Shapiro Administration shares update on intermittent 911 system outage
The Shapiro Administration is sharing updates with the Pennsylvania public regarding the intermittent outages that affected the state's Next-Generation 911 (NG911) system on July 11.
The intermittent outages began around 2 p.m. on July 11, and were resolved on Saturday morning, July 12. Although services were fully functioning, teams were still investigating the cause.
According to a news release, the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency (PEMA) shared its findings in a preliminary report regarding the root cause of the intermittent outages.
The cause of the intermittent outages was not determined to be a cyber attack, but instead due to a defect in an operating system which caused intermittent interruptions to NG911 call delivery.
The NG911 system in Pennsylvania functions as follows, according to the release:
- A caller dials 9-1-1
- The call is sent to one of the data centers for processing by the NGCS, where the system determines the caller's location and delivers the call to the appropriate Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP), commonly called 911 center
- The PSAP processes the call and dispatches the appropriate emergency services
Next Generation Core Services (NGCS) are the systems and components used to process and route calls from phones to 911 centers.
"As soon as the intermittent outages started, our vendors and partner public safety organizations began to investigate the cause and take steps to resolve the issue," said PEMA Executive Director Jeff Boyle.
Boyle continued," We activated the Emergency Alert System and issued Wireless Emergency Alerts as a precautionary measure to notify everyone in Pennsylvania of the issue and to follow county-based back up plans should they not be able to reach the 911 centers by calling the traditional three-digit phone number."
PEMA went on to thank the 61 PSAPs for their hard work and dedication in serving their communities during the intermittent outages.
Additionally, it was stated in the release that a more detailed analysis of the issue and corrective measures to enhance the system are currently being worked on.
More information that is not security-sensitive will be released at a later time.
As part of a safety plan, PEMA encourages residents to have your county 911 center ten-digit non-emergency number saved on your cellphone or in an easily accessible place in case you have an emergency and cannot reach 911.
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