10 November 2023
Ref: DOIA 2223-0930
Blaire Harris
Email: [FYI request #24412 email]
Tēnā koe Blaire Harris
Thank you for your email of 11 October 2023, which was transferred to the Ministry of Business,
Innovation and Employment on 26 October 2023. In it, you request, under the Official Information Act
1982 (the Act), the following information:
This OIA request is around the "pcl.govt.nz" domain.
1. I would like to understand which organisation or business unit is assigned to that domain.
2. Copy of any documents relating to approving the domain (including but not limited to comms
between the applying party and the Domain Name Service Team when seeking to register that
domain).
The domain name is used by the service used by Emergency Service Providers to determine the Probable
Caller Location (PCL) of people who call the 111 Emergency Number. This service is known as ECLI
(Emergency Caller Location Information). The ECLI service enables emergency services to receive
automatically generated geographical information about the likely location of a caller.
Please find attached the documentation relevant to your request –
PCL Doman Name Application
(October 2016). Please note some information has been removed from this document as it was out of
scope of your request.
If you wish to discuss any aspect of your request or this response, or if you require any further assistance,
please contact
[email address].
You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman if you are unhappy with this
decision. Information about how to make a complaint is available at www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or
freephone 0800 802 602.
Nāku noa, nā
Katrina Curry
General Manager
Digital Solution Delivery
.govt.nz Registrar
Domain Name Application
Out Of Scope
Out Of Scope
Out Of Scope
.govt.nz Domain Name Application
3 . Domain name for a project/initiative
E.g.
hazardoussubstances.govt.nz,
employment.govt.nz
Your organisation’s project/initiative is eligible for a new generic third level .govt.nz domain name
only if the project, campaign or initiative is pan-departmental (i.e. more than one agency is involved)
and of national significance (i.e. not limited to a particular area or region and can be considered of
relevance to all New Zealanders).
Domain name requested: pcl.govt.nz
i. Contributing organisations
To demonstrate eligibility, please:
•
provide the names of all the government organisations involved in the project/initiative
o Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE)
o New Zealand Police (NZP)
o St John Ambulance (StJA)
o Wellington Free Ambulance (WFA)
o New Zealand Fire Service (NZFS)
•
explain the roles of the contributing agencies and the nature of their participation,
including funding contributions
o MBIE is leading the project.
o NZP, StJA, WFA, and NZFS are users of the service.
o Project is funded from the Telecommunications Development Levy which was
established in 2011 to fund telecommunications infrastructure and services which
otherwise would not be available at an affordable price, including upgrades to
emergency service calling.
•
include any other helpful documents, e.g. Cabinet papers, briefing notes, memoranda,
terms of reference, legislation
See attached:
o EGI Cabinet paper - Mobile Caller Location (23 June 2016)
o EGI-16-MIN-0151 Mobile Caller Location (29 June 2016)
ii. National significance
Describe how the project/initiative is not limited to a particular area or region and is relevant to all
New Zealanders.
Anyone in New Zealand making a 111 emergency call will benefit from the project. The time taken to
establish the location of mobile emergency callers will reduce resulting in improved response
outcomes because of
shorter time to dispatch emergency responders; and
shorter call answer time in busy periods (call takers being freed up to answer waiting calls).
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iii. Business context
Please provide background information about your business operation and describe your
project/initiative. This is not about your domain name, but to help us better understand what you
want to achieve online.
Please provide:
•
background to your project/initiative
•
strategic objectives and desired outcomes of your project
•
a description of how you intend to use the online channel to engage with your audience
and support your project, and the nature of the online services/content you are creating
•
any additional useful information
The purpose of the Mobile Caller Location project is to provide emergency services with information
concerning the probable location of mobile callers to the 111 emergency number. Currently location
information is provided to call takers for emergency calls from landlines only. For the 70% of
emergency calls made via mobile devices, call takers use question and answer to establish location
and dispatch a response, which is often slow or ineffective (e.g. where the user does not know their
location or want to provide it).
The Mobile caller location solution is depicted in the diagram below. Location information from
Mobile Network Operators and/or the caller’s handset is sent to a central Location Area Service
which can be queried by emergency service providers’ computer aided dispatch systems (or a web
interface), and presented to call takers. ‘Probable Caller Location’ will present on the call taker’s
map as a shaded circle within which there is a 68% (1-sigma) likelihood that the caller is located.
A new schedule is being developed for the Telecommunications Information Privacy Code that will
explicitly cover the provision of location for mobile emergency calls as per this solution.
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iv. Rationale for requiring a domain name
Requests for domain names based primarily on the need to ensure that your project information can
be discovered online will not be accepted.
Domain names no longer serve as the principal gateway to content. Instead, search engines are the
main way people find information on the web.
The key to being found online is not a specialised domain name but appropriate use of content,
search engine optimisation techniques and placement of links on suitable sites with high reputation.
Please explain the need to create a new third level .govt.nz domain name.
•
how/why your project/initiative will benefit from this new third level domain name
•
why it is not appropriate to use a fourth level subdomain or a subdirectory to one of your
existing domains, e.g. initiative.youragency.govt.nz or youragency.govt.nz/initiative
No part of the system is public facing, however the domain will be used by whitelisted Mobile
Network Operators and an SMS gateway for providing location information and by emergency
service providers for requesting and accessing location information.
A .govt.nz domain name is needed as it is important that all parties using the system have trust in it
as an official government system, and trust that privacy considerations are being appropriately
managed.
The alternative of using the ‘mbie’ third level domain (e.g. pcl.mbie.govt.nz) is not preferred as is
misrepresents the role of MBIE. MBIE is lead agency establishing the Mobile Caller Location service
on behalf of the New Zealand Emergency Services via its role administering the Telecommunications
Development Levy which is the funding source of the project. MBIE however will have no ongoing
role managing the operation of the service - no part of the service will reside within MBIE
infrastructure nor will any MBIE employees or its contractors have access to it.
v. Rationale for the choice of name
The main purpose of a .govt.nz domain name is to serve as an identifier of official and trusted
government information and services, and not as the mark or brand of a specific product or service.
Requests for domain names intended primarily for the branding of individual projects or initiatives
will not be accepted.
Domain names for projects/initiatives need to be specific (i.e. unlikely to be confused with other
existing or future services across government) and descriptive (i.e. the domain name describes the
purpose of the site and service being provided).
Please provide:
•
the rationale for choosing this domain name, demonstrating why this name is the most
appropriate choice
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•
evidenced-based research to support the rationale, e.g. user testing or market research
•
copies of any relevant documents, e.g. environmental scans, user experience test findings
Emergency Service Providers have agreed to refer to the spot on a map that is delivered by the
service as ‘Probable Caller Location’. This name assists in educating Call takers how to interpret it
(i.e. an indication of the probable location of the caller, not the certain location of the event). This is
shortened for convenience to ‘PCL’.
PCL is the central notion of the service and summarises what the service provides, thus the request
for ‘pcl.govt.nz’.
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