(WIRLED PEAS) World Information Resources, Localized Environment Distribution: Personalized Emergency Alerting System

As we become increasingly conscious of the risks in the world around us, we also become aware of the need to communicate with large numbers of people who may be exposed to a variety of hazards. Central services need to deliver the right information to the right people, giving first responders, public officials, news organizations, and members of the general public information they can actually use, without causing avoidable distress. The OASIS project for a Common Alerting Protocol, when combined with a reasoning system based on the OASIS eXtensible Access Control Markup Language, offers a new way to build emergency notification systems. CAP and XACML provide means for issuing alerts and building customized messages that can be delivered to individuals on cell phones, PDAs, and computer screens. The issues addressed by this paper stem from the Homeland Security challenge to address the need to expediently provide emergency information to the general public. The Minneapolis Director of Emergency Preparednes