[US] A nationwide emergency alert will be sent to all U.S. cellphones Wednesday

A nationwide test of the emergency and wireless alert systems will be conducted Wednesday at 2:20 p.m. ET, when a message will be sent to all cellphones, TVs and radios.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency said in a news release in August that a message that reads, “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed,” will be sent to all phones. A Spanish version of the message will be displayed depending on the language settings of the devices.

A separate message will be sent to radios and televisions, saying, “This is a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System, issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, covering the United States from 14:20 to 14:50 hours ET. This is only a test. No action is required by the public.”

The test is a joint operation between FEMA and the Federal Communications Commission, meant to “ensure that the systems continue to be effective means of warning the public about emergencies, particularly those on the national level,” according to the August news release.

Redoomed,

FYI:

On GrapheneOS, you can fully disable emergency alerts in Settings → Safety emergency → Wireless emergency alerts since we add a toggle for Presidential alerts. The naming of the alert types varies based on country which is determined by the carrier’s country code not language.

Source: [Nitter link] [Twitter link]

themeatbridge,

I’m a little over 40 years old, which means I’ve experienced a number of situations where such an emergency broadcast system would have been a helpful way to disseminate information and quell panic. We’ve had tests of these systems for as long as I can remember.

I also cannot remember it ever actually being used.

Zoomboingding,
@Zoomboingding@lemmy.world avatar

Adding to that, didn’t we JUST have a different system send a nationwide alert about 4 or 5 years ago?

SheeEttin,

Really? You’ve never heard EAS interruptions on the TV or radio for weather, or gotten an AMBER alert on your phone?

themeatbridge,

Not for every phone everywhere in the country.

ryathal,

My state used it when a natural gas plant had an explosion to ask people to lower their thermostats. They also used it for a handful of covid updates that felt like the incorrect use of such a system.

Zaktor,

I’m in Hawaii. I can remember one being used. To create panic. Twitter was where the best attempt at quelling the panic was done.

Bye,

I have so many friends who were like “yeah I knew it was fake”. Even if they did, so many of us didn’t and were scared. I was super scared. Fucking old man I hate him. Why would you wait so long to send the follow up. Awful.

Zaktor,

While a lot of other institutions were caught flat footed, everyone in that office presumably got the alert as well and should have realized immediately it was a huge fuckup.

Stalinwolf,
@Stalinwolf@lemmy.ca avatar

Alex Jones is going to freak the fuck out.

doppelgangmember,

Here for it.

We should change the text to “THIS IS A JUST A TEST FOR ALEX”

bobman,

This is why PCs were so badass.

We actually had control over shit like this.

I guess that’s why the powers that be made certain that the average person no longer uses a PC.

dan1101,

I’m sure if Microsoft wanted to send a message to everyone they could.

bobman,

Good thing you don’t need to rely on microsoft to use a PC!

SheeEttin,

You can turn them off on iOS and Android, too.

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Sure. That’s just what they want you to think.

ackzsel,

A Spanish version of the message will be displayed depending on the language settings of the devices.

To me this is the most disturbing line from this post. How can the sender of a message probe your phone's settings? What other information can be queried from the device this way? Can we now remotely determine someone ethnicity from just a phone number?

misterundercoat,

Both versions are sent to everyone. Your phone will decide which version to display based on its language setting. You can put the pitchfork down.

AeroLemming,

If we have to put our pitchforks down, does that mean we also need to rotate our yawforks to the left?

RustyWizard,

Could be that both texts are provided to the phone, which would then pick the appropriate version. Seems more reasonable than trying to keep track or query millions of phones of different make and manufacturer for a language setting.

ackzsel,

Indeed that would make more sense.

BaroqueInMind,
BaroqueInMind avatar

This totally sounds like the start of a horror SCP anomaly.

Edit: except the horror is the actual nature of our current reality we are currently experiencing, so nm

Sabata11792,
Sabata11792 avatar

Nah, its just in case we get nuked next week.

edgemaster72,
@edgemaster72@lemmy.world avatar

Next week? But moooom, I wanna get nuked nooooow.

Mr_Blott,

"We have nukes at home!"

  • Nukes at home - The slow inevitable crumbling of society as we know it
FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

Never understood why we needed to be warned of that since there’s fuck all we could do about it.

Sabata11792,
Sabata11792 avatar

So you got time to grab a beer, a chair, and your New Vegas playlists.

Sylver,

Just in case you happen to already be within a quarter mile of a nuclear shelter.

They aren’t advertised very well, but I have seen entrances to one in downtown Pittsburgh.

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

You think you would even survive in a shelter if you lived in a city the size of Pittsburgh? That would be a direct hit.

Sylver,

Oh yeah that thought never left my mind as well. Best case scenario you end up in a tomb with 9,000 others.

bobman,

I think less of anyone who brings up SCP.

BaroqueInMind,
BaroqueInMind avatar

No one cares what you think, loser.

bobman,

No, you just don’t like what I think.

If you didn’t care you’d block me and move on. Lol.

loser.

Yeah. Go read more SCP. That’s what winners do.

Confused_Emus,

Right? How dare people enjoy stuff. Bunch o’ schmucks.

bobman,

I hope you feel the same way about people who enjoy prank videos.

Confused_Emus,

I fail to see how they relate…? Prank videos often show what some might consider harassment of strangers. SCPs are essentially a collection of creative writing prompts. I legitimately cannot fathom how the existence of the SCP website would bother someone unless they just have an issue with fiction writing for some strange reason…?

bobman,

That’s fine man.

You don’t have to understand everything.

Confused_Emus,

Nothin’ to understand here but someone hating on literacy, apparently.

Zaktor,

If anyone has a powered cell phone they don’t want someone in their household to know about, power it off.

kobra,

Wow, good call out. That never crossed my mind.

cantstopthesignal,

My ho phone will be off. Thank you for your service

NotMyOldRedditName,

Ho ho ho!

TheFlopster,
@TheFlopster@lemmy.world avatar

If it’s being sent over the cell phone carrier signal, does that mean if you’re at home, or otherwise connected to Wi-Fi, that you won’t get it?

cm0002,

No, even on WiFi your phone maintains its cellular signal, even data depending on your settings (it’s just not actively used as wifi will be considered superior).

Vilian,

why would someone have that?

MinusPi,

Abusive relationships.

Fondots,

To expand on the abusive relationship aspect, say your partner, parents, etc. want to keep you from contacting people, maybe your family/friends, maybe the police, maybe your doctor (for example to seek abortion services, or maybe treatment for a health issue they’ve been trying to withhold medication from you for) they may check your phone to see who you’ve been contacting or even take your phone from you to prevent you from using it.

There’s also of course less savory reasons, cheating, dealing drugs, or other illegal activities.

And somewhat less likely, undercover officers, FBI agents, investigative journalists, etc. whose cover could potentially be compromised if the wrong people are around and that second phone goes off.

Zoomboingding,
@Zoomboingding@lemmy.world avatar

As an undercover FBI agent, thanks for the heads up

Vilian,

i didn’t thought about abuse etc, make sense, thank for the answer!

Pretzilla, (edited )

And leave it off at least until the end of the hour, until the alerts have timed out

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