IP Speaks Clearly In Mass Notification
How do you tell potentially thousands of people how to avoid an imminent threat?
At Cleveland State University, fire alarm panels in 84 buildings will connect via the school’s fiber backbone network. Using a central controller, the school will be able to issue a network- wide warning or to send a message to one building, a specific floor or a single classroom. The system, from SimplexGrinnell, includes Web-based instant messaging to alert students, faculty and parents off campus.
That’s a snapshot of a modern mass notification system -- not one tool or product but a security solution encompassing an increasing range of networks and applications, many of them Internet protocol-based.
“This market is going through an IP-driven transition and evolution,” says Guy Miasnik, president and CEO of AtHoc, a Burlingame, Calif.-based firm providing enterprise-class MNS to military and private-sector clients.
IP is driving the MNS evolution because it enables integration of a wide range of security and business-oriented systems that may then feed to the MNS.The Department of Defense recognizes this ability in Appendix C of its Universal Facilities Criteria 4-021-01 document that details the promise of “net-centric alerting systems” for emergency notification uses.
The appendix acknowledges the ubiquity of IP-based technology throughout public and private entities as well as IP networking and integration opportunities. It encourages DOD facilities to adopt IP-centric notification solutions -- and education, industrial and business users are incorporating the UFC language into their own MNS requests for proposal, say vendors.
Messaging Matters
The higher education market, reacting to highly publicized campus shootings, has driven the market in “software as a service” messaging- based MNS, say vendors. With SaaS, the vendor hosts the application on its own remote servers; the client accesses applications by the Web or virtual private network.
For MNS, these solutions primarily use IP-based networks and communications protocols, like wireless short messaging service, to deliver emergency notifications to personal communication devices, including cell phones, landline phones, PCs, e-mail, PDAs and pagers. Many can convert text to voice as well as send messages in multiple languages.
Most vendors offer Web-based interfaces for creating messaging alerts. “The system has to be easy to launch,” says Ann Chamberlin, sales director for channels at 3N Global, Glendale, Calif., which provides messaging solutions. “It can’t require an IT person.”
Some messaging systems allow individual users Web access for updating and managing their personal contact information. Others query corporate personnel databases, such as Microsoft’s Active Directory or Oracle. Most enable administrators to group message recipients into logical categories -- by floor, dormitory, function or schedule. Heartland911, a New York-based nonprofit, uses an MNS from Universal Alert, Newark, N.J., to query its databases for volunteers with required skills to respond to natural disasters.
These one-to-many systems have the advantage of being easy to implement. “You deploy once, centrally, on the network,” Miasnik says, giving an MNS wide coverage quickly, yet cost effectively. Messaging systems can vary significantly in terms of infrastruc- true in part because some systems now being marketed as MNS originally were designed for non-emergency functions, such as paging groups of employees or sending desktop alerts.
Throughput also can be an issue for less robust messaging systems. Sometimes lower prices mean the vendor is using a non-guaranteed service level from telecom providers -- so a time-critical message may take hours or even days to arrive.
Questions to ask include how many servers a vendor operates, where these are based, what its survivability strategy is, how many telecom lines it has available, how quickly messages are sent and how often it upgrades its key system components, says Mark Bomber, strategic products manager for ADT Security Services, Boca Raton, Fla.
“We actively replicate data across all our data sites,” says Marc Ladin, vice president of global marketing for 3N Global. The company, which supplies messaging solutions to SimplexGrinnell, runs multiple data centers across the United States and Canada, with each of those sites protected by extensive security measures, he says.
Great Voice Still Speaks
However, even with redundant data servers and dedicated lines, if a recipient’s cell phone or PDA is not enrolled in the system or is turned off -- a requirement in many classrooms -- the one-to-many personal message fails.
“We’ve seen institutions that have purchased these systems and find text messaging isn’t enough,” says Tyler Johnston, director of marketing development, MNS, at Cooper Notification, Long Branch, N.J.
“You’ve got to work the Web messaging into the overall MNS strategy,” says Peter W. Tately, sales development manager, MNS, at Siemens Building Technologies, Buffalo Grove, Ill.
A comprehensive MNS strategy, vendors say, includes one-to-many personal messaging as well as components typically associated with fire alert systems: visual displays, sirens, horns and loudspeakers capable of projecting intelligible “great voice” messages over significant distances. Large education or industrial campuses might need to cover athletic fields or parking areas with wireless networks.
The University of California at Los Angeles, an AtHoc client, has an MNS that incorporates traditional fire emergency devices like sirens and horns and also uses an IP network to communicate to all types of mobile and desktop devices. Further, IP technology integrates the IP tools, fire system and radio to a unified console.
“They’ve achieved a very high level of redundancy in the way communication goes out to people,” Miasnik says.
“One solution doesn’t fit all scenarios,” Cooper’s Johnston says. “If you have multilayered systems, you can target your audiences and give each group specific instructions.”
One System, Many Triggers
Vendors report that many customers ask them to integrate MNS to other internal and external systems, ranging from industrial sensors to local police departments.
“We see more technologically advanced customers saying they want as many of their systems to be interfaced as possible,” says Tom Giannini, CPP, director of security and emergency communications marketing for SimplexGrinnell. Systems triggering the MNS range from National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration weather bulletins to hazardous materials sensors to security systems such as access control and video analytics. Giannini says a fire system could trigger video cameras to switch on at high resolution to record an area where a smoke alarm is active.
Such integration is relatively easy to achieve, provided the other systems also use common IP protocols, including RSS, XML and CAP. Vendors may provide software application protocol interfaces, making it easier for third parties to integrate with their systems.
“What we see is MNS becoming a component of a complete physical security architecture,” Miasnik says. “The notification space opens a path to a more comprehensive security solution.”
The flexibility of an IP-based MNS also leads clients to use their systems for a variety of non-emergency purposes, vendors say. For instance, Raytheon uses its system for multimedia video presentations to specific business units; Boeing has added an RSS news feed. Both are AtHoc clients.
One Siemens healthcare client implemented an MNS for fire alarms and then realized it could be used to manage certain clinical procedures and physician oncall schedules.
“They’ve found three or four daily use applications when the original goal was emergency use,” Tately says. Some consultants worry daily use of an MNS could dull its impact in an emergency. Vendors, however, say using the system often helps administrators be comfortable and familiar with it instead of coming to it cold during an incident.
In addition, emergency communications can easily be demarcated so they are not mistaken for a routine message.
“Our system provides capabilities to create different user experiences based on the types of data coming in,” Miasnik says.
That range of user experiences made possible by an MNS means many functions should be represented in MNS implementation specifications, say vendors. These include facilities, security, IT, business continuity and upper management. “
You really need them all in the room to figure out how to cover all the constituencies,” Johnston says.