General Information - Administrative Message (AM/AML)

Overview

An Administrative Message (AM) is:

A criminal justice related point-to-point free form message.
Differentiated from other Nlets traffic in that it is free form.
May be used for practically any type of information transmission not associated with a specific message type.
May ask for information or assistance.
May be in response to a request from another agency.

An Administrative Message "law enforcement only" (AML) is:

A "law enforcement only" related point-to-point free form message.
May be used for practically any type of law enforcement only information transmission not associated with a specific message type.
May ask for information or assistance.
May be in response to a request from another agency.
Nlets will insert the caveat "FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT DISSEMINATION ONLY" within the body of the message prior to sending.

General guidelines for statewide, regional or all points messages:

To request a statewide, regional, or all points message, all Nlets members must use an administrative message (AM/AML).
Users should confine broadcast type messages to individual states, regions, or "community of interest" states.
State broadcasts may be sent to up to five (5) states.
Regional broadcast codes and two-character state codes may be intermixed in the destination portion of the header.
The general use of all points messages is discouraged.

Note: Information related to officer safety (e.g. "armed and dangerous") should be placed at the front of the message on its own line to highlight it.

Canada has NO facility for broadcasting messages to individual provinces therefore "AM" messages to 2-character province or territory should not be sent. These will be reviewed by INTERPOL in the U.S. prior to forwarding to Canada. To broadcast an "AM" message to Canada, it must be addressed to "CN" for a country-wide broadcast.

FBI National Threat Operations Center (NTOC)

The mission of the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center (NTOC) is to protect the nation by serving as the primary communication channel through which the public provides tips to the FBI. These messages allow the NTOC to push non-emergent state, local, and tribal matters directly to agencies in a timely manner. To support the FBI’s mission, NTOC is providing tip information directly to respective agencies via Nlets Administrative Messages.

The NTOC pushes information via Nlets’ existing Administrative Message infrastructure in real time for any action deemed appropriate by the receiving agencies. The AM can be sent to a local agency, as a state message, or to an FBI Field Office. The recipient of the message is determined by the information provided by the public. The information provided in the AM is informational in nature, will need to be vetted and confirmed by the receiving agency, and is to be used at the discretion of the receiving agency.

These messages will contain a title stating, ‘FBI NATIONAL THREAT OPERATIONS CENTER INFORMATION SHARING’. Example of FBI NTOC AM message:

AM.DCFBIWAE1

09:30 12/01/2023 00001
09:30 12/01/2023 00001 WVX000000
TXT

TITLE: FBI NATIONAL THREAT OPERATIONS CENTER INFORMATION SHARING

CAVEAT: THE INFORMATION HEREIN WAS SUBMITTED BY THE PUBLIC, SOCIAL MEDIA OR PRIVATE SECTOR COMPANIES TO THE FBI TIP LINE AND HAS NOT BEEN CONFIRMED, INVESTIGATED, OR VETTED BY THE FBI. THE INFORMATION PROVIDED IS TO BE USED AT THE DISCRETION OF THE RECEIVING AGENCY TO FURTHER ITS LAW ENFORCEMENT FUNCTIONS. YOU ARE RECEIVING THIS MESSAGE BASED ON ZIP CODE MAPPING.

ORI RECIPIENTS: WVX000000 WV1234567 FBIHQ01234 TRANSACTION REFERENCE NUMBER: 1234xyz SYNOPSIS: CALLER REPORTED SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY IN THE PARKING LOT OF THE MOVIE THEATRE DOWNTOWN. CALLER STATED HE SAW 5 MEN COME OUT OF A WHITE VAN, ALL HEADED IN SEPARATE DIRECTIONS AND HAD THEIR PHONES OUT. IT APPEARED THEY WERE VIDEOING RANDOM FEMALES IN THE PARKING LOT. WHILE CALLER WAS WALKING INTO WORK, AT THE THEATRE, ONE OF THE MEN HE SAW LEAVE THE VAN WAS FOLLOWING CLOSELY BEHIND A SINGLE FEMALE AND APPEARED TO BE RECORDING HER ON HIS PHONE. THE CALLER RECOGNIZED THE MAN TO BE TIMMY TESTING. INCIDENT ZIP CODE: 12345 DATE: 7/7/2023 COMPLAINANT: NAME: TOMMY TESTER PHONE NUMBER: 222-333-1234 SUBJECT: NAME: TIMMY TESTING PHONE NUMBER: 222-333-1235

