In Memorandum Opinion and Order 95- 420 (adopted October 4, 1995, released October 23, 1995), the FCC reaffirmed most of the decisions made in their Report and Order of November 1994, adopting the new Emergency Alert System. The MO&O was issued in response to five Petitions for Reconsideration filed after the summary of the R&O was published in the Federal Register. In addition, the FCC received five comments, five oppositions to the petitions, and three replies to the oppositions. I have reviewed the original petitions and the MO&O outlining the reasoning behind the FCC's decision to continue EAS with only minor modification.
TFT, Inc., a manufacturer of EAS equipment, opposed a delay in implementation of EAS. Any delay would put lives and property at unnecessary risk, since the existing EBS tests cause audiences to ignore actual alerts. Further, delays in EAS implementation would delay the availability of consumer receivers. TFT also argued that a one year delay would cost each station $5,200 "in loss of revenue during the lengthy weekly test, training of personnel, record keeping activities, and maintenance and repair of EBS equipment." TFT finally argues that a delay in implementation would actually result in an increase in the cost of equipment due to storage expenses for manufacturers.
NAB replied that the savings due to EAS would not accrue until well after EAS is fully implemented. They also replied that a delay would not put lives at risk since stations could volunatrily install EAS equipment prior to the deadline.
The FCC decided that in the interest of public safety, it is important to move forward with EAS. Due to delays brought about by the Petitions for Reconsideration (such as the FCC's suspending the testing of manufacturers' EAS equipment), and to allow stations to put the equipment purchase in a later budget year, the FCC delayed the required installation of EAS equipment six months instead of the requested one year.
DBC further requests that the rules restrict the injection level of RBDS used to transmit emergency information to 2% or less, again providing interference protection to their data service.
NAB replied that the DBC suggested 2% limit was not supported by sufficient data. DBC reasserted its original arguments and suggested the FCC warn FM broadcasters of the potential for interference due to RBDS use. Finally, Sage Alerting argued that RBDS is compatible with the DBC subcarrier. The problem is, they state, due to poor design of DBC's receivers.
The FCC decided to make no change in the rule. It will continue to encourage the use of RBDS, but not require it. The FCC decided that potential for interference between subcarrier users is best left to negotiation between the subcarrier users and the station licensee. Further, questions of receiver design are best left to engineers and managers of those leasing subcarriers as a factor in their business strategy.
The FCC decided that it would not be reasonable to adopt standards for something that is optional (though they have almost adopted standards for optional AM and FM stereo by protecting pilot frequencies). They state that including the RBDS standards into the rules would slow progress in RBDS, since changes would then have to go through a rule change procedure as well as the existing industry standards adopting procedures. They also decided that any changes in the FM technical standards (increasing modulation limits) was beyond the scope of this proceeding. It could be taken up in another proceeding (in fact, I have heard that a proceeding on modulation limits is in the works).
In summary, there were no changes in the rules regarding RBDS use in EAS.
Time Warner, in its response, argues that selective override equipment (which would override only selected channels, instead of all channels on a system) would be prohibitively expensive.
Citing various court cases and legislative history, the FCC has decided that the EAS Override on cable systems does not violate copyright law.
The rules were rewritten to clarify the intent that should an EAS header be received without an EAS EOM within a preset interval not less than two minutes, the EAS decoder will be allowed to reset. This prevents the retransmission of dead air or another station's signal in a non-emergency situation.
NAB suggested that a specific type of nonvolatile storage be used to retain EAS data in a decoder. They commented that battery backed RAM was not reliable enough, possibly since batteries require replacement. They would rather see a non-powered storage medium, such as EEPROM. The FCC agreed that battery backed storage was more vulnerable to data loss than nonvolatile integrated circuits (EEPROM), the problem was not serious enough to require FCC intervention in the competition between manufacturers. Although batteries eventually go dead, it has been my experience that data loss in supposedly nonvolatile systems has more frequently been caused by processor writing garbage to the memory during a crash. Manufacturers can take various precautions to make it difficult for an errant processor to wipe out nonvolatile memory.
