[EAS] Where attention needs to be

[Barry Mishkind]

We are going to see a lot of calls for adding long, involved passwords to EAS boxes.

Perhaps this will be done in the name of security, because a few stations have dumbly allowed their systems to sit naked on the
Internet is no reason for an overreaction. 

That is merely going to make it nearly impossible for any studio operator to figure out how to send an RWT, if an inspector shows up.

The security problem is enterprise-wide. And, as a few have hinted, while some agencies will try to push this on station-level responsibility, it is the use of the public Internet that makes things insecure - and during disasters - unusable.

It is worth noting that during Sandy and the snow storm last week, when the power and Internet went out, all the Barix boxes, remote control, and CAP EAS stopped working. We need viable alternatives!

Question: Should stations with their EAS or transmitter remote control exposed to the Internet be given NALs and fined, until they lock things down, at least minimally?

Question 2: Short of returning to the hated "daisy chain," what viable alternatives are there for getting EAS from LP to local stations without prankers getting access?

The one thing I'd hate to see is a series of "advisories," demanding that things be done right away.  We should be taking this opportunity to 
see what things need to be corrected on EAS ... on station data security in general ... and make an industry-wide report and request to the
FCC, etc., to solve the problems.  It should be orderly and deliberate, but faster than the FCC's review of the National EAS test.