The Wearable Smart Gateway* (WSG*) is the world’s first wearable, intelligent communications gateway that allows first responders to share multimedia information over secure wide-area networks in real-time.
Developed by Mutualink and Intel®, the WSG provides unprecedented command-center and inter-agency access to live situational intelligence, including video, biometric, and environmental data. The capabilities of the WSG significantly enhance operational awareness and reduce response times in fast-moving situations, helping police, SWAT, fire, and medical first responders overcome the challenge of operational blindness, promoting quick, well-informed decision making.
The WSG is the first device to emerge as a result of the Internet of Public Safety Things (IoPST*) initiative led by Intel and Mutualink. The aim of the initiative is to equip the next generation of first responders with seamlessly interconnected technologies that help save lives.
The WSG* Genesis
Based in Wallingford CT, Mutualink and its founders have more than 20 years’ experience in the development of communications technologies for the public safety sector. Mutualink’s IP-based network services are used by organizations ranging from defense and law enforcement to agriculture and public health.
One of the major problems facing emergency services and agencies is interoperability—differences in technical standards and protocols makes the sharing of key data between agencies complicated and slow. Taking inspiration from the pioneering telecommunications work of the Edison Laboratory in the 19th century, Mutualink partnered with Intel and set out to break down communication barriers with a system that would seamlessly and securely join the dots between first responders, their command centers, and collaborating agencies.
The result of the collaboration is the WSG, a wearable communications gateway that uses Wi-Fi*, wire, and Bluetooth* to connect devices on or near the first responder with his command center via a secure virtual private network (VPN) connection to a server, which can be located in the cloud or locally. From there, the information can be seamlessly shared with any number of cooperating agencies and stakeholders as the circumstance requires, regardless of proprietary equipment used.
Design Choices
To ensure the WSG answered real-world needs, Intel and Mutualink involved serving first responders early in the product development phase. The development team conducted a series of in-depth interviews with first responders, gathering detailed feedback on feature set and usage requirements. An internal design-thinking session helped the team refine its approach before moving to the prototype stage, with feedback from first responders providing valuable insight, such as the specific needs of the command post’s user interface.
As with any wearable tech, the form factor of the WSG is all-important, and arguably more so given that it can’t afford to be a distraction for, or in any way obstruct, the vital work of the first responders it is designed to assist. The decision was made to put the Intel® Edison module at the heart of the WSG, with its high performance, extremely low power consumption, and tiny size making it a good match for the task.
The demands placed on the WSG are high: it may be called on to connect to any number of wireless, wired, and Bluetooth devices at a given time, including on-body cameras, biometric monitors, environmental Bluetooth locator beacons, or any device capable of delivering digital data that has relevance to a given situation. It’s not difficult to imagine a situation requiring a constantly updated radiation count and other atmospheric composition data, for example.
With those demands in mind, battery life is naturally a key component to the successful operation of the device in the field, and was a key reason why the low-power Intel® Edison module was chosen. In early testing, the WSG has remained fully operational for periods of 12 hours or more, which is a vital feature for emergency responders on extended operations who do not want to be concerned about whether or not their hardware is charged.
The planned future integration of on-board 4G LTE* connectivity will increase power demands and shorten battery life, however the modular design of the WSG means that batteries of different sizes can be used according to the specific needs of the hardware and the circumstance. And should it become necessary during an emergency situation, charging is easy as charging any cell phone.
Network Agnostic, Security First
In its current prototype form, the WSG transmits data by tethering via Wi-Fi to a cell phone using any commercial 4G network or, once available, to the dedicated First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet*) currently being developed for use nationally within the United States. In order to capitalize on the best connection available, the system is designed to work across any network without compromising security.
Ensuring the integrity of data security is crucial when transmitting over any network, particularly a public one. This is where Mutualink’s years of experience come into play in terms of connecting devices securely to servers using its advanced encryption and VPN technology.
The WSG is similarly agnostic—yet secure—when it comes to the relay of data from the uplink to the command center and to other stakeholders within a distrusted peer virtual network. Distributed nodes and on-demand remote application services using private Intel servers and, more recently, with public Amazon Web Services* (AWS*) have been trialed. This modular flexibility never comes at the expense of data integrity and has been chosen to allow clients to choose the configuration that best suits their needs and existing resources.
Intel Security has been closely involved in the software development of the WSG, approaching the security of the device from the ground up at the hardware level, ensuring the integrity of data and implementing advanced malware protection, without any compromise to all-important data transfer speeds.
FirstNet* Ready
FirstNet is a dedicated, public-safety, LTE-broadband network currently in the consultation phase prior to national roll out across the United States. Developed in response to the final recommendation of the 9/11 Commission for a nationwide network of wireless services solely for first responders, the network specifically sidesteps the limitations of public networks, such as the bandwidth throttling experienced in emergency situations such as 9/11/2011 when everyone tried to connect in one place at the same time.
A number of FirstNet Early Builder projects are already up and running. Among these is the mobile JerseyNet network in New Jersey that was deployed for the recent visit of the Pope, and the Harris county, Texas, FirstNet project where Mutualink technology is already in use by first responders. Intel approached the security of the WSG from the ground up, ensuring the integrity of data and advanced malware protection are there, but engineered in order to ensure that the speed and efficiency associated with public safety networks is never compromised.
Field Testing
The user experience is key to the successful introduction of any new technology, even more so when it comes to wearable tech for first responders working in fast-moving, high-pressure situations. The last thing they want to worry about is a new piece of kit. And key to ensuring the acceptance and usability of the WSG by first responders is rigorous field testing. While the WSG remains a prototype-phase device and is not yet available for use in a live situation, the Urban Shield event in September 2015 provided an equally, if not more valuable, opportunity to test the system and overall user experience in a simulated real-life environment, offering the ability to gather feedback with the pressures inherent in a real emergency.
