The Automatic Transmitter Identification System (ATIS) is a

communications protocol A communication protocol is a system of rules that allows two or more entities of a communications system to transmit information via any kind of variation of a physical quantity. The protocol defines the rules, syntax, semantics and synchro ...

used for the

station identification Station identification (ident, network ID or channel ID or bumper) is the practice of radio and television stations and broadcast network, networks identifying themselves on-air, typically by means of a call sign or brand name (sometimes known, ...

television channel A television channel is a terrestrial frequency or virtual number over which a television station or television network is distributed. For example, in North America, "channel 2" refers to the terrestrial or cable band of 54 to 60 MHz, wit ...

s carried on

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna commo ...

. ATIS is only required for

analog television Analog television is the original television technology that uses analog signals to transmit video and audio. In an analog television broadcast, the brightness, colors and sound are represented by amplitude, phase and frequency of an analog s ...

transmission and only via satellites or

earth station A ground station, Earth station, or Earth terminal is a terrestrial radio station designed for extraplanetary telecommunication with spacecraft (constituting part of the ground segment of the spacecraft system), or reception of radio wave ...

s under

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

jurisdiction. It is continuously repeated whilst an earth station is using a

transponder In telecommunications, a transponder is a device that, upon receiving a signal, emits a different signal in response. The term is a blend of ''transmitter'' and ''responder''. In air navigation or radio frequency identification, a flight trans ...

on a satellite. The

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisd ...

(FCC) rules for ATIS are set forth in 47 CFR §25.281. The system was developed in response to the "Captain Midnight" satellite jamming incident. In 2009, HBO and Elmer Musser were awarded a

Technology & Engineering Emmy Award The Technology and Engineering Emmy Awards, or Technology and Engineering Emmys, are one of two sets of Emmy Awards that are presented for outstanding achievement in engineering development in the television industry. The Technology and Enginee ...

for ATIS. ATIS is a

Morse code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one ...

transmission sent on a

subcarrier A subcarrier is a sideband of a radio frequency carrier wave, which is modulated to send additional information. Examples include the provision of colour in a black and white television system or the provision of stereo in a monophonic radio bro ...

of 7.1 MHz and must activate automatically any time the station is transmitting. The

center frequency In electrical engineering and telecommunications, the center frequency of a filter or channel is a measure of a central frequency between the upper and lower cutoff frequencies. It is usually defined as either the arithmetic mean or the geomet ...

must be no more than 25 kHz from this

nominal value In economics, nominal value is measured in terms of money, whereas real value is measured against goods or services. A real value is one which has been adjusted for inflation, enabling comparison of quantities as if the prices of goods had not ...

and the

frequency deviation Frequency deviation (f_) is used in FM radio to describe the difference between the minimum or maximum extent of a frequency modulated signal, and the nominal center or carrier frequency. The term is sometimes mistakenly used as synonymous with fr ...

must be no more than 25 kHz peak when being

modulated In electronics and telecommunications, modulation is the process of varying one or more properties of a periodic waveform, called the ''carrier signal'', with a separate signal called the ''modulation signal'' that typically contains informatio ...

. Injection must be at a minimum of −26 dB referenced to the

unmodulated carrier In telecommunications, a carrier wave, carrier signal, or just carrier, is a waveform (usually sinusoidal) that is modulated (modified) with an information-bearing signal for the purpose of conveying information. This carrier wave usually has a m ...

. The tone used to modulate the subcarrier is nominally 1200 Hz, but may vary by as much as 800 Hz (400 to 2000 Hz). The ATIS message is sent at a transmission rate of 15 to 25

words per minute Words per minute, commonly abbreviated wpm (sometimes uppercased WPM), is a measure of words processed in a minute, often used as a measurement of the speed of typing, reading or Morse code sending and receiving. Alphanumeric entry Since words ...

and must not exceed 30 seconds in its entire length. The message includes the FCC-assigned

callsign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a Identifier, unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be form ...

of the earth station, its

telephone number A telephone number is a sequence of digits assigned to a landline telephone subscriber station connected to a telephone line or to a wireless electronic telephony device, such as a radio telephone or a mobile telephone, or to other devices f ...

, a ten-digit serial number, and sometimes other information which is voluntary. The telephone number must immediately connect to personnel who can resolve

radio interference Electromagnetic interference (EMI), also called radio-frequency interference (RFI) when in the radio frequency spectrum, is a disturbance generated by an external source that affects an electrical circuit by electromagnetic induction, electrost ...

and other

frequency coordination Frequency Coordination is a technical and regulatory process that removes or mitigates radio-frequency interference between different radio systems that operate on the same frequency. Normally frequency coordination is a function of an administrat ...

issues. The serial number cannot be easily changed. ATIS encoders must be included in the

uplink In a telecommunications network, a link is a communication channel that connects two or more devices for the purpose of data transmission. The link may be a dedicated physical link or a virtual circuit that uses one or more physical links or shar ...

airchain In broadcast engineering for radio or television, the airchain or transmission chain (UK) (sometimes air chain (US) or just chain (UK)) is the path or route an audio or video signal takes on its way through a radio station or television station. ...

of all transmitters as of March 1, 1991 "in a method that cannot easily be defeated". Other subcarriers piggybacked on the

video Video is an Electronics, electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving picture, moving image, visual Media (communication), media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, whi ...

carrier are also included in transmissions, often at 6.2 MHz and 6.8 MHz, just above the

bandpass A band-pass filter or bandpass filter (BPF) is a device that passes frequencies within a certain range and rejects ( attenuates) frequencies outside that range. Description In electronics and signal processing, a filter is usually a two- ...

of the video signal (even if scrambled). These carry left and right

stereo Stereophonic sound, or more commonly stereo, is a method of sound reproduction that recreates a multi-directional, 3-dimensional audible perspective. This is usually achieved by using two independent audio channels through a configuration ...

audio and

second audio program Second audio program (SAP), also known as secondary audio programming, is an auxiliary audio channel for analog television that can be broadcast or transmitted both over-the-air and by cable television. Used mostly for audio description or o ...

, and sometimes

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radi ...

s or

radio network There are two types of radio network currently in use around the world: the one-to-many ( simplex communication) broadcast network commonly used for public information and mass-media entertainment, and the two-way radio ( duplex communication) typ ...

s which may be unrelated to the

television network A television network or television broadcaster is a telecommunications network for distribution of television program content, where a central operation provides programming to many television stations or pay television providers. Until the mid- ...

. Backhauls are too intermittent for such uses but may carry in-house private audio channels instead. Because all of these, including ATIS, are all audio, they can all be tuned by an analog

TVRO Television receive-only (TVRO) is a term used chiefly in North America, South America to refer to the reception of satellite television from FSS-type satellites, generally on C-band analog; free-to-air and unconnected to a commercial DBS prov ...

receiver. However,

digital television Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative advanc ...

has overtaken analog because multiple channels can be transmitted on one transponder. These signals carry their station ID as

data In the pursuit of knowledge, data (; ) is a collection of discrete values that convey information, describing quantity, quality, fact, statistics, other basic units of meaning, or simply sequences of symbols that may be further interpret ...

instead.

References

{{reflist Satellite television Broadcast engineering