George Mason University’s Mercatus Center criticized recent federal government efforts to improve cybersecurity protections for critical infrastructure sectors, arguing in a report Thursday that those efforts “trade emergent resilience of the Internet for opaque control of it” (http://bit.ly/1nsRnsc). President Barack Obama’s 2013 cybersecurity executive order, among other things, resulted in the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s collaboration with the private sector on the voluntary Cybersecurity Framework, with the “Version 1.0” framework going public in mid-February. The Department of Homeland Security is now using its Critical Infrastructure Cyber Community program to encourage the private sector to use the framework (CD Feb 13 p5).
The transition to an IP world offers benefits but also new risks for communications failures during and after a disaster, FCC Public Safety Bureau Chief David Simpson said Thursday during an FCC workshop on public safety and the IP transition. An afternoon session focused on disaster communications, with an eye on what the public and first responders should expect.
George Mason University’s Mercatus Center criticized recent federal government efforts to improve cybersecurity protections for critical infrastructure sectors, arguing in a report Thursday that those efforts “trade emergent resilience of the Internet for opaque control of it” (http://bit.ly/1nsRnsc). President Barack Obama’s 2013 cybersecurity executive order, among other things, resulted in the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s collaboration with the private sector on the voluntary Cybersecurity Framework, with the “Version 1.0” framework going public in mid-February. The Department of Homeland Security is now using its Critical Infrastructure Cyber Community program to encourage the private sector to use the framework (WID Feb 13 p1).
The transition to an IP world offers benefits but also new risks for communications failures during and after a disaster, FCC Public Safety Bureau Chief David Simpson said Thursday during an FCC workshop on public safety and the IP transition. An afternoon session focused on disaster communications, with an eye on what the public and first responders should expect.
Public safety officials face a challenge: how to ensure poorer, more rural areas of the country don’t fall behind their often richer urban counterparts as the industry transitions to IP technology. That was a major point of discussion at Thursday’s morning session of an FCC workshop focusing on incident response during and after the planned technology transition (See related story). Figuring out how to craft a national framework with minimum standards could pose difficulties, participants said, given a traditional preference among state and local authorities to do things themselves.
The departure of Bill D'Agostino as general manager of FirstNet comes amid growing questions about the proposed national network for first responders and whether FirstNet has enough independence from NTIA and the Department of Commerce, public safety officials said Tuesday. On Monday, FirstNet said D'Agostino was leaving after less than a year on the job (CD April 24 p1).
The defeat of 911 funding bills in Kentucky, Wisconsin and Mississippi this year has left those in charge of operating emergency services worried about aging equipment, and wondering how to fund upgrades for next-generation 911 (NG-911), even as they struggle to pay for current-generation systems. The bills were among at least six nationwide that sought additional funding to make up for a decline in 911 fees collected from the dwindling number of landline customers.
While AT&T and other telephone companies have been seeking deregulation from states to avoid having to provide costly and increasingly unprofitable landline service (CD March 19 p12), Maine’s primary telco is taking a different tact. FairPoint Communications is asking the Public Utilities Commission for a $67.6 million-a-year public subsidy to continue providing landline. The company is also asking $2-a-month increase for residential and business landline customers.
The Rural Wireless Association warned the FCC that many carriers won’t be able to make a target date of Dec. 31 for being able to route emergency texts to public safety answering points (PSAPs) (CD April 8 p10). For carriers now deploying LTE-only networks, texting can’t be provided until IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) software is integrated into the LTE core, “which is dependent on the release of IMS software by major equipment and software vendors,” RWA said (http://bit.ly/1eeVkAV). “Such software has not been made available for use by small wireless carriers, and realistically it cannot be expected to be made available for national use until the nation’s two largest wireless carriers have demanded the release of IMS” from vendors, said RWA. “Implementation of data roaming on a national basis at commercially reasonable rates is necessary to justify” a carrier’s investment in IMS, it said. T-Mobile said a “primary remaining potential impediment” is that the major text control center (TCC) providers are not yet fully interconnected. “Until that happens, T-Mobile will not be able to reach PSAPs that are not served by T-Mobile’s TCC vendor,” the carrier said (http://bit.ly/1ittfCB). “The absence of full interconnection and interoperability between TCCs has the potential to affect PSAPs who wish to implement the service, as lack of interconnection and interoperability may hinder their access to all carriers. To ensure all PSAPs can benefit from the voluntary commitment, the Commission’s near-term focus should be on solidifying these interconnection arrangements.”
The FCC should avoid imposing regulations and rely instead on voluntary agreements allowing more Americans to send emergency texts to 911, said CTIA among comments posted Monday in docket 11-153 responding to a January NPRM. The FCC agreed to seek further comment on issues including whether to impose a text-to-911 mandate on interconnected over-the-top (OTT) text providers like Apple’s iMessage or Samsung’s ChatOn. Carriers, the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials and the National Emergency Number Association reached agreement on emergency texting in December 2012. Among the provisions, Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile agreed to make their networks capable of transmitting texts to 911 call centers by May 15. The FCC should “continue to encourage voluntary industry initiatives to support text-to-911 services,” CTIA said in the new filing (http://bit.ly/1emHsyX). “The Commission should not codify or attempt to enforce the Carrier-NENA-APCO Agreement. Rather, it should allow stakeholders the flexibility to develop creative, voluntary solutions to evolving text-to-911 issues.” CTIA assured the FCC the industry “remains steadfast in its commitment” to next-generation 911. NENA said the FCC should make sure that receiving emergency texts is not overly complicated for public safety answering points (PSAPs). “NENA continues to believe that a reasonably uniform, technology-neutral approach to the 911 obligations of text Originating Service Providers (OSPs) will best serve the Commission’s statutory mandate with respect to the preservation of life and property,” NENA said (http://bit.ly/PHal36). “Consistent with that principle, NENA supports the Commission’s proposal to apply a December 31st, 2014 deadline for the implementation of service support for Text-to-911 by all covered text OSPs.” NENA also said the FCC should impose a unitary text-to-911 service request model “to reduce burdens on service providers and PSAPs alike.” Microsoft said the FCC shouldn’t impose the same requirements on non-interconnected OTT text message services as it does on interconnected services. “Such an expansion presents a host of challenges -- on technical, competitive, and enforcement fronts -- that must be fully considered before it is implemented,” Microsoft said (http://bit.ly/1h9fuLS). “Unlike traditional communications services that are tethered to a network and, as a result, have high barriers to entry and require a significant investment of time and capital, apps are easily developed and rapidly enter the marketplace from anywhere on the planet that an app developer has Internet access and the ability to publish her app in an app store.” Among the questions Microsoft raised is the fairness of imposing a mandate on U.S. app developers but not on developers living abroad.