1. Alert Gateway Group (AGG)
Status Report to the Commercial Mobile Service Alert Advisory Committee
September 19, 2007
Anthony Melone, AGG Leader

2. AGG Progress Since Last Update
Submitted Two Drafts on Alert Gateway Requirements
August 9th: Third Draft
September 7th: Final Draft
Completed all Deliverables
Finalized Alert GW filtering and mapping logic from CAP to CMAC protocol
Set alert expiration to one hour if not provided
Finalized Alert GW message construction logic to support both free format text and automatic text generation
Use CAP parameter for free format text
For automatic text generation, use canned text “in this area” for area effected instead of listing area names to meet the CMA message length limitation
Limit the sender agency to 12-character if necessary

3. Alert Gateway Requirements
Outline of requirements is as follows:
Alert Gateway Architecture
Security
System capacity and Performance
Interfaces and Protocols
Protocol Mapping
CMS Provider Profiles
Reporting
Performance Testing

4. Summary of Draft Conclusions
Alert Gateway Architecture
Flexible Architecture
Geo-redundant
Security Requirements
Authentication and Authorization
At both B and C interfaces
Assumed that B Interface is within government defined “trust-model”
C interface will support non-proprietary standards-based security (e.g. IPSec, SSL)
Gateway locations will be physically secured

5. Summary of Draft Conclusions
System Capacity and Performance
Capacity
Based on historical data the Alert Gateway should be designed to support
25,000 CMA’s per year.
Design peak rate of 30 alerts per second.
Buffering
The Alert Gateway shall support two queues per CMSP Gateway
One queue for buffering the Presidential alerts
Another queue for buffering non-Presidential alerts
The processing of Presidential alerts takes priority over non-Presidential alerts
Non-Presidential alerts are processed sequentially as received

6. Summary of Draft Conclusions
Interface and Protocols
B Interface
Documented, Non-proprietary standards based (likely IP)
CAP v1.1 protocol (XML)
C Interface
XML based protocol
Protocol Mapping
CAP Element to “CMAS” Element (w/CTG, AIG)
Translation Logic
Defined Default Values
CAP Element to Text Verbatims (w/UNG, AIG)

7. Summary of Draft Conclusions
CMSP Profiles
CMSP GWs Information (i.e. IP addresses)
Geo-Location Coverage on a State Level
Reporting
Message Logs
On-line (90 days)
Archived (36 months)
General System & Performance Reporting

8. Summary of Draft Conclusions
Performance Testing
Connectivity (C interface)
Periodic “keep alive” messaging
CMSP requested testing after planned and unplanned outages
Functional (Alert GW through CMSP GW)
Alert GW originated Test Messages
Accepted by CMSP GW, but not sent to end user device
Support Overall System Testing
Will be treated as a normal message with appropriate mapping of CAP element to CMAS element to maintain “test” identity of alert

9. Conclusions
The AGG has resolved all the technical issues related to Alert GW.
The AGG has completed specifying all technical requirements for the Alert Gateway