Voglio sapere a riguardo di…

16572

Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 59 / Tuesday, March 30, 2021 / Proposed Rules
jbell on DSKJLSW7X2PROD with PROPOSALS

rule requiring false alert reports from EAS industry participants to clarify the required nature of those reports compared to the voluntary reporting system for the Administrator of FEMA
or a State, local, Tribal, or territorial government entity.
To help the Commission more fully evaluate the cost of compliance should our proposals be adopted, in the Notice we request comments on the cost implications of our proposals and ask whether there are more efficient and less burdensome alternatives for the Commission to address our obligations under the NDAA21. Although the Commission cannot fully quantify the cost of compliance for all small entities impacted by the rules proposed in the Notice, we believe our proposed modifications to the WEA and EAS
rules are the most efficient and least burdensome approach to codifying the requirements of the NDAA21. We expect the information we receive in comments including cost and benefit analyses, to help the Commission identify and evaluate relevant matters for small entities, including compliance costs and other burdens that may result from the proposals and inquiries we make in the Notice.
E. Steps Taken To Minimize the Significant Economic Impact on Small Entities, and Significant Alternatives Considered The RFA requires an agency to describe any significant, specifically small business alternatives that it has considered in reaching its proposed approach, which may include the following four alternatives among others: 1 the establishment of differing compliance or reporting requirements or timetables that take into account the resources available to small entities; 2 the clarification, consolidation, or simplification of compliance or reporting requirements under the rule for small entities; 3 the use of performance, rather than design, standards; and 4 and exemption from coverage of the rule, or any part thereof, for small entities.
The proposed action in the Notice are designed to be minimally burdensome to all affected entities, including small entities. While the Commission does not expect the proposals to have a significant economic impact on small entities, below we discuss actions that should minimize any significant impact on small entities and some alternatives we considered.
The Commission believes that its proposal to replace WEAs existing Presidential Alert class with a National Alert class is the appropriate approach
VerDate Sep<11>2014

16:16 Mar 29, 2021

Jkt 253001

because it would require few, if any, technical changes to be made to participating CMS provider networks or the mobile devices of their subscribers and impose fewer costs than available alternatives. This proposal allows all participating CMS providers wireless systems currently receiving mandatory Presidential Alerts, to receive National Alerts the same waydistributed automatically as a non-optional alert to the same class of wireless customers that they currently receive Presidential Alerts. This can be effectuated by using the existing WEA handling code for Presidential Alerts along with the name change to National Alerts, which minimizes costs for participating CMS
providers. With respect to our proposal to require participating CMS providers that use WEA header displays that read Presidential Alert to change those alert headers to read National Alert, the Commissions approach grants participating CMS providers flexibility in the approach they use to ensure compliance. Specifically, this proposed requirement could be satisfied by any approach that ensures that Presidential Alert is not displayed on a users mobile device, whether by changing the displayed header or not displaying the header at all. The Commission further proposes to reduce the burden on participating CMS providers by exempting from the requirement any network infrastructure that is technically incapable of meeting this requirement, such as situations in which legacy devices or networks cannot be updated to support this functionality. In our efforts to minimize costs and explore other alternatives, we have requested comments on each of these WEA proposals as well as on costs implications and cost estimates for these proposals as well as any alternatives.
The proposals to require each SECC to meet not less frequently than annually to review and update its State EAS Plan and certify as much in the updated plan it submits annually to the Commission, should not impose burdens on SECCs.
The proposal allows SECCs to meet virtually, thus to the extent any SECC is not already meeting regularly, the annual meeting requirement would only entail greater coordination efforts on the part of such SECC to arrange a mutually agreeable time and meeting platform.
While we recognize that the requirement to certify that the SECC has meet by phone, IP-based meeting application, or in person at least once annually, may impose some costs for SECC members, it is likely that many if not most SECCs are already are meeting in some form on a regular basis, and
PO 00000

Frm 00025

Fmt 4702

Sfmt 4702

therefore the proposed annual meeting certification likely will certify an activity already being undertaken and documented.
In adopting a voluntary reporting process for FEMA or a State, local, Tribal, or territorial government entity to report false EAS or WEA
transmissions to the Commission, we believe that our proposal, which provides a reporting system for receipt of false alerts via email directed to the Commissions Operations Center, is the most efficient, least costly, and least onerous method to implement this system. We have also structured this voluntary reporting system to be similar in format to the existing reporting requirement the Commission adopted in the Alerting Reliability Order and FNPRM, requiring EAS industry participants to report false EAS alerts to the Commission via email sent to the FCC Operations Center, avoiding the need for duplicative structures.
The primary rule modification proposed to provide for repeating EAS
alerts issued by the President, the Administrator of FEMA and any other entity determined appropriate under the circumstances by the Commission would not add any burdens to any entity. To the extent the modifications adopted involve adding a new alert originator and/or event code, or other changes to the EAS Protocol or alert processing by the EAS device, such changes likely would entail modifying the existing deployed base of EAS
devices via software updates, which would entail some minimal installationrelated costs.
Throughout the Notice, the Commission has requested comment on the relative costs and benefits of these various proposed alternatives to ensure it has input from small entities and others to minimize the economic impacts of whatever action it might take. Nevertheless, in addition to the steps taken by the Commission discussed herein, commenters have been invited to propose steps that the Commission may take to further minimize any economic impact on small entities. Commenters have also been invited to propose alternatives that facilitate the Commissions obligations to implement the NDAA21 provisions.
F. Federal Rules That May Duplicate, Overlap, or Conflict With the Proposed Rules None.
Ordering Clauses Accordingly, it is ordered, pursuant to the NDAA21, Public Law 116283, 134
Stat. 3388, sec. 9201, that this notice of
E:FRFM30MRP1.SGM

30MRP1