Re: Emergency Alert System

["James R. Pardonek" <pardonjr () CALUMET PURDUE EDU>]

At Purdue Calumet, we are implementing a product called Attention Real Time.  It allows for SMS, email, PA 
announcements, digital signs, the emergency frame on our main web page, and voice prompted cell phone calls.  We then 
coupled it with our Enterasys NAC system which gives us a web based front end and also sets a TOS bit on our switches 
to redirect web traffic to an alert page.

The thought is that the more avenues we can use for alerts, the better.

Jim

James R. Pardonek, CISSP

Senior Network Administrator

Purdue University Calumet Data Network

Information Services

Purdue University Calumet

Hammond, Indiana

 

From: The EDUCAUSE Security Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU] On Behalf Of 
Stanclift, Michael
Sent: Thursday, September 10, 2009 8:45 AM
To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU
Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Emergency Alert System

 

We currently use http://www.textcaster.com/ <http://www.textcaster.com/>  -- they’re locally based and I think it was 
started by an alumni, but it’s worked very well for us.

Michael Stanclift

Network Analyst

Rockhurst University

 

http://help.rockhurst.edu <http://help.rockhurst.edu/> 

(816) 501-4231

 

PThink before you print!

 

From: The EDUCAUSE Security Constituent Group Listserv [mailto:SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU] On Behalf Of David 
Boyer
Sent: Thursday, September 10, 2009 8:34 AM
To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU
Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Emergency Alert System

 

I think you're right. Off-campus hosting with multiple delivery options. 

 

Thanks to everyone for their responses.

> > > Ken Connelly <Ken.Connelly () UNI EDU> 7:25 PM 9/9/2009 >>>
I have not heard of anyone actually trying to do this in house.  We
considered it *very* briefly, but quickly realized that you may reach a
relatively small handful of people within a few minutes with e-mail or
(heaven forbid) a desktop pop-up.  You will reach *far* more with SMS
and voice calls to cell and home/office phones.  Any reputable hosted
solution will be able to offer parallel delivery to e-mail, SMS, and
voice in rapid succession, so much so that you'll need to artificially
slow them down so that your resource (trunk lines to campus, campus (or
city) phone switch, cell service) is not overwhelmed.

- ken

David Boyer wrote:
> That's actually what worries me about a hosted solution. Since every
> student has a notebook, our campus is relying on email and desktop
> popups in the event of an incident. An incident that impacts our
> internet pipe would result in hosted alerts not reaching campus. We
> have plenty of redundancy with our LAN and servers, but not the type
> of immediate failover we'd need for a WAN interuption.
>
> > > > Charlie Prothero <Charlie.Prothero () KEYSTONE EDU> 5:59 PM 9/9/2009 >>>
>
> Hi, David.  We thought about that briefly and then opted for WENS, a
> hosted service.  WENS works well, and there are obviously lots of
> other players.  A key point in favor of that approach is that it will
> still work in the event of a local incident that disrupts your
> on-campus systems…
>
> - Charlie
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *From:* The EDUCAUSE Security Constituent Group Listserv
> [mailto:SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU] *On Behalf Of *David Boyer
> *Sent:* Wednesday, September 09, 2009 4:49 PM
> *To:* SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU
> *Subject:* [SECURITY] Emergency Alert System
>
>  
>
> Are there any decent free/open source systems that will allow us to
> send out both SMS, email, and desktop popup alerts in the event of a
> campus lockdown or similar emergency event?
>
>  
>
> Sorry if this has been covered already. Thanks in advance!!!

-- 
- Ken
=================================================================
Ken Connelly             Associate Director, Security and Systems
ITS Network Services                  University of Northern Iowa
email: Ken.Connelly () uni edu   p: (319) 273-5850 f: (319) 273-7373