SOME ADDITIONAL NTOS RELATED DATA, ALONG WITH UNCLASSIFIED CRIMINAL JUSTICE INVESTIGATIVE INFORMATION, MAY BE FOUND IN THE FBI'S NATIONAL DATA EXCHANGE (N-DEX) SYSTEM. THE N-DEX SYSTEM IS A NO COST NATIONWIDE INFORMATION SHARING SYSTEM WITH ACCESS TO OVER ONE BILLION FEDERAL, STATE, LOCAL, AND TRIBAL RECORDS. FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE N-DEX SYSTEM, PLEASE CONTACT NDEX@LEO.GOV.

Information Sharing Parameters:

NTOC will not send a duplication of what is already sent to fusion centers as part of the dual route Threat to Life initiative.
Tips are informational in nature and may be actioned by state/local law enforcement at their discretion.
Tips containing urgent matters have other processes in place to be shared with the appropriate agencies.

Multiple Destination Administrative Messages

Multiple ORIs or region codes may be used to send a message to more than one agency or region, up to a maximum of five locations.

State Broadcast Messages

A state broadcast is an administrative message (AM/AML) sent to a state control terminal requesting that state to send an APB within the state.

Note: Information related to officer safety (e.g. "armed and dangerous") should be placed at the
front of the message on its own line to highlight it.

Regional Broadcast Messages

A regional broadcast provides Nlets users with the ability to send selected types of messages to the control terminal in a group(s) of predefined states and agencies located in a geographical area. The control terminal will handle further dissemination at its discretion.

The five types of regional broadcast messages are:

Administrative Messages (AM)
Administrative Messages "Law Enforcement Only" (AML)
Driver's License Queries (DQ)
Idenity Queries (IQ)
Vehicle Registration Queries (RQ)

Regional Broadcast Messages will be transmitted to points-of-entry only once. For example, if a message is addressed to two regions, the FBI and Dept. Of Treasury (TECS) would receive only one copy of the message, not two.

To assist control terminals in further disseminating administrative type regional requests, the sender may include a request such as: "Deliver to State Crime Lab" or "Deliver to Major Cities".

Regional Codes

The Regional Codes with their respective states and agencies are listed in the tables that follow. Users that are preceded by an asterisk * do not receive regional broadcast messages.

Region A Code: A1 Region B Code: B1 Region C Code: C1 Region D Code: D1 Connecticut District of Columbia Kentucky Alabama Maine Delaware North Carolina Arkansas Massachusetts Maryland South Carolina Florida New Hampshire New Jersey Tennessee Georgia Rhode Island New York Virginia Louisiana Vermont Pennsylvania West Virginia Mississippi FBI/NCIC FBI/NCIC FBI/NCIC Puerto Rico TECS TECS TECS Virgin Islands
Interpol Interpol Interpol FBI/NCIC
GSA TSA TSA TECS TSA *Army *Army TSA
*Army *Navy *Navy Interpol
*Navy *Department of Interior *Department of Interior *Army *Department of Interior *Department of Justice *Department of Justice *Navy *Department of Justice *Department of Interior *Department of Justice
ATF Region E Code: E1 Region F Code: F1 Region G Code: G1 Region H Code: H1 Indiana Iowa Arizona Alaska Illinois Minnesota Colorado California Michigan Montana Kansas Guam Missouri Nebraska New Mexico Hawaii Ohio North Dakota Oklahoma Idaho Wisconsin South Dakota Texas Nevada FBI/NCIC Wyoming Utah Oregon TECS FBI/NCIC FBI/NCIC Washington Interpol TECS TECS FBI/NCIC TSA Interpol Interpol TECS *Army TSA TSA Interpol *Navy *Army *Army TSA *Department of Interior *Navy *Navy *Army *Department of Justice *Department of Interior *Department of Interior *Navy *Department of Justice *Department of Justice *Department of Interior *Department of Justice

Restrictions on Regional Broadcast Messages

There are two types of restrictions placed on regional broadcast messages. They include:

Secondary dissemination of regional broadcast messages received.
Content and use of regional broadcast messages sent.

Secondary Dissemination of Regional Broadcast Messages

Regional broadcasts may not be secondarily disseminated to non-criminal justice agencies without first obtaining specific approval from the originator.

