Igorce Karafilovski, Head of Department of information technology and telecommunications, Crisis Management Centre, North Macedonia - End-to-end SIP based NG112 platform for emergency service in Republic of North Macedonia

1. END-TO-END SIP BASED NG 112
PLATFORM
FOR EMERGENCY SERVICES
IN REPUBLIC OF NORTH
MACEDONIA
Igorce Karafilovski, MSc
Head of Department of information technology and
telecommunications,
Crisis Management Centre, North Macedonia
cuk.gov.mk or 112.mk

2. - Quick overview of the country and organization of emergency services in North
Macedonia
- Drivers to implement NG 112 – why was the decision taken to implement it?
- Stakeholders involved in the project
- Needs to update the legislation
- Challenges found
- Lessons learnt & conclusions
10/12/2021
EENA2021 5-8 October 2

3. ▪ Description of Country
▪ Size in 25,713 km²
▪ Population 2.077 million (2019) Eurostat
▪ Ratio of macedonian 65%, albanian 25%
speakers, 10% is other.
▪ Arround 1,218 milion lives in Urban area
and 0,846 milions lives in Rural area
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4. ▪ The emergency services in the country are provided by four
institutions via emergency telephone numbers that are free of
charge:
▪ Ministry of Interior - Police (Emergency Phone Number: 192)
▪ Fire Departments (only in 35 Municipalities) ( Number: 193)
▪ Ministry of Health – Ambulance (Emergency Phone Number: 194)
▪ Crisis Management Centre (Emergency Phone Number: 195)
▪ They work with 24/7 available Public Safety Answering Points
– PSAPs, covering the whole territory of the country.
▪ Emergency telephone numbers are currently independent,
part of them have not option for recording of the calls and
part of them are working with manual telephones without
communications system and support.
10/12/2021
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5. The national law for Crisis Management
http://www.cuk.gov.mk/mk/легислатива/закони.html,
put the Crisis Management Center in charge of the technological and procedural upgrade of the
National Emergency system, with:
▪ One single technological platform
▪ Nation-wide operating procedures
▪ Implementation of the European Electronic Communication Code (including the most
recent technologies such as eCall, AML and more)
Implementation co-financed as part of the EU- IPA2 Program:
1. EU Service Contract for Tendering and Implementation Guidance
2. EU Supply Contract for Hardware,Software and delivery
3. Site-renovation and furniture are locally financed
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6. • Four agencies still exist and keep their own
emergency numbers, plus 112 is introduced
as a single emergency number, handled by
a Stage #1 Call Taking PSAP.
• One unique technical infrastructure to get all
emergency calls, forward them the the most
appropriate PSAP for dispatching, and a
unique incident management application,
distributed to all forces.
• Harmonised Operational procedures,
incident qualification codes, etc. for the
whole Country
• (Police will eventually join the unified
platform with the dispatching in a second
phase)
10/12/2021
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7. Phase 1 Phase 2
IMPLEMENTATION:
CFS = Call For Service 10/12/2021
EENA2021 5-8 October 7

8. The chance of renewing the national emergency platform led us at looking for the
most advanced technologies currently available (why starting all new, with
something old?).
We decided then for three main pillars of our new platform:
▪ 100% IP-based communications: only SIP trunks (no ISDN) to handle emergency
calls, only SMPP protocol to send/receive text(SMS)).
▪ This guarantees future-proof network capabilities for new multimedia contents
▪ 100% standard ETSI TS 103 479 for ESInet implementation
▪ This guarantees advanced geolocation-based routing, skill-based routing (e.g. based on
language) and provides real-time possibilities to create ad-hoc routing for crisis
situations
▪ 100% multi-tenancy, web-based SaaS incident management software platform
▪ This guarantees scalability for system expansion, rapid deployment and real-time
implementation of Operation protocols changes.
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9. Implementing the core components of an ESInet, gave us several new options. Some
important examples:
▪ Incoming calls are distinguished by region and, thanks to the skill-based routing,
also by potential language of the caller (some areas of North Macedonia have a
majority of albanian-speakers). These calls are automatically routed towards
bilingual call takers
▪ eCalls are distinguished from normal calls, not based on the incoming ISDN trunk,
as in most European countries, but by the SIP protocol header, and trated properly
by the SIP-based eCall modem
▪ The LIS component of the ESInet takes care of receiving all geolocation sources
that are not in the PIDF-LO part of the SIP protocol, making them availalbe to the
incident management software, all at once.
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10. Managing a multi-agency, multi-PSAP organisation with a single platform, the most
efficient way, was through a distributed solution. NG112 indicent management
software provides:
▪ SaaS (software as a service) architecture
▪ Made of services that can be replicated with no effort, to easily scale-up the platfom,
when requiring expansion
▪ Web-based clients
▪ No need to install anything on remote sites, all data going through a regular browser, all
managed by the central IT facility
▪ Multi-tenant
▪ One single platform to manage all disciplines, segregating restricted information, sharing
common information. Capable of adding new agencies, should they join the 112
integrated platform.
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11. 10/12/2021
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12. CFS = Call For Service
10/12/2021
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13. The renovation project was initiated by an international tender, whose stakeholders
are:
▪ Contractor (EU delegation in North Macedonia)
▪ Consultancy (Bonumstrat consulting, with Keyexpert Gregor Janin)
▪ Beneficiary (National Crisis Center, North Macedonia)
▪ Technology providers (ICS Consulting Engineering dooel, Beta 80 S.p.A.)
There were also external stakeholders, cooperating with the Beneficiary of the
project, for coordination aspects and provision of emergency data:
▪ Ministry of Interior (Police cooperation reference)
▪ MNOs (Makedonski Telekom, A1, etc.)
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14. ▪Legislation for E-112 in North of Macedonia in already
updated
▪Published in official gazette at 16 September 2021 and valid
from 24 September 2021
▪Only need to publish rulebook for E-112
(just need some clarification for publishing)
10/12/2021
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15. ▪ The biggest challenge was how to synchronize all PSO’s (Public Safety
Organizations) as Police, Medical and Fire Service in one platform E-112
▪ Integration with 3rd party systems as the
NICS (Next Generation Incident Command System),
founded by NATO SPS Program, developed in North Macedonia.
▪ When need to include more institution (crisis situation) E-112 will send
incident to directly to NICS functioning as Common Operational Picture
Send incident as a CAP/GIS service
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16. ▪ Lessons witch we learned is that we don’t need to change way of
working of other PSOs as Police, Medical and Fire Service.We need
to setup E-112 according their rules.
▪ We need not to force the PSOs to “move in” with E-112, but rather
expand the “room” virtually using the ESInet
▪ Just we need to setup E-112 Operational procedure/platform to
existing Operational procedures of other PSO’s.
▪ With that we:
✓ Reducing time to incident and better utilization of units
✓ Unified reaction and intervention
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17. ▪ Activation of platform (Nov. 2021)
▪ Moving of 193, 194, 195 on the platform
▪ Activation of 1-1-2 as national Service (on 11-2 Day)
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18. Igorce Karafilovski, MSc
Head of Department of information
technology and telecommunications,
Crisis Management Centre, North Macedonia
igorce.karafilovski@cuk.gov.mk
https://www.linkedin.com/in/igorkarafilovski
10/12/2021
EENA2021 5-8 October 18