it is concerned about the lack of cable operator participation on many SECCs.

The commission agreed with a suggestion that the topic of drafting needed members onto SECCs be taken up by a future Communications Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council, which is an FCC federal advisory group that provides recommendations to the commission.

NWS EAS ALERTS VIA THE IPAWS EAS FEED
Currently, the NWS is not sending weather alerts over the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS) EAS feed, because of issues with the inability to detect duplicates of the same alert issued in legacy EAS over NOAA Weather Radio vs. the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) version.

Although NWS is currently deploying new software for controlling NWR, called Broadcast Message Handler (BMH), this upgrade will still only be a partial step to curing the duplicate alert detection issue. NWS is interested in a recommendation by a past CSRIC group to add an identification tag to EAS messages to cure this issue, and will likely propose such a solution in its NPRM comments.

NWS was also questioned as to whether the new BMH software will now allow NWR to carry the president’s Emergency Action Notification (EAN) EAS message. NWS responded that BMH is a stepping stone, but not a full solution. However, NWS, FEMA and FCC will continue to work toward that goal.

CSRIC EAS PROGRESS
The current CSRIC Working Group is making progress with recommendations to the commission on three EAS topics: fostering adoption of EAS security best practices by EAS Participants, updating the EAS Operating Handbook and multilingual EAS alerting. The reports of these groups will be delivered to the FCC at the March and June CSRIC meetings.

PEP UPGRADES
FEMA reported that some new Primary Entry Point stations were added over the last two years, and now the focus is on modernizing the 30-some original PEP stations to replace their aging equipment. In addition, FEMA has now transitioned to satellite-based delivery of the EAN message to PEP stations, which also allows two-way communications with individual stations.

FILE YOUR COMMENTS
The FCC acknowledged that there are a lot of proposals and requests for comment in the current EAS NPRM, and at many points during the meeting stressed that they want official comments submitted by all parties in the EAS community.

The commission has stated many times in the past that they do not make decisions on adopting new rules based on their own judgement; decisions are always based on the comments received—whether for or against any particular FCC proposal.

Don’t just sit in your chair saying, “That’s a great idea” or conversely, “That’s a terrible idea” — make your comments known. Especially, don’t presume that something is so obviously right or wrong that comment isn’t needed; the EAS community has gotten caught in the past by not commenting and after the FCC implemented the rule they rescinded it after an uproar.

State your opinions at www.fcc.gov/ecfs. Comments are due May 9; replies are due May 7. Use proceeding number 15-94 for EAS and 15-91 for wireless alerts when filing comments.

WASHINGTON—The House of Representatives have passed S.1180, the Integrated Public Alert and Warning Systems Modernization Act of 2015. This bill, which was co-sponsored by Sens. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), previously passed the Senate in July of 2015.

IPAWS allows emergency authorities to create customized messages, authenticates them and delivers them to various platforms. The new bill is designed to boost and expand IPWAS, which delivers emergency alerts to multiple platforms—i.e. TVs, radios, cell phones, computers and electronic billboards—boost training and increase collaboration.

“NAB applauds the House’s bipartisan passage of this legislation strengthening the public’s access to important emergency warnings and alerts,” said Dennis Wharton, NAB executive vice president of communications. “As ‘first informers,’ local radio and television stations understand the crucial need for up-to-the-second information when danger is near. We thank the House Transportation & Infrastructure and Homeland Security Committees, and Senators Ron Johnson and Claire McCaskill, for their leadership on this bill and we support President Obama’s swiftly signing it into law.”

WASHINGTON— A new year ushers in the next regional IPAWS test. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will conduct a test of the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System in certain states on Feb. 24 at 2:20 p.m. EST. (See “Next Regional Alert Test Is a Biggie.”)

In advance of that test, FEMA is disseminating specific technical info about a new filter required for some stations. The test message will use the National Periodic Test (NPT) event code with an audio message that sounds like a typical Required Monthly Test text.

A number of states will be part of the test, including most of the East Coast and large sections of the South and Midwest. As a result, broadcast radio stations within this testing area may need to configure a new incoming filter using the event code “National Periodic Test.” FEMA also announced that the new NPT incoming filter should have the originator listed as “Primary Entry Point.”

The NPT code “was among the original event codes specified when EAS was first established, but there was no published definition or procedure established at the time,” said Al Kenyon, IPAWS national test technical lead for the IPAWS program office within FEMA. Lacking specific direction, EAS device manufacturers included the event code in their device menus but did not program any specific response or action to be taken upon receipt of an NPT, with the exception of equipment from Gorman-Redlich, he said.

“Given that the default EAS device configuration calls for the device to ignore NPT, stations must take some action to cause their EAS device to forward an incoming NPT in order to participate in the IPAWS/EAS test,” he said.

As a result, the FEMA IPAWS office is asking all stations that will participate in the Feb. 24 test to configure their EAS devices to forward the NPT event code message upon receipt. “To do that, stations must adjust what most EAS device manufacturers refer to as an incoming message filter,” Kenyon said.

