9 Enhancements of Public Warning System (ePWS)

22.2683GPPPublic Warning System (PWS) requirementsRelease 18TS

9.1 Service description

Requirements specified in the clause 9 do not apply for US WEA and Japan ETWS.

Enhancements of Public Warning System (ePWS) define behaviours for UEs with no user interface or with a user interface that is incapable of displaying text-based Warning Notifications when receiving a Warning Notification.

In addition, enhancements of Public Warning System (ePWS) is intended to improve the comprehension of a Warning Notification to the following categories of users:

– Users with disabilities who have UEs supporting assistive technologies beyond text assistive technologies; and

– Users who are not fluent in the language of the Warning Notifications.

Requirements defined for PWS-UEs in clause 4 are applicable for ePWS-UEs unless dedicated ePWS-UE requirements described in clause 9 supersede them. Specifically, roaming requirements specified in clause 4.7 and security requirements specified in clause 4.8 are applicable for ePWS-UEs.

9.2 General Requirements

9.2.1 ePWS Requirements

ePWS-UEs shall only be required to receive and present Warning Notifications in languages as presented by the Warning Notification Provider. Regional/regulatory requirements may require the Warning Notifications to be broadcast in multiple languages.

There shall be no requirement for language translation in the operator’s network or the UE.

It shall be possible for the Warning Notification to be presented on the ePWS-UE upon reception and without any user interaction.

It shall be possible for users to configure the behavior of an ePWS-UE with regard to Warning Notification alerting and should allow at least volume adjustment if an ePWS-UE supports the alerting sound.

ePWS-UEs should have the ability to present previously displayed Warning Notifications if requested by the user.

– ePWS-UE shall be able to support concurrent reception of multiple Warning Notifications.

9.2.2 Battery Life of ePWS-UE

Battery life of the ePWS-UE shall not be significantly reduced by ePWS.

9.2.3 Enabling and disabling of Warning Notifications

The ePWS-UE shall be configured to receive all Warning Notifications.

It shall be possible for users to disable (e.g., opt-out) presentation of some or all of the Warning Notifications, subject to regulatory requirements and/or operator policy. The user shall be able to select ePWS-UE enabling/disabling options via the user interface to disable, or later enable, the ePWS-UE behavior in response to some or all Warning Notifications. Depending on the regional/regulatory requirements, the user shall be able to receive Warning Notifications in one or more selected languages.

Where regional or national regulations allow, the HPLMN operator shall be able to instruct the ePWS-UE to ignore all Warning Notifications in the HPLMN and in PLMNs equivalent to it, by means of a setting on the USIM.

Where regional or national regulations pertaining to a VPLMN allow, the HPLMN operator shall be able to instruct the ePWS-UE to ignore all Warning Notifications that are received whilst in this VPLMN, by means of a setting on the USIM, when the integrity of Warning Notifications in this VPLMN is known by the HPLMN operator to be compromised. This setting need not distinguish VPLMNs.

Subject to regional or national regulations, a ePWS-UE in limited service state shall be able to receive and present Warning Notifications.

NOTE : Non-existing or empty USIM data files results in all Warning Notifications being presented to the ePWS application.

9.3 Requirements for 3GPP system supporting ePWS-UEs

The 3GPP system shall allow the content of a Warning Notification to include information that can be mapped to an event or a disaster and is identifiable by the ePWS-UEs.

NOTE: The information included in the content of a Warning Notification may be an identifier of an event or a disaster.

9.4 Requirements for ePWS-UE incapable of displaying text based Warning Notification

9.4.1 Requirements for ePWS-UE with no user interface

ePWS-UEs with no user interface shall be able to receive a Warning Notification broadcast from the 3GPP network.

Subject to the intended function of the ePWS-UE (e.g. IoT) which has no user interface and regional regulatory requirements, the ePWS-UE may either:

1. Ignore Warning Notification; or

2. Take actions consistent with the ePWS-UE function (e.g. IoT) in response to specific Warning Notifications based on the content of the Warning Notification, e.g. shut down machinery or trigger a building alarm system.

9.4.2 Requirements for ePWS-UE with a user interface incapable of displaying text based Warning Notification

The ePWS-UE with a user interface that is not capable of displaying a text-based content shall be able to support the reception of a Warning Notification broadcast from the 3GPP network and shall be able to support the extraction of the information on the type of a notified event or disaster from the received Warning Notification.

NOTE: The information extractable from the received Warning Notification may be an identifier of an event or a disaster.

9.5 Requirements for the improvement of understanding the Warning Notification

The ePWS-UE with a user interface providing accessibility extensions to mobile users with disabilities shall be able to support the reception of a Warning Notification broadcast from the 3GPP network.

The ePWS-UE with a user interface providing accessibility extensions to mobile users with disabilities shall be able to support the extraction of any information on the type of a PWS notified event or disaster from the received Warning Notification

The ePWS-UE with a user interface providing accessibility extensions to mobile users with disabilities shall support the presentation of the information that improves the comprehension of Warning Notification by the accessibility extensions.

NOTE: Subject to regional regulatory requirements the ePWS-UE may use alternative alerting modes for user alerting consistent with ePWS-UE accessibility extensions and based on the content of the Warning Notification.

A PWS-UE may support the extraction and presentation of information representing a disaster or an event identifiable by Warning Notifications.