FCC Poised to Order ‘Interim’ Solution for Wireless EAS

Wireless industry sources said the FCC appears likely to impose an interim EAS requirement for wireless carriers, built around the use of text messages, or SMS, for alerts, patterned on the popular Amber Alert program, during its July agenda meeting. Much like the Universal Service Fund item scheduled for the June meeting, the agency’s action is likely to be couched only as a step toward a long range solution, we're told.

“We've been talking to them about something that is similar to what the industry does for Amber Alerts, where consumers would opt into a warning system,” said an industry source: “If the Commission is looking for a near term solution, SMS is what’s available.”

A 2nd wireless source confirmed that the FCC is expected to approve an interim step forward on EAS. “It’s likely to be on the July agenda,” the source said: “We're most concerned it’s done in a way that is efficient and effective.” Lobbying on the issue is intensifying at the FCC, sources said.

As part of an EAS rulemaking released last year, the FCC proposed extending mandates to wireless carriers - a proposal that has proven controversial. Cingular, the largest national carrier, said the proposal could “cause more harm than good,” particularly since little research demonstrates alerts to wireless handsets improve public safety.

In a recent filing at the FCC, Motorola warned that an interim SMS-based approach to EAS is extremely limited and should be used for only the highest level of alerts. “SMS- based EAS is not scalable. It cannot be enlarged to become a full throttle solution,” Motorola said. The length of messages is also limited, and warnings are likely to be slow to arrive. An “opt-in” systems available only to interested subscribers makes the most sense, Motorola said.

Wireless carriers working with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) have made an SMS alert system available to subscribers since last year. Subscribers have to sign up through the NCMEC website or the website of a participating carrier. The service has been used to send text messages on a regional basis a number of, a CTIA spokesman said.

Still unclear is whether the Commission’s next action on EAS will tackle other questions raised in its Nov. FNPRM -- particularly state and local EAS vs. national alerts. The Nov. EAS order, which extended EAS to digital broadcast and cable TV, satellite radio and DBS, was considered by all 4 Commissioners at the meeting to be the first step of many in a major EAS overhaul. The Nov. order didn’t require state and local EAS compliance, but strongly encouraged it. The FNPRM raised the issue for comments.

Since then, satellite interests have been most vocal on state and local alerts. They're seen as a technical nightmare, if not an outright impossibility, over national satellite systems. Satellite radio and DBS officials we spoke with said they aren’t sure if the Commission’s next action will cover the national vs. local issues.

Whether the Commission is preparing to address a joint FSS petition for reconsideration on national alerts also isn’t clear, satellite officials said. FSS giants Intelsat, PanAmSat and SES Americom jointly petitioned the FCC to reconsider parts of the Nov. EAS order in early 2006, arguing they should be left out of EAS. The burden of EAS rules should be shifted directly to the direct-to-home video providers FSS sells capacity to, they said.

DirecTV Latin America (DTVLA), which leases all its capacity from PanAmSat, opposed the petition. A DirecTV official called the debate “a jurisdictional issue.” DTVLA recently told the International Bureau it intends to send national EAS alerts to Puerto Rico, but FSS is responsible for the “distribution of DTVLA programming” and should be the ones directly regulated by the FCC. - Howard Buskirk, Adrianne Kroepsch