This integration provides E911 emergency services for Webex for Cisco BroadWorks users. When a user places an E911 emergency call, RedSky finds the user location and routes the call to the appropriate Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP). A dispatcher can send emergency services to the user location to provide aid, if it is needed.
E911 Emergency Calling with RedSky
This integration provides compliance to Ray Baum Act Phase II. Full compliance for all devices, including mobile devices such as tablets, will be provided by January 2022.
How it Works
The RedSky service provides user location services and a network that routes emergency calls to Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) around the US, its territories, and Canada. The service is enabled on a per-location basis. After a location is enabled, emergency calls (911 for emergency calls and 933 for test calls) placed from phones and clients assigned to that location use the RedSky service. The RedSky service does the following:
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FIND—RedSky finds the user location. Both the Webex App and desk phones send MAC or network information to the RedSky service, which uses a company wiremap to determine the location. For Webex App users, if their location can't be determined, the user is prompted to enter location information, which is then submitted to Redsky.
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ROUTE—For 911 and 933 calls, the location information is added to the SIP header, which also identifies the user as a Redsky user. RedSky routes the call to the appropriate PSAP for the location.
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NOTIFY—RedSky sends notifications to the appropriate personnel (e.g., security or emergency services).
RedSky handles the following tasks:
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RedSky maintains the partner/customer provisioned database that maps an emergency call to a dispatchable location.
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Based on the calling device's dispatchable location, RedSky directs emergency calls to the correct PSAP. The call includes location information so that the PSAP knows where to dispatch emergency personnel as well as the call-back number.
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RedSky generates optional notifications to enterprise personnel.
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For subscriptions with enhanced licenses, RedSky bridges enterprise personnel into emergency calls placed by enterprise users and provides pop notifications.
Location Detection
RedSky supports two main types of location detection: HELD and non-HELD.
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For HELD-capable devices (the Webex App or multiplatform firmware (MPP) devices)—Location detection is based on network discovery. The HTTP Enabled Location Delivery (HELD) protocol reports network environment information to the RedSky HELD service. This information includes the upstream switch, wireless access points (WAP) BSSID, IP address, or MAC address. Note that MPP devices and the Webex App send HELD information differently as follows:
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MPP devices use HELD. When the phone registers, it sends an HTTP request to RedSky that includes device network information. The HELD server uses this information to determine location.
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The Webex App use HELD+. In addition to standard HELD information, the Webex App also sends a user indentifier to RedSky. RedSky uses this information to determine user and device location. If a location is unknown, the Webex App prompts the user to enter the address.
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For non-HELD capable devices (mobile devices without cellular access, softphone clients, Cisco ATAs, Cisco DECT systems, and any non-Cisco customer premises equipment)—Location determination is based on the Caller ID asserted in the test or emergency call.
PSTN and RedSky Locations-Enabled Routing
BroadWorks routes emergency calls to the RedSky service, so that the call can be sent to the appropriate PSAP, instead of the PSTN. This route gets used for all endpoints that place emergency calls from the RedSky-enabled location. This includes hard phones and portable endpoints (such as mobile phones, tablets, and laptops).
One exception to this rule is for cellular-based phone clients. These clients send emergency calls directly to the Public Land Mobile Network (PLMN, the mobile equivalent of the PSTN) using the built-in dialer on the phone.

Requirements for RedSky E911 Integration
Component |
Requirement |
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RedSky |
The partner must enter an agreement with RedSky to route emergency calls using Cisco-provided implementation for Webex App desktop and tablet clients and MPP phones (HELD). RedSky Configuration The partner must configure the RedSky portal to provide location services for the following types of devices:
For more information, see the following RedSky documentation:
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BroadWorks |
To use this feature, you must have installed the following BroadWorks patches. Install only the patches that apply to your BroadWorks release:
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Phones |
MPP phones use downloaded configuration parameters to access the RedSky Location Information Server (LIS). They receive a token that gets passed forward over the peering connection to RedSky when a RedSky-enabled user dials 911 or 933. |
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Devices |
HELD capable devices: Once a location is enabled for RedSky services, Cisco BroadWorks device management systems generate updated device configurations to enable HELD functionality. Each HELD device must be re-synced or reinitialized to pick up the new configuration before the device can use HELD for location services. |
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Webex App |
Webex desktop and tablet apps use downloaded configuration parameters to access the RedSky Location Information Server (LIS). Users must enter their location information once per location. RedSky maintains a record of each location. When the user logs in from a new location, they are prompted to enter their location information, which gets added to the database. When the user places a 911 or 933 call, the geolocation information gets passed in the SIP Header. ![]()
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RedSky E911 Configuration Task Flow
Complete the following tasks on BroadWorks to configure Webex for Cisco BroadWorks for E911 Emergency Calling with RedSky. On BroadWorks, E911 is configured using the Third-Party Emergency Calling feature.
Command or Action | Purpose | |
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1 |
Use the CLI to activate feature 101792. |
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2 |
Use the CLI to configure settings such as URLs used by RedSky. |
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3 |
Verify the dial strings that BroadWorks uses for Emergency Calling. |
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4 |
On the Application Server, configure a SIP Header proxy rule. |
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5 |
Configure Third-Party Emergency Calling (Enterprise/Service Provider Service) |
On CommPilot, configure the Enterprise service for Third-Party Emergency Calling. |
6 |
On CommPilot, configure the Group service for Third-Party Emergency Calling. |
Activate Feature
On the Application Server, run the following CLI command to activate feature 101792.
