The European Union is promoting eCall to reduce the number of roadway fatalities by minimizing the response time when an accident has occurred. eCall is a combination of an In Vehicle System (IVS), a device with a GSM cell phone and GPS location capability, and a corresponding infrastructure of Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) Intelligent Vehicle Safety Systems use Information and Communications Technologies for providing solutions for improving road safety in particular in the pre-crash phase when the accident can still be avoided or at least its severity significantly reduced.With these systems,which can operate either autonomously on-board the vehicle, or be based on vehicle-tovehicle or vehicle-to-infrastructure communication (co-operative systems), the number of accidents and their severity can be reduced. Location-enhanced emergency calls like in-vehicle e-Call have their primary benefit to society of saving lives and in offering an increased sense of security. The articol presents the system eCall and how does it work.eCall, functional architecture, PSAP

Cezar Botezatu

Claudiu BÂRCĂ

English

Research Papers in Economics

INTELLIGENT VEHICLE SAFETY SYSTEMS-eCALL 
 
Cezar Botezatu 
Faculty of Computer Science for Business Management, 
Romanian – American University, Bucharest, Romania 
and 
Claudiu BÂRCĂ 
Faculty of Computer Science for Business Management, 
Romanian – American University, Bucharest, Romania 
 
ABSTRACT 
 
   The European Union is promoting eCall to reduce the number of roadway fatalities by minimizing the 
response time when an accident has occurred. eCall is a combination of an In Vehicle System (IVS), a 
device with a GSM cell phone and GPS location capability, and a corresponding infrastructure of Public 
Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) Intelligent Vehicle Safety Systems  use Information 
and Communications Technologies for providing solutions for improving road safety in particular in the 
pre-crash phase when the accident can still be avoided or at least its severity significantly reduced.With 
these systems,which can operate either autonomously on-board the vehicle, or be based on vehicle-
tovehicle or vehicle-to-infrastructure communication (co-operative systems), the number of accidents and 
their severity can be reduced. Location-enhanced emergency calls like in-vehicle e-Call  have their 
primary benefit to society of saving lives and in offering an increased sense of security. The articol 
presents the system eCall and how does it work. 
 
Keywords: eCall, functional architecture, PSAP 
 
1. INTRODUCTION 
The EU plans to have every new car equipped with the eCall system from 2010. The system will 
automatically generate an emergency call after a serious accident. With this call, the data of the vehicle 
including location is transmitted to the 112 emergency call centre.(PSAP) 
The eCall Generator initiate the eCall by sensors triggered and/or manually, send the in-vehicle 
triggered eCall to a PSAP. The eCall consists of two elements: a pure voice (audio) telephone call based 
on 112 and the minimum set of data (MSD) 
 The eCall (data + voice) carried through the mobile network, is recognized by the mobile network 
operator (MNO) as a 112 emergency call, and is first handled by the MNO. Based on the 112 handling the 
MNO enrich the call with the CLI (caller line identification), and at the same time, according to E112 
recommendation, add the best location available .After the 112 handling, the telecom operator delivers the 
112-voice together with the CLI, mobile location and the eCall MSD to the appropriate PSAP. 
 The PSAP transmits an acknowledgement to the eCall Generator specifying that the MSD have been 
properly received.[1] 
  
 
 
2. eCALL SERVICE CHAIN 
 
The overall performance criteria for the eCall service chain have been derived from a range of studies 
and experiences from the various stakeholder groups involved. Furthermore, experiences from 
comparable automatic and manual vehicle emergency or assistance calling systems and current PSAP 
operation systems and emergency response systems have been taken into account. 
eCall involves a number of different stakeholders all with separate responsibilities and tasks, which 
even overlap. In order to provide a clear understanding of the different aspects of the eCall chain six 
different domains have been identified : 
 
o  Vehicle eCall Triggering System ―›112 eCall Trigger (eCall sensors or manual) ―› Transmission 
over vehicle bus  
o  eCall Generator (EG) ―›In-vehicle software triggers 112 call ―› in-vehicle communication module 
initiates 112  all and send MSD 
o  EG 2 MNO ―› Receive 112 call and MSD  
o  Mobile Network Operator (MNO) ―› 112 call with CLI, celluar location and MSD 
o  MNO 2 PSAP    ―› Forward 112 voice, CLI, celluar location and MSD to PSAP 
o    PSAP ―› Answer 112 voice call, decode and visualise celluar location and MSD 
 
