Telstra’s Vision for Public Safety Mobile Broadband (PSMB) in Australia

What is PSMB and why is it needed?

Public Safety Mobile Broadband (PSMB) is a mobile broadband capability provided to public safety agencies (PSAs) for high-speed mobile voice and data services.

To date, PSAs have used Land Mobile Radio (or LMR) networks – a tried and proven technology - to communicate using push-to-talk radio terminals, provide location services and enable duress alerting.

With the rise in technology capabilities, we are seeing new critical communication use cases that are being driven by a need for greater situational awareness and to improve operational efficiency, along with interoperability to enable communication across different agencies and jurisdictions. Other jurisdictions around the world have experienced first-hand the need for these capabilities, especially during times of crisis, and many are well-progressed with a national PSMB capability. For example, FirstNet, the national, dedicated public safety communications network in the United States launched in 2018, was borne out of the September 11 2001 tragedy, where first responders across various agencies experienced challenges communicating with each other, and with overwhelming volumes across both fixed and mobile phone lines.

Video and data capabilities have become particularly important. For example:

• body-worn devices such as cameras can send real-time video streams to base to enable informed decision making and crises management,
• wearables such as biometric watches can help to monitor the wellbeing of first responders in high-pressure situations,
• drones with video and thermal imaging technology can be used to search large areas, and
• automatic number plate recognition systems that exceed the capacity of human operators.

These data-rich use cases demand more bandwidth and faster response times, which the underlying network needs to be able to support. Whilst our customers significantly benefit from the capability existing mobile broadband technology enables, they are yet to trust it with mission critical applications such as push-to-talk, duress and location services. However, traditional LMR networks have limited capacity to support these applications, and this is where PSMB will transform public safety.

Community benefits of PSMB

A national PSMB capability will also deliver significant community benefits, including enhanced public safety outcomes (particularly in the regions) as well as expanded and more resilient commercial mobile networks. This will in turn drive economic growth through investment and jobs, again particularly in the regions, due to increased public and private sector confidence to invest in previously underserved or less resilient mobile coverage locations, greater tourist visitation to regional and remote locations due to new or more resilient mobile coverage and improved digital inclusion outcomes.

Telstra’s history of delivering mission critical solutions for Public Safety

Telstra has been at the forefront of providing Australia’s public safety agencies with critical communications for many decades. We believe our experience and expertise is founded in the capabilities of our networks but is enhanced through our contribution to outcomes focused engagements that include:

• Being the national provider of Triple Zero, including bringing Next Generation Triple Zero to Australia that provided citizens and first responders with Advanced Mobile Location (AML) in August 2021 
• The provider of Emergency Alert, Australia’s Community Information Warning System
• Delivering frontline communication services to twenty-five PSAs across Australia, including cellular and satellite connectivity, radio networks, devices and managed services
• Designing, building, and operating the Queensland and Tasmanian Government’s radio networks and the Victorian Government’s Regional Mobile Radio Network (VicRMR) that was commissioned by the Victoria Government after the tragedy of Black Saturday
• Being an active member of disaster management responses in Australia, including attending Local, District and State Disaster Management forums 
• The creation of Telstra LANES® Emergency - a world-leading mobile broadband data service designed specifically for mission-critical communications, offering PSAs prioritised access and preferential data treatment on Australia’s largest 4G/5G network to help ensure delivery of their critical communications (LANES is currently being enabled on 5G technology).

Telstra’s vision for a National PSMB capability for Australia

Telstra’s vision for a national PSMB extends on the capabilities of LANES® by providing PSAs access to Telstra’s mobile network, which is Australia’s largest mobile network, along with:

• A primary carrier network model, leveraging our commercial spectrum, for optimal end to end delivery and management, supported by a secondary carrier and deployable temporary coverage where required
• A dedicated PSMB mobile network core
• Additional Prioritisation and Quality of Service on the Telstra network
• Mission Critical Push to Talk / Video / Data (MCX) on public safety grade mobile devices
• Enhanced resilience through network hardening and transmission redundancy such as satellites
• Ecosystem of public safety grade applications and certified and managed devices
• PSMB Device Centre of Excellence (CoE) to manage device requirements, testing and validation
• Dedicated secure App Store with PSMB certified and approved applications for PSAs
• Highly secure network management and monitoring
• Standard based technologies to maximise global and domestic innovation and mix of current and new suppliers
• Seamless Interworking with existing LMRs

Our vision is in line with many of the leading PSMB deployments globally.

