Press Releases

Emergency Alert System Manufacturers and Service Providers Develop Profile for Using Common Alerting Protocol in Broadcast EAS

25 September 2008 — The EAS-CAP Industry Group – a broad coalition of equipment, software and service providers to the Emergency Alert System - today announced that its members have released a draft profile for the effective use and translation of the open, non-proprietary Common Alerting Protocol (CAP)¹ for the next generation of broadcast EAS.

The profile will be an important step towards improving interoperability across agencies, jurisdictions, systems and vendors, helping to ensure that the public benefits from improved capabilities to communicate weather, civil, AMBER and other alerts via broadcast media.

The Industry Group will provide this profile as a recommendation to U.S. governmental agencies and industry associations on the use of CAP for EAS purposes, including the FCC, FEMA, National Weather Service, and other organizations. Group members intend to rapidly implement the EAS-CAP profile within their own systems and equipment.

The EAS-CAP profile provides developers and manufacturers guidelines as to which elements in a CAP message are required for an EAS message, identifies how a mandatory alert from a state/territorial Governor would be identified, describes basic authentication and security features, recommends accepted formats for audio messages, and other features.

The output of the Group’s work is publicly accessible on its website www.eas-cap.org, and the Group will offer a mechanism for public comment on that site. The Group plans to continue its work to solicit feedback and provide recommendations to EAS stakeholders.

Background:
The Group was established in response to the July 2007 decision by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to maintain EAS and have all U.S. EAS participants adopt an ability to receive messages using the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) within 180 days after the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) formally adopts CAP version 1.1 as a standard for EAS.²  FEMA’s announcement on CAP adoption is expected in the first quarter of 2009.

The Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) is a simple but general format for exchanging all-hazard emergency alerts and public warnings over all kinds of networks. CAP allows a consistent warning message to be disseminated simultaneously over many different warning systems, such as computers, wireless communications, alarms, and television radio and cable via broadcast EAS.

Group members supporting the EAS-CAP Profile include:

Digital Alert Systems, LLC
Hormann America, Inc.
iBiquity Digital Corporation
Monroe Electronics, Inc.
MyStateUSA
Sage Alerting Systems, Inc.
TFT, Inc.
Trilithic, Inc.
Warning Systems, Inc.

Additional information:
For more information about the EAS-CAP Industry Group and its EAS-CAP Profile, visit http://www.eas-cap.org.

For more information about the EAS, visit the FCC's Public Safety & Homeland Security Bureau http://www.fcc.gov/pshs/eas/. For more information about the FCC's Report and Order on CAP, visit
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-07-109A1.pdf.

About the EAS-CAP Industry Group:
The EAS-CAP Industry Group is an informal coalition of Emergency Alert System equipment, software and
service providers. Using the best available information, the EAS-CAP Industry Group has collaborated to
develop a voluntary profile for the interoperability of advanced Emergency Alert System (EAS) capabilities in the United States using the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP). Specifically, the Industry Group collaborated to coordinate interoperable data standards among Emergency Alert System equipment, software and service providers. Further, the Industry Group will seek to provide recommendations to U.S. governmental agencies and industry associations on the use of CAP for EAS purposes.

The EAS-CAP Industry Group’s intention is to offer an interoperable EAS-CAP data profile that is a freely
available resource for EAS participants, equipment, software and service providers, to the benefit of public alert and warning capabilities throughout the United States. It is the intention of the Industry Group that any work product of the group be free of copyright and intellectual property constraints.

Press contact:
press@eas-cap.org
www.eas-cap.org

¹ The Common Alerting Protocol v1.1 was developed by the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), a non-profit, international consortium that develops standards.

² Review of the Emergency Alert System, Second Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, 22 FCC Rcd. 13275 (2007), EB Docket No. 04-296 (Second EAS Report and Order).