On NAB request, the FCC rewrote section 11.33(a)(9) to clarify the requirement that EAS decoders have an indicator for each of the listed three conditions causing a decoder activation.
NAB pointed out that the rules, as written, required certification of encoders or decoders, but notification of combined encoder/decoders. The FCC corrected this inadvertant error to require certification of each of these devices. Further, the FCC would start accepting applications for certification of these devices 14 days after these rules were adopted, and would begin processing the applications 30 days after the rules are published in the Federal Register.
Various people requested more detail on the 1200 bps RS232 data port required on EAS equipment. Further, Sage Alerting proposed a protocol to allow EAS equipment to communicate with television character generators. The FCC declined to expand upon these specifications.
Various people asked whether the EAS codes were the same as the Weather Service's WRSAME protocol. The FCC states that they modified the WRSAME codes to meet EAS requirments, and that WRSAME are being updated to match the EAS codes. The two protocols should be identical. This will allow standard weather radios be used to drive one of the audio inputs of an EAS decoder.
The rules do not include specific event codes for various man-made emergencies, instead including a single code for a Civil Emergency Message. The FCC stated that it would be difficult to anticipate all such emergencies, but will update the codes as new codes are implemented by the NWS and other agencies.
EAS includes location codes for 1/9 of a county, an entire county, and an entire state. It does not include a code for the entire country, However, up to 31 state codes could be included in one header. The FCC decided that this "regional approach" to national emergencies was more manageable than having a single nationwide code.
Several people questioned the inclusion of the authenticator word procedures in national emergency messages (the red envelope). Use of such a method of message authentication certainly limits the ability to automate EAS. However, it appears that this is designed to be used in non-automated stations where an emergency message is received over a wire service, then dropped into the broadcast station web portion of EAS. Several people raised questions on system security in my discussions with EAS manufacturers and others. It appears possible for someone in a broadcast station to send a false alert. Further, through the use of non-secure circuits, someone outside a broadcast station could introduce a false message into the system. Such a message might be introduced into a VHF or UHF communications channel utilized to send EAS messages from a county emergency operations center to local stations. Such a false message would then be repeated by most of the broadcast stations in an area. In developing local plans, local EAS committees should give careful concern to the use of secure circuits (dedicated hardwire circuits, continuous carrier microwave or RF circuits, encrypted circuits, etc.) to carry emergency information.
Sage Alerting suggested the FCC adopt a standard for the transmission of text in EAS messages. The FCC chose to allow maximum flexibility by not adopting a text standard. Perhaps this is an area for an industry standard.
Moody Bible Institute pointed out that the wording specifically exempting television translators used as LPTV stations from the EAS requirements implies that translators not used in LPTV service (standard TV and FM translators) were required to have EAS equipment. The FCC rewrote the section to indicate that translators were not required to have EAS equipment.
NAB suggested the FCC pursue FEMA funding for stations and state emergency plans to implement EAS. The FCC responded that they will include this in their discussions with FEMA.
NAB expressed concern on misuse of the EAS by local officials. They requested a report by the FCC on EAS use to insure it is not misused. The FCC noted that all EAS use must be in compliance with plans approved by the local and state committees, and the FCC. Further, the FCC Compliance and Information Bureau will issue a report on the functioning of the EAS by July 1, 1998.
Finally, Sage Alerting requested the FCC adopt a protocol for two-way data communications as part of EAS. The FCC declined to adopt such a protocol, considering it outside the scope of the proceeding and due to the Commission's lack of a sufficient record on this matter. Sage also suggested the allocation of 8 communications channels specifically for EAS purposes. The FCC will consider this in a separate proceeding.
Finally, this is the first Insight On Rules article written in HTML (hypertext markup language). As time permits, previous articles will be converted and put on the world wide web. Articles should appear about a month after they appear in Radio World.