NC4 Risk Center - Real-time Incidents Alert Profiles - Settings

Creating Real-time Alert Profiles

When you create a new Real-time Alert Profile, whether it is for a Location or Region, you will need to complete the fields on the Overall Settings tab, as shown following.

• NC4 Risk Center - Location-Based Alert Profiles - Settings are useful for monitoring specific assets by specifying meaningful perimeters or “geo-fences” around them. If something happens within the defined perimeter, it will trigger an alert.
• NC4 Risk Center - Device Profiles - Settings are useful when you have a general level of interest in certain categories of events for a country, regardless of the exact location of your facilities in that country, or even if you may not have facilities in the country. For example, NC4 recommends setting a regional alert profile for Terrorism of Severe and Extreme severities for all world regions. In this way, you will be sure to receive alerts for major terrorist attacks, regardless of their proximity to your specific locations/facilities.

Overall Settings required for creating a new Real-time Intel Alert Profile

1. 1. Enter an appropriate Profile Name.
   2. Enter a Short Description of the profile that will clarify its specific purpose.
       

      It is advisable to include locations or regions, incident categories, and severities that the profile is meant to cover within the description, as this will help you locate the profile later if you want to update it.

   3. The system defaults the Profile Category to User Profile. This is system-driven based on your User ID, and cannot be altered.

   4. Click on the appropriate Send Notifications for radio button to indicate your preference for receiving incident alerts from NC4.

      • • All – you will receive every alert about each incident that meet the criteria of the Alert Profile. This includes the initial alert, all subsequent updates, and the final alert.
        • Initial/Closed – you will receive only the first (initial) and final (closed) alerts for incidents that meet the criteria of the Alert Profile.
        • Initial Only – you will receive only the first (initial) alert for incidents that meet the criteria of the Alert Profile
   5. Click on the appropriate Profile Type radio button.
      • • Location – use this Profile Type if you are creating an Alert Profile for one or more buildings, sites, or other locations (single points in space). You can specify the incidents you receive alerts for based on the distance from your locations and the severity level.
        • Region – use this Profile Type if you are creating an Alert Profile for an entire region. You will receive an alert based on whether an incident is taking place in the region or not. The distance from your location will not be calculated.
   6. Click on the appropriate Profile Activation radio button.
       

      Whether a profile is activated or deactivated will determine whether alerts will be triggered.

       
      • • Activate – indicates that the profile is active and will trigger alerts to the users assigned to the profile based on the criteria specified. It is also a prerequisite for other capabilities, like seeing a Proximity Warning on the Situation Map and populating Incident Summary Reports.
        • Deactivate – indicates the profile is inactive and will not trigger any alerts. You may choose to deactivate a profile while you are setting it up or making changes so that no alerts are sent until you are ready.
        • Schedule – indicates the profile is only activated for the time period specified in the Activation Date and Expiration Date fields. These fields are inaccessible (as gray background text) until the Schedule radio button is selected.
        • Select the Activation and Expiration dates for the profile by clicking the calendar boxes. The profile will become active and will expire at 12:00am/midnight on the day entered. While the profile is in the scheduled state, the Scheduled Profile icon is displayed. When the Expiration Date is reached, the profile will automatically switch to Deactivated and display the Deactivated icon. However, the last Activation and Expiration Dates will remain for your reference until the profile is rescheduled.

      The effect of scheduled profiles on the delivery of incident alerts

      Because scheduled profiles are automatically activated and expired, this may affect how you receive incident alerts relative to your expectations. Specifically, you may start receiving alerts for a previously existing incident. If an incident is already being reported, you will begin receiving all alerts issued after your new profile is activated. You will not retroactively receive alerts for that incident issued prior to your profile Activation Date.

      You may stop receiving alerts for an incident of interest when the profile expires. If an incident is on-going after your profile automatically expires, you will not continue to get updated alerts about the incident.

      Whether a profile is activated or expired (or manually deactivated above) will determine whether you see your registered location(s) on the Impact Map for a given incident. Normally, when you receive alerts, you will be able to view the incident and your registered location(s) on a single Impact Map. But if the profile is expired (or manually deactivated), you will no longer be able to view incidents and your registered location(s) together on a single Impact Map.
       

   7. Check all of the appropriate Incident Categories from the list. For Real-time Incidents, further granularity can be added by selecting the specific type(s) within each incident category, as shown here.
      
      Adding granularity within Incident Categories

The default is All NIMC Incidents. Click the checkbox in front of All NIMC Incidents to remove the check, so that you can select individual Incident Categories. When a category has some, but not all, types selected, a green checkbox appears to the right of the category. If all types within the category are selected, then the checkbox to the left of the category will display a checkmark. Using this level of granularity, users can create multiple Alert Profiles within specific categories to better meet their needs. For example, you create a PROFILE A that has Minor Fires set at a 3-mile perimeter; however this is triggering too many 1-alarm fires that are of low relevance. The recommendation would be to remove 1-alarm fires from PROFILE A and create a PROFILE B for just 1-alarm fires with the perimeter for Minor severity set to, say, 1-mile.

After completing the fields on the Overall Settings tab, proceed to the Location/Region tab. The screen displayed will depend on whether you are creating a new Location or Region, based on your selection in step #4 above.

NC4 strongly recommends that users register all of their locations before creating new location Alert Profiles. You can more easily ensure the consistency of your Alert Profiles, as well as take advantage of the select all feature. It is also a good practice to review and update all of your location profiles whenever a new location is registered.