Benefits of using the Telstra mobile network as the primary carrier

Using the Telstra mobile network as the primary carrier for PSMB unlocks the capabilities of Telstra’s network for public safety agencies. Additionally, 5G offers PSAs capabilities above and beyond that offered by 4G.

Resilience, robustness and security are at the heart of Telstra’s 5G service delivery, and there will be new scope for supporting differentiated connectivity experiences, such as network slicing, private networks, cell-edge and uplink performance thresholds.

Technologies such as network slicing can be used to offer first responders dedicated high capacity, low latency slices for their mission critical applications, such as video streaming to aid situational awareness.

5G also enables us to open-up the network in a secure manner like never before, through network Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). Using APIs, opportunities exist to onboard network capabilities into public safety applications, enabling functions such as location verification and tracking, and longer term, the ability to dynamically optimise the network experience for first responders.

Anchoring PSMB on the Telstra network opens the door for PSAs to leverage these innovative capabilities of the 5G programmable network.

PSMB capabilities are here

Telstra has successfully tested foundational PSMB capabilities at its Public Safety Experience Centre (PSEC) on the Gold Coast. This centre showcases the latest critical communications technology for police, emergency services and critical industries in Australia. Live and hands-on demonstrations include: 

1. Mobile Network Prioritisation and Quality of Service (QoS)

With prioritised access, by leveraging our commercial spectrum we will be able to deliver prioritisation along with Quality of Service. These measures will ensure PSMB users have priority and access to the full commercial network, delivering improved performance during events and emergencies, and providing PSAs with a consistent and reliable experience when they need it the most.

Watch Telstra's 5G Innovation Centre - Telstra LANES Video

2. Interworking

With Interworking capability, it is possible to integrate multiple and separate LMR (and other voice and data) networks into a PSMB solution. It is important to recognise that LMR is a tried and proven technology that continues to thrive in critical communications in Australia. Mobile networks, with their reach, capacity, support for video and other features can really complement LMR, and investments made to date, and increase the overall effectiveness of mission critical solutions.

Through the work of the global mobile industry technical standards body, 3GPP, an interworking capability between LMR and mobile networks was established (at the technical level) in 2019, building upon earlier, standardised, mission critical capabilities including MC-PTT, MC-Data and MC-Video.

There are solutions for this capability in the market today, and Interworking is one of the PSMB capabilities Telstra has demonstrated in our PSEC.

Pathways such as this can securely extend the mission critical voice capability of PSMB users beyond the reach of their geographical LMR coverage, and across Australia’s various jurisdictions.

Watch Telstra's 5G Innovation Centre - Interworking Function (IWF) Video

3. Mission Critical Push-to-Talk (MC-PTT), Video (MC-Video) and Data (MC-Data)

MC-PTT is a service that provides high-priority, reliable and secure communications at the touch of a button, particularly for public safety use cases. Enhanced features may be provided such as call groups, broadcast and priority handling. Modern MC-PTT devices are ruggedised and fit-for-purpose, for use in the control room, or out in the field. Through interworking, users carrying a mobile device can communicate with users carrying a traditional radio terminal, giving great capability and access, and for example, enabling volunteers and back of house to coordinate and support response efforts.

MC-PTT is another capability Telstra has deployed at our PSEC.

Watch Telstra's 5G Innovation Centre - Mission Critical Push to Talk (MC-PTT) Video

Building on MC-PTT, both MC-Video and MC-Data enable users to share video and data to further improve situational awareness.

Telstra has deployed MC-Video and MC-Data capability at our PSEC.

Watch Telstra's 5G Innovation Centre - Mission Critical Video and Data Video

Telstra continues to test the boundaries of what’s possible on its mobile network and has demonstrated that the technical capability to operate a PSMB is possible. Telstra continues to engage with agencies to make this capability a reality.

If you’d like to find out more, “Register here” and one of our specialists will contact you with more information about our Public Safety Experience Centre.