NTIA urges update to Wireless Priority Service
The US National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has filed a Petition for Rulemaking with the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to update the rules governing Wireless Priority Service (WPS), a program that enables wireless emergency calls to get through if networks are congested.
The petition is designed to update the rules governing WPS, which were developed in the late 1990s and have not been updated since the program began following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
The WPS program originally provided priority access only to cellular network radio channels, but has evolved to reflect new standards and technologies as well as meet the increased priority communications needs of the national security/emergency preparedness community.
NTIA filed the petition on behalf of the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Emergency Communications (OEC), which manages priority telecommunications programs.
Many of the requests covered in the petition simply seek to align the FCC’s rules with OEC’s current business practices and capabilities, but ask for some increased WPS capabilities, including the following changes:
- Permit WPS voice calls for a small subset of high-priority WPS users, if needed, to pre-empt or degrade in-progress, non-911 calls.
- Extend priority services beyond just voice calls to include data, text and video services.
- Require WPS providers and users to provide DHS performance data needed to evaluate program effectiveness.
- Modify the rules to reflect authorities, organisations and requirements that were not in existence at the time the rules were approved.
- Reflect current capabilities not present or envisioned at the onset of the program, eg, end-to-end priority, new methods of invoking priority, and refine the rules used to approve and categorise the WPS user base.
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