Week ending Oct. 4, 2026 · About a 4-minute read
NAB is making the case for location-aware ATSC 3.0 emergency alerts while resisting new geographic-targeting mandates for the legacy Emergency Alert System.
The week in brief
NAB highlighted receiver-side alert targeting. Its Sept. 29 filing describes how a compatible ATSC 3.0 receiver could determine whether an alert applies to its location.
ATSC's B2X candidate period now runs through June 2027. A/391, the proposed entry signal for Broadcast-to-Everything services, remains a Candidate Standard.
ZapperBox added clear-recording export. Its Sept. 22 desktop release supports home-media-server workflows for ATSC 1.0 and unencrypted ATSC 3.0 recordings.
Updated digital rights management (DRM) guidance is available. ATSC lists the September edition of its Recommended Practice, approved Sept. 18.
NAB puts location-aware receivers into the alerting debate
The National Association of Broadcasters highlighted ATSC 3.0's alert-targeting potential in Sept. 29 reply comments to the Federal Communications Commission on modernizing the Emergency Alert System, or EAS.
NAB says a location-aware receiver can compare its position with an alert's mapped boundaries and determine whether the message applies to it. The association supports allowing those boundaries to inform stations' decisions about relaying alerts, but opposes mandatory partial-county codes in legacy EAS.
The filing also describes Advanced Emergency Information, or AEI, which can carry maps and supplemental warning information. It presents voluntary AEI as a complement to EAS.
Why it matters: A station can broadcast across its coverage area while a location-aware receiver determines whether the alert applies to its own location. That is a different decision from whether the station relays the alert at all.
ATSC extends the B2X candidate period to June 2027
ATSC's current Candidate Standards listing gives June 30, 2027, as the end of the candidate period for A/391, B2X System Discovery and Signaling. That replaces the previously listed Sept. 30 deadline.
B2X means Broadcast-to-Everything, ATSC's developing framework for reaching mobile and other non-TV devices. A/391 defines its bootstrap: the entry signal that lets a device recognize a B2X waveform and determine how to begin receiving it.
The candidate document remains dated July 9. It defines discovery for B2X operation in broadcast and mobile spectrum while leaving the existing ATSC 3.0 discovery standard unchanged.
ZapperBox opens unencrypted recordings to home media servers
ZapperBox's Sept. 22 zApp v3.0 release adds Windows and macOS tools for using recordings with home media servers.
The company says zApp can create MP4 files from ATSC 1.0 and clear, meaning unencrypted, ATSC 3.0 recordings. It reports playback of clear ATSC 3.0 recordings through Jellyfin. Plex clients, it says, lack support for the recordings' AC-4 audio format.
That gives users a route from an unencrypted over-the-air recording to a home media library. For encrypted channels, ZapperBox still plans a 2026 update that would allow protected reception without an initial internet connection.
In a Sept. 29 FAQ update, ZapperBox also targets revised subscription plans around Oct. 9, including a whole-home option. The company says existing subscriptions will be grandfathered.
Other developments this week
ATSC's September DRM guidance is available. A/362:2026-09, approved Sept. 18, provides implementation guidance for security and content protection, including interactive content. It is the current Recommended Practice, a guidance document for implementers.
Around ATSC 3.0
Advocacy: The Advanced Television Broadcasting Alliance argues against a separate 5G Broadcast authorization for low-power television. Its Oct. 1 commentary favors coexistence within the ATSC 3.0 framework and sets out the association's spectrum-policy concerns.
Research: Brazil's research and education network, RNP, describes its TV 3.0 research and implementation work, including receiver certification and integrated testing. The Sept. 28 participant account connects earlier conference demonstrations with the practical work of assembling a usable system.
Experiment: Ron Economos's firsthand account in Zero Retries describes ATSC 3.0 experiments between two rooms at home. The accompanying gr-atsc3 code accepts Transport Stream input, an older way of packaging broadcast media, for experiments with ATSC 3.0's radio-transmission layer.
Event: The Institution of Engineering and Technology's online Time to Talk discussion runs Oct. 6, 8–9 a.m. PDT. Sam Matheny of Merkhet Solutions and Elena Parsons of the UK's National Physical Laboratory will discuss resilient timing and broadcast time references.
Event: Triveni Digital lists an ATSC 3.0 broadcast-chain webinar for Oct. 8 at 10 a.m. PDT. The vendor-led session covers components such as signaling, monitoring and datacasting.
Event: NAB Show New York's broadcaster guide lists a NextGen TV workflow session Oct. 21 and an ATSC 3.0/Korean-content session Oct. 22. Both are part of the show's Oct. 21–22 program in New York.
About ATSC Now
ATSC Now is a free weekly briefing on the policy, standards, receivers, deployments and business activity shaping ATSC 3.0.
Written by Mark Barrington and published by Barrington Technology. ATSC Now is an independent publication and is not affiliated with ATSC. All opinions are our own.