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Recently, emergency services have faced a series of significant challenges during major system outages, such as the one caused by a Crowdstrike software update that affected systems running the Microsoft Windows operating system. The debilitating issue impacted the operational functionality of systems worldwide and across all vertical markets, including Transportation (Air and Rail), Hospitals, and Commercial and Corporate networks. An issue of great concern is that it also reduced the capabilities in several 911 centers, forcing them to go to paper and pencil for logging their calls as some Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) were either down or seriously degraded, resulting in reduced functionality in handling the increasing deluge of incoming calls. In some cases, the outage affected the actual inbound 911 call traffic due to the fact that the primary call-handling functionality of systems providing critical location information was Windows-based. This had a significant and severe impact on call completion and ended up overloading adjacent centers that were up and capable of handling calls, as standard “overflow routing” kicked in across centers that were affected.
This has been seen several times in the past, as this cascading domino effect of overflow creates virtual choke points in centers that are unaffected, effectively overloading them to the point where they are no longer operational. Think of it this way: You are going to mow your front lawn. Your lawnmower shoots the grass out on the RIGHT side. You cut your lawn in circles in a clockwise pattern. The first few times around are non-eventful, but eventually, your mower gets bogged down, choking on all the grass. This is exactly the reason behind Hurricane Sandy over a decade ago, which highlighted the need for a next-generation 911 network able to route calls away from a problem area to a center capable of processing traffic.
However, there are a few silver linings. The FIRST is the Next Generation 911 Emergency Services IP Network (ESInet) build out is rapidly advancing across the country, and in an outage that affects the legacy network, can provide services. A case in point, for the second or third time this year, alternative 911 carrier networks utilizing Next Generation 911 (NG911) services, were able to deliver calls to NG911-enabled PSAP/ECCs using the NG911 Core Services networks as alternative routing into the 911 PSAP Emergency Communications Centers (ECC) over circuits less dependent on the affected systems. Admittedly, during this last outage, this was no guarantee of access to 911 because not every system within the NGCS or the NG911 network of functional elements relies on Non-Windows operating systems (the vulnerable component in this case), but reports indicate that some were.
The key Factor in success is that an IP Mesh Network of Networks, better known as the Internet (not necessarily THE PUBLIC Internet), can offer resources and topological flexibility. This dynamic ability allows traffic to be rerouted around outages or problematic services to the duplicity and redundancy of systems across a geographically diverse topology.
Consider this analogy: RIGHT NOW, it’s likely that several servers at Google are offline. As an internet user, you don’t need to do anything special; you simply go to Google as usual. The Internet automatically knows about offline and unavailable services, rerouting your request to an instance of an operational service at Google. All while, this process is entirely transparent to you as the user.
As NG911 continues to be deployed and implemented across many states, and as 911 PSAP/ECCs upgrade to the latest NG911software and functionality, we now have new FCC rules requiring carriers to supply NG911 circuits to a PSAP within 6 to 12 months after announcing their NG911 readiness. With this being the case, smart Enterprise IT Administrators can take advantage of this and begin their deployment of NG911 functionality in Enterprise networks today using an enterprise-class NG911 solution, such as the 911inform platform. Utilizing the ability to deliver NG911 call traffic through a SIP-enabled provider like Bandwidth, SIP traffic can be routed to either legacy or NG911 PSAP/ECCs, providing the most flexibility and connectivity options during any emergency event.
By deploying an NG911 solution at the ORIGIN of the emergency event session, enterprises can become NG911 compliant immediately, benefiting from the advantages that topology enables. This way, when the local PSAP transitions to NG911, call events pass straight through with NO CONVERSION, but what is really important is that no additional work is required at the enterprise level to take advantage of the new functionality, nor does the enterprise need to track and compensate for the change.
It Is completely understandable that because NG911 is rapidly changing and new, most enterprise IT administrators are confused, considering it too complex to deal with. That’s where we are here to assist. Over the past four years, the 911inform solution has been recognized by Frost & Sullivan for its innovative work in NG911 emergency event management in the industry. As a market leader in this segment, we currently offer the only solution capable of providing both legacy and a true NG911 NENA i3 compliant solution for enterprises today, ensuring future interoperability and legislative compliance.
If you are ready to upgrade your enterprise 911 compliance environment with future-proof technology that aligns with upcoming capabilities, visit 911inform or contact us at 1-833-333-1911 to speak with one of our knowledgeable sales engineers. We’ll show you how an advanced NG911 architecture can bring your business into federal compliance, reduce the time spent on database management, and provide affordable NG911 services.
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