Final WEA Notice Saw Numerous Changes Over Draft

The final version fleshes out a section on compliance deadlines for smaller carriers, an issue that had been raised by the Competitive Carriers Association (see 2304190027). “Because the new capabilities would be dependent on device-level software, firmware, or hardware changes, they necessarily would not be available to alerting authorities and consumers on a ‘flash cut’ basis,” the notice now says. The FCC also added a question on how to define small- and medium-sized providers and whether to make a distinction between nationwide and non-nationwide carriers. A new line notes that the FCC’s Communications Security, Reliability, and Interoperability Council has “directed ATIS to conduct a study to determine a feasible, accurate, and effective method for enhancing language support.”

The final version includes new language in a section on whether giving consumers the option to suppress the presentation of the WEA audio attention signal and vibration cadence would make it more likely that people are interested in receiving alerts. The draft asks whether participating carriers should re-set WEA-capable mobile devices to their default opt-in status as part of implementing the section. It now asks whether providers would have “the technical ability to do so” and “to what extent” they would “require support from device manufacturers to support such a re-set and update? Could such a re-set take place without affecting other settings on a user’s device (e.g., location)?”

A section looking at whether to allow more WEA tests adds a new question: “Recognizing that alerting authorities may have overlapping jurisdictions (e.g., a city, within a county, within a state), should we limit the number of tests to two per county (or other geographic area) per year, to ensure that alerting authorities coordinate with one another to prevent alert fatigue for their citizens?”

The FNRPM asks about reporting requirements carries should face for MVNOs and resellers who use their networks. Added questions ask whether this restricted to “entities” with which providers have a “contractual relationship” and whether there are “any other relationships a … Provider’s WEA election should capture to better identify wireless providers’ WEA participation status?”

The FNPRM asks about whether information about the geographic availability of WEA needs to be supplemented with additional information about WEA delivery to be useful to alerting authorities. The final version now asks whether carriers have access to information from roaming partners and whether to require carriers to provide a list “of their roaming partners via the WEA database to allow the database to compile that coverage area information.” Another new question asks about the benefit to alerting authorities of knowing whether mobile assets, like cells on wheels, deployed in their area support WEA.

The draft and final version note “inconsistent WEA performance” may lead some emergency management agencies to delay becoming authorized as alerting authorities and may cause others to limit their use of WEA. A new question asks: “Are there other reasons why emergency management agencies may delay becoming authorized as alerting authorities or otherwise limit their use of WEA, such as the costs of establishing and maintaining alerting capabilities with third party vendors?”

The approved version adds additional questions in a section on the data carriers should have to submit to verify WEA performance. “What measures would handset manufacturers and [operating system] vendors need to take to capture, store, and provide such information? What are the privacy implications of this proposal for users?” the notice now asks: “Does this proposal raise implications for device manufacturers’ security and privacy policies or for device costs? Can … Providers access or collect raw data at the device level?”