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Configure Third-Party Calling URLs
Use the CLI to configure the AS with Third-Party Emergency Calling parameters such as RedSky URLs.
1 |
Run the following CLI command to view current parameter settings:
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2 |
Run the following CLI command to set the parameters. Refer to the subsequent table for information on the fields:
See the following table for help with the parameters:
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Check Emergency Dial Strings
1 |
On the AS, run the following CLI command to verify the dial strings that are being used for emergency callings. Note that 933 should be included in addition to 911. The 933 prefix is used for test calls.
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2 |
If you need to add dial strings, use the following command:
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Configure SIP Header Proxy Rule
1 |
Run the following CLI commands to set the
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2 |
Run the following CLI commands to add the SIP headers to that rule:
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Configure Third-Party Emergency Calling (Enterprise/Service Provider Service)
Configure Third-Party Emergency Calling settings at the Enterprise level.
Before you begin
Make sure that you understand which provisioning model you are using as the Customer ID and Secret Key configurations depend on the model:
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Enterprise provisioning model—The customer organization is an enterprise. Different groups, such as different sites, fall within the enterprise.
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Service Provider provisioning model—The goup is a customer organization. Different groups under the Service Provider are unrelated to one another.
1 |
On Comm Pilot Services window, select Third-Party Emergency Calling. |
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2 |
Check the Allow Activation check box. |
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3 |
Enter values for the Customer ID and Secret Key fields, depending on which provisioning model you run:
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4 |
Click OK.
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Configure Third-Party Emergency Calling (Group Service)
If you are using the Service Provider provisioning model, configure Third-Party Emergency Calling that appears under Group Services.
Before you begin
Make sure that you understand which provisioning model you are using as the Customer ID and Secret Key configurations depend on the model:
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Enterprise provisioning model—The customer organization is an enterprise. Different groups, such as different sites, fall within the enterprise.
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Service Provider provisioning model—The goup is a customer organization. Different groups under the Service Provider are unrelated to one another.
For the Group Profile settings, the Country must be USA or CAN (for Canada).
1 |
On the Comm Pilot Group Services window, select Third-Party Emergency Calling. |
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2 |
Check both of the following check boxes:
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3 |
Enter the appropriate Customer ID and Secret Key values for this group according to your provisioning model:
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4 |
Click OK. See the following table for help with the fields.
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Webex Client Configuration Tags for Emergency Calling
Dynamic Tags
The following table summarizes the dynamic Webex DMS tags that appear in the Webex client configuration file (config.wxt-xml) and how they get derived dynamically from the BroadWorks configuration.
These are “built-in dynamic” tags, not custom tags that are directly created and populated by administrator. |
Tag |
Data Source |
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%BWE911-PRIMARY-HELDURL% |
AS_CLI/Service/ThirdPartyEmergencyCalling> primaryHELDServerURL |
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%BWE911-SECONDARY-HELDURL% |
AS_CLI/Service/ThirdPartyEmergencyCalling> secondaryHELDServerURL |
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%BWE911-EMERGENCY-NUMBER-LIST% |
AS_CLI/System/CallP/CallTypes> Digit Map values marked as “Emergency”
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%BWE911-CUSTOMERID% |
Configured Group Customer ID if not empty, otherwise SP/Enterprise configured ID |
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%BWE911-SECRETKEY% |
Configured Group Secret Key if not empty, otherwise SP/Enterprise Secret Key |
Custom Tags
Following is a list of Webex App desktop and tablet custom tags for emergency calling. Please refer to the Webex for Cisco BroadWorks Configuration Guide for additional details:
%ENABLE_EMERGENCY_DIALING_WXT%
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Description: Enables Emergency Calls detections
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Values: [true|false]
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Default value: false
%EMERGENCY_DIALING_ENABLE_REDSKY_WXT%
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Description: Enable Redsky Emergency Location Platform
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Values: [true|false]
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Default value: false
%EMERGENCY_REDSKY_USER_LOCATION_PROMPTING_WXT%
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Description: Defines the E911 location prompting behavior. The "aggressive" value shows the dialog to the user on each network change to an unknown location. The "once_per_login" value shows the dialog only while logging in at an unknown location, preventing further popups and distractions for the user.
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Values: [aggressive|once_per_login]
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Default value: once_per_login
%EMERGENCY_REDSKY_USER_MANDATORY_LOCATION_WXT%
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Description: The times that the user is allowed to close the location dialog before location becomes mandatory. A value of -1 allows the user to close the dialog indefinitely.
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Values: [-1 - 100]
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Default value: -1
%EMERGENCY_REDSKY_USER_REMINDER_TIMEOUT_WXT%
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Description: The timeout in minutes that will be used to reminder the user to update the emergency location if the current one is not entered or is invalid. If 0 is set, there will be no reminders.
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Values: [0 - 43200]
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Default value: 0
Change History
Change |
Details |
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April 25, 2022 |
Added Country requirement to Group Service configuration. |
March 23, 2022 |
Added wildcard restriction to |
March 21, 2022 |
Added Note with info on requirements for the %BWE911-EMERGENCY-NUMBER-LIST% native tag. |
March 14, 2022 |
Added new config tag, %EMERGENCY_REDSKY_USER_LOCATION_PROMPTING_WXT%, which lets administrators edit the location update frequency. |