Urban Shield is an annual, 48-hour, tactical training event held in California at which teams of first responders from around the globe—primarily SWAT, but also fire, EOD, and EMS—run through a demanding series of realistic exercises. The event is an opportunity for the teams to work on operational tactics and also serves as a valuable test bed—and awareness tool—for emerging technologies, the technology in this case being the WSG.
Following a research period prior to the event, which included consultation with a team of first responders from Santa Clara, California, Mutualink produced a number of Intel® Edison module-powered WSG prototypes. These were designed to fit snugly with the FirstNet phone used to provide the Wi-Fi hotspot 4G connectivity. During the exercises the WSG streamed live video, heart rate, and location data to the command post.
Event scenarios included a kidnapping and a bus bomb, with paint guns used to replace live ammunition. The problem the teams were looking to WSG to solve was the need for command-center personnel to have more detailed and accurate information about events on the ground during an emergency situation, with the additional data helping them coordinate more effectively and improve the overall effectiveness and safety of the teams. While there were certainly important learnings as a result of this test, overall the WSG performed as intended technically, providing mission commanders a window into live situations that they hadn’t ever had before.
User Experience
Aside from the successful functioning of the device on a technical level, another key success marker was the adaptability of the teams to use the additional new equipment—if the WSG device were to be obstructive or a distraction to their work, adoption in the field would be hindered. However, during and after the event, the first-responder teams reported no in adding the WSG to their kit.
From a technical perspective, the WSG performed to expectations, with the test giving valuable insight on necessary future improvements for the next stage of prototyping. Among these were the goal of improving video performance by replacing the Motion JPEG compression with H.264 format video, and the importance of incorporating 4G LTE connectivity within the device itself to further reduce the form factor and to remove the need for cell phone hot-spot tethering.
Instant Command Center
Another lesson from the Urban Shield test came from the simple observation that the space demands of the command-center computers called for an extra tent in addition to that used for squad briefings. This unnecessarily separated the squad from the command center, and led the WSG team to consider the use of the quad-core Intel® Atom™ -powered Intel® Compute Stick running Mutualink’s command software to replace bulky tower units as the command center.
Inside the command-center for testing the WSG* at Urban Shield 2015
The advantage of using the Intel® Compute Stick to power the command center is that they are small enough to be carried anywhere and can be plugged into any USB-equipped monitor, creating an on-the-fly command center in seconds. As a working example, imagine an emergency scenario in a hotel where any room with a TV is instantly transformed into a command center, providing a level of proximity to the situation that would otherwise be more time and resource consuming to achieve.
Internet of Public Safety Things*
A great deal has been written and about the Internet of Things (IoT) and its importance to the connected future. And in 2015 an increasing number of concrete applications of the disruptive technologies involved are finding their way into daily life, from smart home devices to supermarket Bluetooth beacons. Intel and Mutualink saw an opportunity to apply IoT technologies and thinking in the public-safety arena that led to the Internet of Public Safety Things* (IoPST*) initiative.
The WSG is the first device to emerge as a result of their combined work in the field, and is the herald of additional safety-focused innovations to come. One of the key thoughts is that the technology inside the WSG doesn’t necessarily need to be wearable—it can serve a whole new set of purposes as part of static installations in smart devices.
For example, Mutualink recently showed a prototype of the smart technology fitted in a fire-pull box on the Intel stand at Maker Faire in New York. Rather than channeling data to a command center, one idea for the fire-pull box hardware is to provide first responders with a dedicated Wi-Fi network—dubbed WiFi911*—that is activated when the alarm is pulled and automatically accessed with pre-shared keys known to emergency services.
Intel® Edison module inside a fire-pull box as example of The Internet of Public Safety Things* (IoPST*), as shown at Maker Faire New York, 2015
This neatly sidesteps three of the biggest communications problems first responders encounter in emergency situations: often encountered lack of in-building public safety radio coverage, limited or no functional bandwidth availability over public mobile networks caused by sudden high use in emergencies, and the inability to quickly access typically present private Wi-Fi networks at any given location because of password protection.
The WiFi911* technology could be fitted to any powered hardware in a location; lightbulbs, for example. Not only can modern low-energy lightbulbs more easily accommodate such hardware additions, but the use of lightbulbs creates a neat link back to Edison, the original inspiration behind Mutualink’s mission to seamlessly connect people. To this end, Mutualink has already successfully inserted the Intel® Edison module at the heart of the WSG* into a prototype lightbulb.
Next Steps
The WSG* is currently still in development with a commercial release planned for 2016. Intel and Mutualink are using this time to refine the design and form factor, to add features such as 4G LTE connectivity and H.264 video compression, and to polish the command-center interface.
As with any product destined for such a demanding usage scenario, the product will be put through highly rigorous testing prior to any large-scale roll out, at which point it’s potential to enhance the operational efficiency of first responder teams across the United States will be fully demonstrated.
About Mutualink
Mutualink, Inc., has developed an interoperable communications platform that enables community-wide multimedia sharing of radio, voice, text, video, data files and telephone communications in a secure environment. Mutualink’s system is currently deployed by hundreds of public and private entities worldwide, including homeland security and defense installations, NATO Special Operations Forces, police and fire departments, hospitals, schools, transit authorities, utilities, shopping malls, casinos, and more. Mutualink is a privately-held company headquartered in Wallingford, Conn., with R&D facilities in Westford, Mass., Allen, TX., and Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, and with Defense Services office near Washington, DC. For more information please visit www.mutualink.net.
Additional Resources
Learn more about Mutualink here.
Check out the latest on Urban Shield here.
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