S-04 Solutions · Higher-ed campuses
Lockdown orders that land offline, answered by name.
LOCKDOWN, SHELTER, EVACUATE and ALL CLEAR, sent building by building through the safety app your campus already runs. Staff answers return to dispatch by name, and drills produce a record for your Clery file.
For: campus public safety and dispatch, emergency management, and the IT team that runs the campus network.
01 The gap in campus notification
In a lockdown, dispatch cannot say which buildings have the order.
Alerts ride the network
Text, email and app alerts need cell, Wi-Fi or internet. Residence halls and basements have dead spots, and campus networks overload first in an emergency, as reported at Virginia Tech (2007), Northern Illinois (2008) and Western Kentucky (2012).
The record is on you
The Clery Act requires emergency notification without delay and a documented annual test. Few systems can show who actually received the order.
The result
Dispatch works without a list, and the after-action file is thin.
Sources: CIO Insight (2007); Daily Herald (2008); WAVE3 (2012); 34 CFR 668.46(g).
02 A shelter order in the residence halls Illustrative
SHELTER to one building, and every staff answer back by name.
- 01
Dispatch sends
SHELTER to North Halls only. Orders are signed per building: LOCKDOWN, SHELTER, EVACUATE, ALL CLEAR.
- 02
Phones show it
Campus Wi-Fi is down. The campus app shows SHELTER, carried by Cover4 nodes.
- 03
Staff answer
RAs and staff press once and are counted by name. Students receive the order.
- 04
HELP with location
A student sends HELP with typed text; officers see the nearest node.
- 05
Drill record
Drills read DRILL on every screen. One click exports PDF and CSV for the Clery file.
HELP and by-name confirmations: Bench Per-building campus orders and the drill record: Twin only. The institution owns Clery compliance.
03 Deployment
Nodes on each building's wired network, with a battery radio network behind them.
| Where | One venue on campus, such as the arena, and one residence hall. Staff only. |
|---|---|
| Network | Nodes on each building's wired network, powered over Ethernet where available. Cover4's battery radio network carries every order if the wired network or power fails. |
| Phones | Students and staff keep the campus safety app they have. Cover4 runs inside it through the SDK, after the normal sign-in. No second app. |
| Staff tags | For public safety, facilities and dispatch staff not carrying a phone. |
| Measured in the pilot | Coverage floor by floor, delivery times and the by-name drill record. |
| Paperwork before a pilot | A data-processing agreement, an accessibility conformance report and a security questionnaire. |
| Node counts per building come from the walk test; we do not quote them before it. | |
04 What you keep, what Cover4 adds
Your notification system stays the system of record.
You keep
- Your mass-notification system, sirens, PA and fire alarms.
- The campus safety app students already carry.
- Dispatch radios and your emergency procedures.
Cover4 adds
- An offline lane beneath the app that keeps working when Wi-Fi and cell are saturated.
- Orders to a building, zone, role or person.
- Confirmation by name against a deadline: who confirmed, who was not reached, and why.
- HELP with text and location, shown at the nearest node.
- DRILL marking and a one-click drill record from the tamper-evident record.
05 Proof and security
Measured on the bench; a campus building is the next test.
| Stage | Date | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Bench | 2026-10-25 | Two phones in airplane mode, Bluetooth on, never paired: a signed STOP acknowledged by name in 13.4 s and 18.5 s from send, reading and tap included (filmed). |
| Bench | 2026-10-29 | The backup control center took over when the primary was stopped and re-sent the order to the people who had not confirmed. |
| Bench | 2026-10-30 | HELP with typed text from a never-paired phone, Wi-Fi off, reached the operator; the reply came back. |
| Not yet shown | open | A full campus building. That is what the pilot measures. |
Pinned pairing
Phones pair only over HTTPS pinned to the site's own certificate authority.
HELP is encrypted
HELP messages and operator replies are encrypted end to end between the phone and the site's control center.
Operator sign-in
Operators sign in with multi-factor authentication or single sign-on. Security details
- Not yet field-tested. Campus orders and the drill record run on our digital twin only.
- iPhone lock-screen delivery awaits Apple's approval for the app.
- The SDK is not yet inside a partner app; your campus app vendor's integration would be the first.
- Designed to FCC Part 15.247, not yet certified. No outside security audit yet.
Walk one venue and one hall with Public Safety and IT.
A phase-1 reference pilot: one campus venue and one residence hall, staff only, run alongside your existing alert system. Public Safety starts the drills, marked DRILL. You receive the by-name drill record and a measured coverage map. We ask for one contact in public safety and one in IT.
partners@getcover4.com