3. FUNCTIONAL ARCHITECTURE 
 
The eCall IVS function is to : 
 
o  Collect data from the vehicle network and from vehicle sensors, and maintain an up-to-date GPS fix 
of the vehicle’s location. 
o  Automatically detect a crash based on car-sensor information. 
o  Call a PSAP automatically when a crash is detected, or when the driver presses a dedicated eCall 
button.  
Each call has 2 main parts: 
o  Establish voice contact between the car’s occupant and a PSAP operator to provide assistance to the 
driver. 
o  Transmit a Minimum Set of Data (MSD) to the PSAP, including the current GPS position and 
direction the car was heading.[5] 
 
   
Figure 1: eCall - functional architecture. 
 
Figure 1 depicts the architecture of an eCall IVS. Its functional blocks are: 
 
o  Emergency Call Function: This is the  eCall application. It gathers vehicle information through the 
CAN bus or other sensors and geo-location information from the GPS function. In case of a crash, it 
sends an emergency message to the PSAP through the GSM/GPRS function. 
o  GPS: The GPS function is responsible for gathering information from GPS satellites and processing 
this information to accurately compute the vehicle’s geo-location. 
o  GSM/GPRS: The GSM/GPRS function is responsible for establishing and maintaining a GSM call to 
the PSAP so that the crash information can be sent and a voice connection established between the car 
occupants and an operator. 
o  In-band Modem: Among a few technologies to send data to the PSAP (SMS ,GPRS or inband 
modem), the most likely to be used is the in-band modem. This technology uses the voice channel; 
typically a special processing unit in the audio path encodes/decodes messages. 
 
4. eCALL MINIMUM SET OF DATA (MSD) 
 
The requirements to the minimum set of data were set by a group of emergency services involved in the 
Driving Group (DC) eCall. The requirements were based on the information that emergency agencies 
would need to speed up the response time and to ensure a correct deployment of emergency resources.[2] 
The DG eCall recommends that the below MSD content should be standardized by an appropriate 
standardization body. 
 The MSD provides the following information: 
 
o  GPS Position 
o  Direction of travel 
o  Number of triggers of the call 
o  Colour, make, model of the vehicle 
o  Indicates which sensors are triggered: airbag, roll-over, front crash, side crash or rear crash sensor (at 
least two should be activated) 
o  Time stamp of the event 
o  SP ID(Service Provider Identification ) 
o  SP telephone number 
o  Country ID, and 
o  Special vehicle /user code. 
 It is recommended to send the minimum set of data in the 112-voice channel to the PSAP 
via a specific vehicle protocol - Global Telematic Protocol (GTP). During testing the 
consortium decided to use short message service (SMS) to transfer the eCall MSD to the 
PSAP and if subscribed there to the full set of data (FSD) to the Service provider using the same vehicle 
protocol (GTP). 
 
