1. at the CAP Implementation Workshop (Rome, Italy)
WMO Alert Hub
My name is Eliot Christian. I am retired from, but remain a volunteer to, the United States Geological Survey (USGS). I am also retired from WMO but I am working for WMO as a consultant here today.
Since about 2001, I have been involved in defining and promoting the CAP standard, especially internationally.
My presentation is about the WMO Alert Hub, proposed by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) as an authoritative source for copies of official alerts, supported through NOAA as a free public service worldwide.
Here I am presenting about WMO Alert Hub on behalf of NOAA. The Program Manager of the WMO Alert Hub is Bob Bunge, in NOAA's National Weather Service, Office of Dissemination. Many of you here know Bob as the key leader in CAP for the past dozen years, especially in use of CAP by the U.S. National Weather Service.
Presented 23 September, 2015 by Eliot Christian
at the CAP Implementation Workshop (Rome, Italy)
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

2. An Alert Hub Aggregates Alerts
An Alert Hub aggregates alerts from multiple Internet news feeds (in RSS or ATOM format)
Each news feed lists alerts, sorted most recent first, for example:
I'd like to begin by explaining what is meant by an "Alert Hub" as a technology. An Alert Hub is a kind of "one stop shop". It aggregates copies of alerts from known Internet news feeds to facilitate distribution of alerts. This is much like any Internet "search service" begins by aggregating Internet content in order to help users find resources such as Web pages.
Internet news feeds act as directories of news items, with the most recent items listed first. In the case of an alert feed, each "news item" is a particular emergency alert. The news feed may be set up to disseminate alerts publicly, or privately to a specific set of users.
News feeds are communicated using a technique known as "publish-subscribe". News or alert publishers update their news feeds whenever a news item is published or an alert is issued. News and alert subscribers check for updates at intervals of their own choosing.
So, the purpose of any Alert Hub is to simplify access to published alerts by offering an aggregated store of alerts that are published as alert feeds. These alert feeds typically use either of two Internet news feed standards, both based on the eXtensible Markup Language (XML): Really Simple Syndication (RSS) or ATOM.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

3. CAP Alert as an RSS Item
Each CAP alert is referenced by an RSS news feed "item": <rss> <channel> <item> <title> cap:headline </title> <link> URL of CAP file </link> <description> cap:description </description> <author> cap:sender </author> <category> cap:category </category> <guid> cap:identifier </guid> <pubDate> cap:sent </pubDate> </item> </channel> </rss>
Here we see a typical mapping between CAP alert elements and RSS item elements.
To aggregate CAP alerts, an Alert Hub only needs the URL given in the item link, which is used to fetch the actual CAP alert.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

4. CAP News Feeds Linked from a Web Site
In this discussion, we are not concerned with test or private CAP alert feeds, just operational CAP alert feeds published for the general public.
A common practice is that these CAP alert feeds are accessible by URL displayed as a hyperlink on a Web site. The link may be identified with the CAP logo, as seen here on the web site for the news feeds of the National Meteorological Service of Argentina.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

5. Alert Hub Obtain CAP alerts via CAP news feed or direct push
Update Alert Hub news feed and push as needed
Alert Hub
news feeds
Alert Hub news feed subscribers
feed subscriber
feed publisher
alert
alerts
pull
push receiver
push sender
The Alert Hub aggregation process can be initiated in two ways: either a publisher posts a immediate notice to the Alert Hub whenever the alert news feed is updated, or the Alert Hub periodically polls the publisher's news feed to check for updates.
In the case of immediate posting, it becomes possible to achieve alert dissemination from publisher to targeted user in less than a second. When periodic polling is used, the polling interval may be a minute or more.
As the Alert Hub adds a new alert to its store, it updates it own news feed. Any Alert Hub subscribers get the alert the next time their software checks the feed for updates.
The Alert Hub may also provide a "push" service for those who need especially quick notification of new alerts.
Alert Hub direct push customers
push
alert
alert
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

6. Google Alert Hub
What I have described so far is the general concept of an Alert Hub. A particular example is seen in the Google Alert Hub. Here we can see that the Google Alert Hub aggregates alerts from various news feeds. Most of these news feeds, though not all, publish CAP alerts.
Now let me describe the particular case of the WMO Alert Hub.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

7. Official Sources Listed in the International Register of Alerting Authorities
The WMO Alert Hub is specialized in that it only handles copies of CAP alerts issued by official sources. These sources are limited to the organizations designated in the Register of Alerting Authorities maintained by WMO. Those designations are made by the Members of WMO: 185 Member States and 6 Territories.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

8. Example CAP Alert Feeds
Brazil: Instituto Nacional de Meteorologia
Canada: Alberta Emergency Management Agency
aeapublic/feed.atom
Colombia: UNGRD (National Unit for Disaster Risk Management)
rss/AtomAlert.aspx
Indonesia: BMKG (Agency for Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics)
rss/capatomlast40event.xml
Philippines: PAGASA (Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration)
Tanzania: Tanzania Meteorological Agency
USA: EPA, Air Quality Alerts
USA: NOAA, National Weather Service
USA: NOAA, West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center
events/xml/PAAQAtom.xml
USA: USGS, Earthquakes greater than magnitude 4.5
earthquakes/feed/v1.0/summary/4.5_hour.atom
This is a list of ten example CAP alert feed URLs that should be designated official in the Register of Alerting Authorities. These CAP feeds are operated by: Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Indonesia, Philippines, Tanzania, and the United States.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

