Emergency alerts coming to cell phones

[WDeranged]

Personal localized emergency alerts coming to smart phones

 

Emergency alerts coming to cell phones

 

Simultaneously functional and creepy in the 1984 style, I tend to think people are panicked enough these days and considering that governments tend to give bad information in the first few days/weeks of a disaster, who really wants this?

Edited May 14, 2011 by WDeranged

[LadyCrimson]

I dunno...I don't see how this is any worse than having the Emergency Alert System come on in the middle of your TV/radio program, which you also can't "opt out" of, at least in terms of inconvenience. Especially in this day & age where more people are likely to have a cellphone than be sitting in front of a TV/radio. I don't have any sympathy for people being possibly upset because their Facebook, Twitter, or phone call was interrupted for a possibly important tornado/tsunami warning or whatever.

 

But if there are possible data-privacy concerns re: the software/techniques being used to relay the EA's, that's always a sticky thing (don't know if there actually are, just saying "if"). Still, "smart phones" already have that in spades, what's one more?

Edited May 15, 2011 by LadyCrimson

[Tigranes]

It's a single text message. It doesn't make Obama's face pop out of your phone and yell GET TO IT SOLDIER. Let's not blow it out of proportion.

 

governments tend to give bad information in the first few days/weeks of a disaster

 

I don't know, "there is a tsunami coming right now get the hell out" might be a good one. Or the location of nearby shelters.

 

As LC says, the data privacy thing is the only issue, how the gov is getting all the numbers, how it will use them in the future.

[Zoraptor]

It'll just be the government telling the service providers to send the txt to all the people within range of the cellphone towers in state y, or just everyone in the country. While it could be a precursor to establishing something like a Five Minute Hate it isn't really anything to worry about privacy wise. If the government or service providers are routinely tracking you then they are already doing it and your only real way of avoiding it is not to have a cell phone in the first place.

[Walsingham]

Few people object when their sercvice provider spams them with a note saying 'take advantage of new holiday tariffs', but they squeal like angsty pigs when the govt. says they might want a message saying 'tsunami coming' or 'nerve gas approaching from east' or 'reactor over-reacting'.

 

Yes, it could be abused. better stay a-****-ing wake, then.

[Moose]

Citizens of Eutopia, all is well. Move along, move along...