States participating in the Feb. 24 test include Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, D.C., Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Texas, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Virginia.

Some stations may need to contact their EAS equipment manufacturer to ensure that their system is ready for the test. Some manufacturers have created procedures to show stations how to add an NPT filter.

Information for the Sage Alerting Systems 3644 ENDEC gives an example of what FEMA is asking stations to do (to view the procedure, click on image at right).

The Digital Alert Systems DASDEC-II allows users to enable both the national all-zero location code and the NPT event code for automatic forwarding; these need to be manually enabled by the user (view the steps here). “These settings changes are sufficient if a station wants to voluntarily participate in the upcoming FEMA NPT test,” said Edward Czarnecki, senior director of strategy and global government affairs for Digital Alert Systems/Monroe Electronics.

Stations using other EAS systems should contact their manufacturers directly.

WEBINAR SCHEDULE
To get stations up to speed on what will be required in the Feb. 24 test, FEMA has organized several Webinars. The seminars will take place on the following dates, and can be accessed via the links shown. Attendees should log on to the event address to register, or can call in with the following access codes. All three technical seminars will cover the same material.

Technical Webinar I: Thursday, Jan. 28 at 2 p.m. Eastern
Audio Call In: 650-479-3207
Access Code: 665 717 452

Technical Webinar II: Wednesday, Feb. 3 at 10 a.m. Eastern
Audio Call In: 650-479-3207
Access Code: 662 357 165

Technical Webinar III: Tuesday, Feb. 9 at 10 a.m. Eastern
Audio Call In: 650-479-3207
Access Code: 667 519 455

WASHINGTON —The federal agency in charge of managing national emergencies will conduct tests on the advanced alerting capabilities of ATSC 3.0, the new broadcast transmission standard now under development.

The Department of Homeland Security Federal Emergency Management Agency National Continuity Programs’ Integrated Public Alert and Warning System—IPAWS—Division said it has “begun to assess the feasibility of a public alert and warning capability that is being developed in the private sector.”

This technology, the Advanced Warning and Response Network, or AWARN, works by using advanced capabilities in ATSC 3.0, which provides for the transmission of large media-rich, data messages over-the-air to mobile, portable, and fixed TV devices without interrupting the programming.

The new technology could deliver detailed emergency information to the public with pictures and videos of evacuation routes, storm tracks, and shelter information – increasing community preparedness before, during, and after a disaster. The media alerts will be able to include multilingual and multi-format information to warn non-English speaking populations and people with access and functional needs.

AWARN capitalizes on existing emergency alerting standards and builds upon the Mobile Emergency Alert System, or M-EAS, developed during a pilot project and standardized by the Advanced Television Systems Committee.

FEMA’s testing, in the IPAWS Lab located at the Joint Interoperability Test Command in Indian Head, Md., will demonstrate the feasibility and operational deployment of AWARN within the IPAWS suite of technologies and allow public safety officials to gain confidence using IPAWS in a secure environment, according to FEMA.

“FEMA is committed to working with the private sector to examine and improve future alerts and warnings,” said Roger Stone, acting assistant administrator for National Continuity Programs. “New systems could someday include pictures and video as part of the advanced alert and warning information provided to the general public.”

FEMA’s IPAWS is a national system for local alerting. IPAWS enables authorities at all levels of government to alert and warn people in areas endangered by disasters. IPAWS is used by federal, state, and local authorities to send emergency alerts to cellular phones as Wireless Emergency Alerts, to radio and television as Emergency Alert System broadcasts, to NOAA Weather Radios, and to an All-Hazards Alert and Information Feed for Internet applications, services, and Websites.

For more information on IPAWS, visit www.fema.gov/ipaws.

WASHINGTON - The NAB is pleased with the Senate’s passage of a bill aimed at modernizing the Integrated Public Alert and Warning System, or IPAWS.

“As America’s hometown ‘first informers,’ radio and television broadcasters know the crucial need for up-to-the-second information that can keep lives and property safe,” NAB Executive Vice President of Communications Dennis Wharton said in a statement. 

The Integrated Public Alert and Warning System Modernization Act of 2015 was introduced by Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Sen. Claire McCaskill, (D-Mo.). It aims to ensure that warnings about natural disasters, acts of terrorism and other disasters or threats are disseminated quickly and effectively “across all viable communications platforms. It had been passed out of committee in May; now it has passed the full chamber by unanimous consent. 

The bill calls for a training program to instruct government officials on how to use IPAWS. A similar bill has been introduced in the House and passed two committees there.

“We thank Sens. Johnson and McCaskill for their leadership on this issue and look forward to working with stakeholders to ensure all Americans have access to emergency alerts,” NAB stated.

As we reported earlier, the Broadcast Warning Working Group — whose membership is made up of several leaders of the U.S. EAS broadcast community — support the legislation, calling it “a first step to the United States having a true, real and comprehensive public warning policy called for by the Partnership for Public Warning in 2002 following the tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001.”