9. Internet-based Services
WMO Alert Hub will be fast, highly reliable, highly available, secured against cyber attack
Alert sources will be authenticated and the content of alerts will be verifiable
The WMO Alert Hub will be highly reliable, highly available, and fast enough that an alert can reach online users within a second after being issued. This speed is crucial for immediate threats such as earthquakes, tsunami, and tornadoes, where seconds can mean the difference between warnings that are life-saving and warnings that arrived too late.
To a certain degree, the WMO Alert Hub is independent of local network services. This means that some alerting will continue even if local services are weak or become overwhelmed. This off-loading of server demand can be especially crucial for events in least-developed countries.
The WMO Alert Hub will be hardened against cyber attack. It will also assure that alerts are from authenticated sources, and will allow receivers to verify that alerts are the same as what was sent. The WMO Alert Hub will also support analytic capabilities to help alert publishers optimize their dissemination mechanisms.
Given these characteristics, the WMO Alert Hub is expected to be of great value to emergency alerting.
I'd like to focus in a bit more detail on the particular benefits of the WMO Alert Hub.
WMO Alert Hub
Alerting Authorities
CAP Alert Receivers
Google Alert Hub
Other Alert Hubs
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

10. Benefits Redundancy Scale Security and Authenticity Analytics Speed
Redundancy - One obvious benefit of the WMO Alert Hub is that it provides a backup copy of every alert. Having an additional copy of alert messages on a site away from the originator helps assure that alert messages do not get lost.
Scale - It is very important that the Alert Hub is supported on a global scale dissemination infrastructure that is largely independent of the infrastructure local to where the hazard event is occurring.
For instance, if a small island state issues a tsunami alert, their local Internet infrastructure can soon be overwhelmed by the demands of this potential disaster situation. The situation can be exacerbated by any local damage that may accompany the events, but even without such damage the telecommunications will be stressed by the sudden increase in local use as well as by the sudden global interest in the event. These capacity-stressing effects are especially the case for least developed and developing countries that often have less cushion to maintain adequate communications services. In such situations, the high performance, high reliability, and high availability of the WMO Alert Hub can be a crucial supplement to local capabilities.
Security and Authenticity - Security of the alerting service and assured authenticity of alert messages are of great interest to official alerting authorities. In addition to the pervasive malware attacks common to all public networks, it is widely acknowledged that the official alerting function could become a target for cyber attacks. This can occur as deliberate disruptive tactics designed to exploit or mimic hazard threats.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

11. Benefits Redundancy Scale Security and Authenticity Analytics Speed
In these situations, the WMO Alert Hub offers the benefit of high levels of security on the publishing side so that alerts are only posted by authenticated sources that are officially authorized.
On the subscriber side, the WMO Alert Hub offers the benefit of high levels of authenticity to assure that the alert as received by the targeted user is actually the alert that was sent by the alerting authority.
Security and authentication methods available include encryption and digital certificates.
Analytics - Another benefit of the Alert Hub involves analytic capabilities that follow from its design as a centralized aggregator. This aggregation simplifies analysis of how alert dissemination actually occurs--patterns that can be difficult to discern across many independent disseminators.
Speed - From a WMO alerting infrastructure perspective, the AlertHub technology can be used as an alternate high-speed channel to enable immediate (sub-second) push notification of certain time-critical hazard events.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

12. Earthquake Early Warning (USGS)
For example, in an Earthquake Early Warning system, warnings triggered on detection of an earthquake are sent electronically to warn people before destructive ground motion arrives. In the most affected areas, the system can only give a few seconds of warning time, so it is crucial that warning messages are pushed to user devices immediately.
A few seconds of warning may not seem like much, but it is enough for people to take some protective actions, such as turn off stoves, safely stop vehicles, and of course: drop, cover, and hold on.
It is enough time for surgeons to stop delicate procedures, for digital highway signs to warn against entering tunnels or proceeding across bridges, for emergency responders to open firehouse doors, for nuclear power plants to take precautionary measures.
The U.S. Geological Survey intends to leverage CAP as another way to disseminate Earthquake Early Warning messages to affected areas as quickly as possible.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

13. Data Centre within WMO Structure
Before I conclude, I'd like to note how the WMO Alert Hub will be situated among the 374 data centres operating as part of the WMO infrastructure.
Within the scope of the WMO Information System (WIS), the WMO Alert Hub will be a Data Collection and Production Centre (DCPC), established by NOAA in the United States and organized to the Washington Global Information System Centre (GISC).
As my parting comment, let me also emphasize: alerts facilitated by the WMO Alert Hub remain clearly a product of the alert issuer. That is to say: the WMO Alert Hub does not originate alerts, it only helps disseminate alerts.
WMO Alert Hub will be a DCPC (Data Collection or Production Centre) as part of the WMO Information System (WIS)
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub

14. Questions? That concludes my presentation
We may have time for one or two questions.
23 September 2015
WMO Alert Hub