The PSAP is the public controlled call centre responsible for providing a first point of contact to a 112 
call. The PSAP is thus receiving the Emergency 112-voice call and the MSD. Based on the voice 
connection and the MSD content, the PSAP operator decides the handover to the correct dispatcher, 
which will handle the remaining part of the specific emergency response. The PSAP’s source of 
information is the voice, the MSD and the location information provided by E112. For cases where the 
driver is subscribing to a SP the additional set of data can be pulled by the PSAP operator over a secure 
Internet IP connection. It may happen that the PSAP operator does not speak the language of the driver 
involved in the accident. In that case and under the sole condition that the driver has a service provider 
subscription, it is possible for the PSAP operator to set up a conference voice call between himself, the 
vehicle occupant and the operator at the responsible service provider.[4] 
The specification of the minimum set of data was created by the emergency agencies. These 
specifications were set on the basis of the information the emergency agencies would need to make a 
correct response and to speed up the response time. The definition of the MSD was made in close co-
operation with the vehicle makers because in the end, the vehicle manufactures need to make sure that the 
information was present. The minimum set of data has been coded using the GTP protocol and consists of 
the following information that will be forwarded, together with the voice call, to the PSAP operator when 
receiving an in-vehicle eCall: 
 
o  "When" via time stamp 
o  "Where" via precise locations (e.g. satellite positions including the direction of driving) 
o  "Who" via vehicle description (caller line identification [CLI], colour, make and model including, if 
possible the vehicle identification number, VIN) 
o  "Where to obtain more information" via service provider identifier (IP address, including for example 
telephone number and country code), and 
o  "How severe" via eCall qualifier (source of the trigger – manual or automatic including what type of 
sensors or, if available, the number of sensors). 
 
The minimum set of data makes it possible for the PSAP operator to respond to the eCall 
even without the voice connection. It was requested by the PSAP operators that at least 
two sensors should be activated and send information to the PSAP before they deal with 
the call as a silent call. The reason being that the PSAP wanted to minimise the number of false calls in 
case of a failure on a sensor in the vehicle. The minimum set of data is critical for supplying the correct 
service to the crash-site and to speed up the response. It is generally expected by the PSAP’s that the 
response time can be improved by 5-10% when this information is available at the PSAP immediately 
after the crash. 
The necessary standardisation activities in Europe related to the technical solution for the 
implementation of a pan-European emergency eCall system for road vehicles cover two main issues: (1) 
the transport protocol by which the minimum set of data (MSD) will be send via the mobile 
telecommunication network (e.g. GSM) to the public service answering point (PSAP), and (2) the content 
and format of the MSD.  
 The Commission approached ETSI in 2005 to look for developing supporting standards for eCall. ETSI 
subsequently divided the work into two parts [3] 
a)   the agreement of a communication link (transport protocol) was assigned to ETSI MSG 
b)   a standard to specify the overall architecture and MSD was assigned to ETSI ERM TG37. 
 5. CONCLUSIONS 
 
In order to make the reporting of an accident more simple and to give the emergency call operator more 
information about the accident the European Commission launched a communication telling the EU 
Member States to implement the single European emergency call number 112, which has been follow by 
all EU Member States. In addition the European Communication launched a recommendation about the 
enhanced E112- number, with also provides the location when an emergency call is made from a cellular 
phone.  
The problem with the existing eCall solutions provided by the different vehicle manufacturers and 
service providers today is that they only operate in on country. 
From the network operators and service provider’s perspective they are developing different systems 
for all vehicles manufactures, which is making the system expensive and not able to work across the 
different EU Member States [3] 
Another conclusion is that if there should be a Pan-European eCall system, the vehicle manufactures or 
the network providers can’t develop this themselves. It is very important to include the public authorities 
in this matter and the public body for this has to be the EU. Only here can a solution be pushed across all 
EU Member States. 
 
6. REFERENCES 
 
[1] https:// eSafetySuport.org 
[2] www.escope.info 
[3]http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/programmes/esafety/index_en.htm 
[4] http://www.prevent-ip.org/ 
[5] wawecom blue paper no 2-implementing eCall  

INTELLIGENT VEHICLE SAFETY SYSTEMS-eCALL

http://www.rebe.rau.ro/RePEc/rau/jisomg/FA08/JISOM-FA08-A16.pdf

INTELLIGENT VEHICLE SAFETY SYSTEMS-eCALL

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