Message Use and Content of Regional Broadcast Messages

Users are encouraged to use regional codes rather than APBs if possible. In instances where a regional code may not contain every state to which you wish to send a message, the use of multiple 2-character state codes and regional codes (up to a maximum of 5 destinations) can address many states without using a blanket APB. The list that follows outlines the restrictions on regional broadcast message content.

Restrictions Adopted for Regional Broadcast Content: No social announcements (i.e., holiday messages or retirements). No recruitment of personnel. No messages in which the complainant is interested only in recovery of property. No attempts to locate vehicle (breach of trust) without warrant. No messages supportive or in opposition to political issues or announcements of meetings relative to such issues. No messages supportive or in opposition to labor management issues or announcements relative to such issues. No messages supportive or in opposition of legislative bills. No messages relating to requests for information concerning salary, uniforms, personnel, or related items that can
be routinely obtained by correspondence or means other than Nlets. No messages relating to the advertisement or sale of equipment. No requests for criminal history record information. IQ, FQ and AQ must be used for this purpose. No reply only if wanted (ROIWS). No solicitation of funds. No training messages that include the name of the company that is providing the training unless the company is
not-for-profit and is providing a direct service to law enforcement.

Exceptions to Restrictions on Regional Broadcast Messages

The restrictions may be waived under the following conditions:

A user has information that is pertinent to a criminal investigation, is of interest to a group of states, and cannot be entered into NCIC.
A user has information regarding kidnapping, skyjacking or other serious criminal acts. Keep messages as brief as possible.
A user has information on a wanted person that cannot be entered into NCIC but may be of interest to a group of states.
Permission has been granted by Nlets on a "per case" basis.

Note: Information related to officer safety (e.g. "armed and dangerous") should be placed at the front of the
message on its own line to highlight it. Note: Users initiating wanted messages of any type; wanted persons missing persons or runaways must cancel
these messages when they no longer apply.

All Points Broadcast

An all points broadcast (APB) provides Nlets users with the ability to send administrative type messages (AM/AML) to each state and Federal member terminal.

A destination code of "AP" will result in the message being directed to all state and Federal control terminals.

Restrictions on All Points Broadcasts

There are two types of restrictions placed on nationwide broadcast messages. They include the following:

Secondary dissemination of APBs received and
Content and use of APBs sent.

Secondary Dissemination of All Points Broadcasts

Regarding secondary dissemination, nationwide broadcasts may not be secondarily disseminated to non-criminal justice agencies without first obtaining specific approval from the originator.

Message Use and Content of All Points Broadcasts

Regarding the content and use of APBs, users are urged to carefully consider whether there is a necessity to send the message to all states. If the message pertains to a geographical area of the United States (i.e., East Coast, Sunbelt) the user should seriously consider the use of a regional broadcast that will more narrowly focus on the states that could provide assistance.

The following table outlines the restrictions on all points broadcast content.

Restrictions Adopted for All Points Broadcasts No social announcements (i.e., holiday messages or retirements). No seminar, training class or convention announcements. Training and seminar announcements may be sent via
Regional broadcast codes to states in geographic proximity of the sender. No recruitment of personnel. No messages in which the complainant is interested only in recovery of property. No attempts to locate vehicle (breach of trust) without warrant. No excessively long messages. No messages supportive or in opposition to political issues or announcements of meetings relative to such issues. No messages supportive or in opposition to labor management issues or announcements relative to such issues. No messages supportive or in opposition of legislative bills. No messages relating to requests for information concerning salary, uniforms, personnel, or related items that
can be routinely obtained by correspondence or means other than Nlets. No messages relating to the advertisement or sale of equipment. No messages regarding wanted subjects or vehicles if they can be entered into NCIC. No attempt to locate messages. No reply only if records (ROIRS). No reply only if wanted (ROIWS). No runaways. No missing persons. No solicitation of funds.

Exceptions to Restrictions for All Points Broadcast Messages

The restrictions may be waived under the following conditions:

A user has information that is pertinent to a criminal investigation that is of interest to all states and cannot be entered into NCIC.
A user has information regarding kidnapping, skyjacking or other serious criminal acts. Keep messages as brief as possible.
A user has information on a wanted person that cannot be entered into NCIC but is of interest to all states.
Permission has been granted by Nlets on a "per case" basis.

Note: Information related to officer safety (e.g., "armed and dangerous") should be placed at the front of the
message on its own line to highlight it. Note: Users initiating want messages of any type; wanted persons missing persons or runaways must cancel
these messages when they no longer apply.