Press Releases

WASHINGTON – The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS) and the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) today announced the release of J-STD-110, Joint ATIS/TIA Native SMS to 9-1-1 Requirements & Architecture Specification, a standard that, upon implementation, will provide short message service (SMS) subscribers the ability to send an SMS text message to 9-1-1.  This industry-generated solution positions service providers to have a fully operational text to 9-1-1 solution in place by May 15, 2014, the target date communicated to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) by AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile USA and Verizon, all active participants in the J-STD-110 development. 

These four service providers have pointed to J-STD-110 to support the voluntary framework for an interim text to 9-1-1 solution, which supports coarse location to route the text to the appropriate Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP), the ability to send a text to the short code “911,” and delivery of a message advising the caller to dial 9-1-1 when texting to 9-1-1 is not available.  This interim solution will be implemented while the long-term Next Generation 9-1-1 solution is being developed in ATIS and 3GPP for Multimedia Messaging Emergency Services in the next technology generation.

“Text messaging is one of consumers’ preferred means of communication and increasingly they are expecting that they can access life-saving emergency services using SMS.  Thus, market demand has helped drive the need for this critical standard,” said ATIS President and CEO Susan M. Miller. “J-STD-110 makes a new generation of emergency communications capabilities possible. It allows text to 9-1-1 to be broadly implemented across the United States to get emergency messages to public safety answering points at times when help is needed most.”

“The development of J-STD-110 is a consensus response from the telecommunications service provider and manufacturer community to address the critical need to enable delivery and reception of native SMS text to and from the PSAP,” said TIA President Grant Seiffert. “In the short-term, the standard will enable life-saving communications between those in situations where voice conversations are not possible, and will augment the deaf and hard of hearing community’s ability to communicate with emergency services in a timely fashion. In the long-term, this standard will serve as a bridge to a future next generation 9-1-1 service that will see numerous benefits for the public, including enhanced accessibility to 9-1-1 services, improved information sharing with PSAPs at a quicker rate, and a more diverse, reliable and resilient communications medium for reaching emergency services.”

ATIS, TIA and their members were actively involved in the FCC’s Emergency Access Advisory Committee, which, on March 1, approved a report on interim text messaging to 9-1-1 wherein J-STD-110 was singled out as a non-proprietary solution that can encourage the timely deployment of text to 9-1-1.  The report also notes that the joint standard supports a flexible and interoperable environment for multiple wireless carrier and public safety network configurations, and defines capabilities necessary to support SMS to 9-1-1, including standardized interfaces from the originating network to the PSAP, obtaining coarse location for routing, handling bounce-back messages, and managing the text message dialog between the originator and PSAP.

The new ATIS/TIA joint standard will be available via the ATIS Document Center and TIA’s website and will be complimentary through June 2013.

About ATIS 
As a leading technology and solutions development organization, ATIS brings together the top global ICT companies to advance the industry’s most-pressing business priorities. Through ATIS committees and forums, nearly 200 companies address cloud services, device solutions, emergency services, M2M communications, cyber security, ehealth, network evolution, quality of service, billing support, operations, and more. These priorities follow a fast-track development lifecycle — from design and innovation through solutions that include standards, specifications, requirements, business use cases, software toolkits, and interoperability testing.

ATIS is accredited by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). ATIS is the North American Organizational Partner for the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), a founding Partner of oneM2M, a member and major U.S. contributor to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Radio and Telecommunications sectors, and a member of the Inter-American Telecommunication Commission (CITEL). For more information, visit www.atis.org.

About TIA
The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) represents the global information and communications technology (ICT) industry through standards development, advocacy, tradeshows, business opportunities, market intelligence and world-wide environmental regulatory analysis. Since 1924, TIA has been developing standards to enhance the business environment for broadband, mobile wireless, information technology, networks, cable, satellite and unified communications. Members’ products and services empower communications in every industry and market, including healthcare, education, security, public safety, transportation, government, the military, the environment and entertainment.

TIA is an ANSI-accredited standards development organization with standards development activities have both a national and global reach and impact. TIA is one of the founding partners and also serves as Secretariat for 3GPP2 (a consortium of five SDOs in the U.S., Japan, Korea, and China with more than 65 member companies) which is engaged in drafting future-oriented wireless communications standards. TIA also is active in the formulation of U.S. positions on technical and policy issues, administering four International Secretariats and 16 U.S. Technical Advisory Groups (“TAGs”) to international technical standards committees at the International Electrotechnical Commission (“IEC”). Visit www.tiaonline.org.

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