QC for Presence of Emergency Alert System (EAS) Message
https://www.veneratech.com/qc-emergency-alert-system-eas-message/ The Emergency Alert System (EAS) is a national public warning system in the United States, commonly used by state and local authorities to deliver important emergency information, such as weather and AMBER alerts, to affected communities. EAS participants include radio and television broadcasters, cable systems, satellite radio, and television providers, and wireline video providers. These participants deliver local alerts on a voluntary basis, but they are required to provide the capability for the President to address the public during a national emergency. The majority of EAS alerts originate from the National Weather Service in response to severe weather events, but an increasing number of state, local, territorial, and tribal authorities also send alerts.
https://www.veneratech.com/qc-emergency-alert-system-eas-message/
The Emergency Alert System (EAS) is a national public warning system in the United States, commonly used by state and local authorities to deliver important emergency information, such as weather and AMBER alerts, to affected communities. EAS participants include radio and television broadcasters, cable systems, satellite radio, and television providers, and wireline video providers. These participants deliver local alerts on a voluntary basis, but they are required to provide the capability for the President to address the public during a national emergency. The majority of EAS alerts originate from the National Weather Service in response to severe weather events, but an increasing number of state, local, territorial, and tribal authorities also send alerts.
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tornado-watch alert interrupts it. According to a source familiar with the situation, the scene used
a muffled, background sound that was altered to balance the authenticity of a family’s reaction to
a severe-weather event and the FCC’s rules against the misuse of the EAS tones. Nevertheless,
FCC has proposed a $272,000 fine against CBS for this violation.
To avoid such penalties, broadcasters and other content providers must ensure that an audio
tone similar to an EAS message is not present in the content they broadcast. Any missed
instance can attract heavy penalties and would also potentially tarnish the brand image of that
content provider. Therefore, every content must pass through stringent QC (validating there are
no EAS tones) before getting delivered to the end-users.
EAS Message Structure
The EAS message structure is based on Specific Area Message Encoding (SAME). Messages in
the EAS are composed of four parts: SAME header, an attention signal, an audio announcement,
and SAME end-of-message marker; as described below:
1. SAME Header: SAME header uses Audio Frequency Shift Keying (AFSK) at a rate of 520.83 bits
per second to transmit the codes. It uses two frequencies – 2083.3 Hz (Mark frequency) and
1562.5 Hz (space frequency). Mark and space-time must be 1.92 milliseconds. Key information
in the header includes originator, type of alert, region for which alert is issued, and date/time for
which the alert is applicable.
2. Attention signal. Single tone (1050 Hz) or Dual audio tone (853/960 Hz). Commercial broadcast
operations use dual-tone (853 and 960 Hz together), while the single tone (1050 Hz) is used by
NOAA weather radio. It is designed to attract the immediate attention of the listeners.
3. Actual audio, video, or text message.
4. SAME end-of-message marker. It indicates the end of the emergency alert.
File-based QC
File based QC tools are now commonly used in the content preparation and delivery chains,
thereby reducing the dependency on manual QC. Many content providers resort to spot QC as
against a full QC, exposing them to the risk of missing potential violations of FCC guidelines.
Therefore, a QC tool that can reliably detect the presence of an EAS message or a tone similar
to an EAS message can potentially save a content provider from the potential losses and
embarrassment.
EAS message detection is part of all of our QC offerings – Pulsar & Quasar. As a result of QC,
the report will contain the exact location of such violation that users can use to review and
decide.
Our QC tools not only detect the ideal EAS message tones but can also report tones that sound
similar to EAS message tones. Considering the case of “Young Sheldon” episode, this becomes
important and can potentially save content providers from potential penalties.
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