Members Approve Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) v1.1 as OASIS Standard

["Carol Geyer" <carol.geyer@oasis-open.org>]

Members Approve Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) v1.1 as OASIS Standard 

Boston, MA, USA; 30 November 2005 -- OASIS, the international e-business standards consortium, today announced that its members have
approved the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) version 1.1 as an OASIS Standard, a status that signifies the highest level of
ratification. Developed through an open process by the OASIS Emergency Management Technical Committee, CAP provides a simple,
general-purpose format for exchanging all-hazard emergency alerts and public warnings over any network. 

"CAP allows a consistent warning message to be disseminated simultaneously over many different systems, increasing warning
effectiveness while simplifying the notification task," said Elysa Jones of Warning Systems, Inc., chair of the OASIS Emergency
Management Technical Committee. "Since the approval of CAP v1.0 in 2004, the standard has been deployed by a wide variety of
government agencies and companies within the emergency management community. CAP v1.1 incorporates many lessons learned in the
production implementation of the standard."

Jones cited several high-profile CAP implementations, including the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) and the United States Geological Survey (USGS).

"CAP is an integral part of relaying civil emergency messages on the NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards and other NWS dissemination
systems," said Mark Paese, Director, Operations Division for NOAA's National Weather Service. "Its success is an excellent example
of how the emergency management community and the government can work together to increase the effectiveness of emergency alerting."

"The United States Geological Survey is pleased to be providing information about earthquakes and volcano and landslide advisories
in CAP format," said David Oppenheimer, a seismologist with the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program. "The advantage of CAP is that it
allows the USGS to instantaneously distribute our earthquake information to a wide audience of emergency responders in an approved
message format." The USGS automatically distributes CAP messages about earthquakes within minutes after their occurrence as well as
advisories via the Disaster Management Interoperability Services (DMIS) and as an RSS feed from the USGS website. 

CAP v1.1 enhancements include flexible geographic targeting using latitude/longitude shapes and other geospatial representations in
three dimensions; multilingual and multi-audience messaging; phased and delayed effective times and expirations; enhanced message
update and cancellation features; template support for framing complete and effective warning messages; compatibility with digital
encryption and signature; and a facility for digital images and audio.

Chip Hines, Program Manager for the Disaster Management eGov Initiative Office of the Chief Information Officer Emergency
Preparedness and Response/FEMA Department of Homeland Security, noted, "Not only does the publication of the CAP OASIS Standard
signify an increase in capability to send alerts, it also shows that the process works--that the emergency community is ready,
willing, and able to bring standards into their operations. CAP has grown into a standard that is being adopted worldwide, helping
the seamless transition of a host of alerts across platforms and systems. The end result is a world better prepared for any
emergency."

"The CAP OASIS Standard is being used in many exciting ways, some that weren't envisioned in the initial stages of its development.
It offers tremendous benefits for local public safety environments as well as in global and regional efforts, such as tsunami
warnings," said Patrick Gannon, president and CEO of OASIS. "With this work and their continuing efforts, members of the OASIS
Emergency Management Technical Committee are responding well to today's critical need for enhanced response. There is little doubt
that the use of CAP offers the potential to save lives."

The OASIS Emergency Management Technical Committee remains open to new participation and particularly seeks input from those in the
international community  to advance CAP in alignment with other specifications in its Emergency Data Exchange Language (EDXL) suite.
All interested parties are encouraged to exchange information on implementing CAP via the cap-dev mailing list
(http://www.oasis-open.org/mlmanage/). As with all Consortium projects, archives of the OASIS Emergency Management Committee's work
are accessible to both members and non-members, and OASIS hosts an open mail list for public comment on the standard.


About OASIS:

OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) is a not-for-profit, international consortium that
drives the development, convergence, and adoption of e-business standards. Members themselves set the OASIS technical agenda, using
a lightweight, open process expressly designed to promote industry consensus and unite disparate efforts. The consortium produces
open standards for Web services, security, e-business, and standardization efforts in the public sector and for application-specific
markets. Founded in 1993, OASIS has more than 5,000 participants representing over 600 organizations and individual members in 100
countries. Approved OASIS Standards include AVDL, CAP, DITA, DocBook, DSML, ebXML CPPA, ebXML Messaging, ebXML Registry,
OpenDocument, SAML, SPML, UBL, UDDI, WSDM, WS-Reliability, WSRP, WS-Security, XACML, XCBF, and XML Catalogs.
http://www.oasis-open.org
 

Additional information:

OASIS Emergency Management Technical Committee
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/emergency
 
FAQ
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/emergency/faq.php
 

 
Press contact:

Carol Geyer
Director of Communications
OASIS
carol.geyer@oasis-open.org
+1.978.667.5115 x209