US 9,319,755 B2Granted

Common distribution and rendering for emergency alert services

AssigneeVerizon Patent and Licensing Inc.

InventorsDaniel C. Fusco, Michael J. Talbert, William S. Downey

Life of this patent

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Abstract

A system and method for are provided for common distribution and rendering of communications capability for emergency alert services. A zone headend device, for a local zone, receives a local emergency alert service (EAS) message that is intended for a particular geographic locality. The zone headend device processes the local EAS message for delivery over a television conditional access system and sends the local EAS message to a regional headend device for a region of multiple zones including the local zone. The regional headend device receives the local EAS message and another local EAS message from another zone headend device. The regional headend device processes the local EAS message and the other local EAS message for in-band delivery with regional programming for broadcast quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) and over-the-top streaming.

Claims14

Dependent claims

A method, comprising:

receiving, by a zone headend device for a local zone, a local emergency alert service (EAS) message that is intended for a particular geographic locality;
processing, by the zone headend device, the local EAS message for delivery over a television conditional access system;
sending, by a regional headend device for a region of multiple zones including the local zone, a polling signal to the zone headend device;
receiving, by the zone headend device and from the regional headend device, a response to the polling signal indicating that a local EAS message has been received;
sending, by the regional headend device and to the zone headend device, a first request for the local EAS message;
sending, by the regional headend device, another polling signal to another zone headend device for another local zone;
receiving, by the regional headend device and from the other zone headend device, a response to the other polling signal indicating that another local EAS message has been received;
sending, by the regional headend device and to the other zone headend device, a second request for the other local EAS message;
receiving, by the regional headend device, the local EAS message, in response to the first request, and the other local EAS message, in response to the second request;
and
processing, by the regional headend device, the local EAS message and the other local EAS message for in-band delivery with regional programming for broadcast quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) and over-the-top streaming;
receiving, by the regional headend device, a regional EAS message from an emergency message source;
processing, by the regional headend device, the regional EAS message for in-band delivery with regional programming for over-the-top streaming;
sending, by the regional headend device, the regional EAS message to a national headend device for multiple regions including the region;
receiving, by the national headend device, the regional EAS message;
and
processing, by the national headend device, regional EAS message and other regional EAS messages for in-band delivery with live linear national programming for over-the-top streaming,
wherein each of the zone headend device, the regional headend device, and the national headend device are different devices.

15 more elements

A system, comprising:

multiple zone encoder/decoder devices, wherein each of the multiple zone encoder/decoder devices are configured to:
receive a local emergency alert service (EAS) message that is associated with a local zone,
process the local EAS message for delivery over a television conditional access system,
receive a polling signal from a regional encoder/decoder device for a region of multiple zones including the local zone,
respond to the polling signal when the local EAS message has been received, and
send the local EAS message to the regional encoder/decoder;
the regional encoder/decoder device configured to:
send the polling signal to each of the multiple zone encoder/decoder devices,
receive responses to the polling signal indicating that local EAS messages have been received,
send, to each of the multiple zone encoder/decoder devices that provided a response to the polling signal, a request for a local EAS message,
receive the local EAS messages from each of the multiple zone encoder/decoder devices,
process the local EAS messages for in-band delivery with regional programming for over-the-top streaming, and
send an aggregate of the local EAS messages to a national encoder/decoder device for multiple regions including the region, the national encoder/decoder device being a different device than the regional encoder/decoder device;
and
the national encoder/decoder device configured to:
receive the aggregate from the regional encoder/decoder device and another aggregate of EAS messages from another regional encoder/decoder device, and
process the aggregate and the other aggregate for in-band delivery with national programming for over-the-top streaming.

14 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Facts

Application: 14/201,339Filed 7 Mar 2014
Published: US 2015/0256902 A110 Sep 2015
Granted: 19 Apr 2016
Term ends: Not estimatedThe source records don’t support an estimate.

Classification10 codes

H04N 21/814
Involving additional data, e.g. news, sports, stocks, weather forecasts: comprising emergency warnings
H04H 20/59
Arrangements specially adapted for specific applications, e.g. for traffic information or for mobile receivers: for emergency or urgency
H04N 21/214
Server components or server architectures: specialised server platform, e.g. server located in an airplane, hotel, hospital
H04N 21/2221
Secondary servers, e.g. proxy server, cable television Head-end: being a cable television head-end