PBS Pushes Next-Gen Emergency Alerts

According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which is the lead agency charged with IPAW implementation, less than 40 percent of the American population has access to radio or television during the workday, making it an increasingly unreliable method of delivering emergency alerts. The future will be creating one emergency alert and delivering it to all devices.

That’s why FEMA sees potential in MDTV as one component of IPAWS. “We are in talks with Mobile TV and look forward to establishing formal contacts with them,” Damon Penn, FEMA assistant administrator for national continuity programs, told Security Management. “Our goal is simple: to provide the ability for emergency alerting officials to send one message over more devices to more people for maximum safety of our entire community.”