A New Era of 911 Has Begun. It is Time to Rebuild the Foundation.

As 911 becomes a data-rich ecosystem, agencies need a stronger foundation to protect truth, integrity, and public trust.

By Jon Whirledge, Founder of 911 Trust Ledger (911TL)

For more than fifty years, 911 was a voice-centric system.

Voice was the primary signal that guided everything else. Call routing, call handling, dispatch, event logging, training, investigations, and auditing all followed a predictable path because every event began in the same place. This gave public safety agencies clarity and consistency, and it created a level of transparency that supported public trust.

That world has changed.

911 is now a voice plus data ecosystem. This shift is driven by innovation across every corner of public safety. Smartphones deliver rich context before a call taker even answers. School safety platforms, connected vehicles, wearables, and IoT sensors generate alerts and telemetry before the first question is asked. Cameras feed real time information into cloud platforms. AI models summarize, classify, and interpret data in ways that were impossible only a few years ago.

This is progress.

And it is good for public safety.

New information can reduce response times. It can help call takers make better decisions. It can give responders stronger situational awareness. It can help agencies understand complex events with more accuracy and speed.

But as the ecosystem expands, the structure beneath it must evolve too.

A single 911 event can now involve a dozen systems. Each produces its own version of what happened. These systems were not designed to align with one another. They often do not share formats, timestamps, or methods of verification. Some run on local infrastructure, others in the cloud. Some operate under public ownership, others under private control. As a result, the narrative of an event is no longer created in one place. It is created across many platforms, many vendors, and many independent timelines.

This is the reality of a data-rich environment.

The challenge is not the innovation itself. The challenge is how to ensure that innovation remains transparent, accountable, and aligned with the public mission of 911.

Let's talk about governance.

In the voice-centric era, governance was simple. Records were generated along a single path. Verification was possible because there was only one version of the event to follow. Oversight could rely on the structure of the workflow itself.

In the data era, that foundation no longer holds. Multiple systems create multiple narratives. Conflicts appear across platforms. AI may generate insights that do not match raw data. Third party vendor logs may not align with CHE or CAD timelines. Agencies may receive information they cannot directly verify because the system that produced it sits outside their infrastructure.

This is not a failure of technology.

It is the natural result of a rapidly expanding ecosystem.

To support this new environment, governance must evolve.

A modern governance model must account for the fact that information now lives in many places. It must ensure that agencies can verify the integrity of data they depend on, even when it comes from systems they do not control. It must create a reliable way to understand the sequence of events during complex incidents. And it must protect the public’s trust by ensuring that new technologies do not unintentionally create blind spots or inconsistencies.

This does not require replacing existing standards or systems. Standards like NENA i3 remain essential. But standards alone cannot solve the alignment and verification challenges created by a multi-source environment. Governance must now support the ability to reconcile data across platforms, confirm the integrity of event timelines, and give agencies confidence that they are seeing a complete and accurate view of the incident.

So what should a modern governance foundation look like?

It should be neutral.

No single vendor can or should own the underlying mechanism that verifies the integrity of 911 events. That responsibility belongs to the industry as a whole.

It should be open.

A modern foundation must work alongside existing standards and integrate with both legacy and next generation systems.

It should be verifiable.

Agencies must be able to confirm that the information they receive is consistent with the underlying evidence. This includes timestamps, system fingerprints, and the sequence of events.

It should be simple to adopt.

A governance foundation cannot require agencies to overhaul their infrastructure. It must fit into the workflows that already exist and support the systems already in place.

It should protect privacy.

Verification does not require storing or moving sensitive data. It requires validating the integrity of the metadata and the relationships between systems.

Most importantly, it should be designed to support the future. The pace of innovation will continue to accelerate. AI and automation will create new forms of intelligence. Devices and sensors will continue to multiply. A modern governance foundation must be strong enough to support this evolution.

This is the role of 911 Trust Ledger (911TL).

911TL is not a vendor platform. It is not a product. It is not a replacement for CHE, CAD, radio, recorder, or any other system in the workflow.

911TL is a foundation that helps agencies verify and align the data that flows through the expanding 911 ecosystem. The first step is simple. Create a single, end-to-end record of a 911 event. Not by moving or storing sensitive information, but by capturing the fingerprints, hashes, and timestamps that allow systems to be aligned and verified without exposing the underlying data.

This gives agencies a way to confirm that all participating systems agree on the event timeline. It helps identify conflicts between platforms. It creates a consistent backbone for audits, investigations, and after-action reviews. And it ensures that as innovation expands, transparency expands with it.

A verifiable foundation does not slow innovation.

It accelerates it.

Vendors can build new capabilities with confidence. Agencies can adopt new tools without losing visibility into how information moves. AI systems can be evaluated against objective evidence. And the entire ecosystem can evolve without sacrificing public trust.

The shift from voice to data is one of the most important transformations in the history of 911. It brings enormous potential. It introduces new complexity. And it demands a new approach to governance that reflects the world we are now operating in.

We have the opportunity to build that foundation before the ecosystem fully hardens.If we do it well, we create an environment where innovation thrives, agencies maintain control, and the public remains protected.

That is the mission of 911TL.

To support the future of 911 with a foundation that is open, verifiable, and built for the data era.