SIGforum
Amber alerts to my cell phone
September 11, 2018, 03:49 PM
SigmundAmber alerts to my cell phone
Suggestion: DISABLE THESE!
Last night we spent the night at a hotel in Columbus OH, I set the alarm for 0600. Imagine my surprise when it went off at 0525!
Wait. That wasn't the alarm, it was an amber alert for a loser Mom from Cleveland who killed her loser boyfriend and kidnapped their two kids. It was on the local TV news.
It seems most amber alerts are essentially domestics the end up with kids taken by one loser parent or the other. At home (Davenport IA) I can't say I've ever seen one that was a genuine stranger-danger kidnapping.
I disabled mine this morning, should have done it a long time ago.
September 11, 2018, 04:05 PM
V-TailFor iPhone users: Settings --> Notifications
Scroll down to the bottom of the page, the last section is "Government Alerts."
You can enable / disable AMBER Alerts and Emergency Alerts.
הרחפת שלי מלאה בצלופחים September 11, 2018, 04:11 PM
LS1 GTOWait until you and your wife each have a personal and a work phone and said alarms happen in intervals.
Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.
"If dogs don't go to Heaven, I want to go where they go" Will Rogers
September 11, 2018, 04:40 PM
egregore
September 12, 2018, 08:24 AM
Perceptionquote:
Originally posted by egregore:
I don't. I wouldn't mind them if they didn't go off at 0330 in the morning loud enough to wake the dead when a simple text message would suffice. I'm no more likely to look outside to notice anything when you wake my sleepy ass up than I am when I'm asleep.
The whole loud alarm probably does more harm than good, as most people turn them off as soon as possible, whereas they would still see them in the morning if they were quiet like other notifications.
"The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people."
"Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy."
"I did," said Ford, "it is."
"So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't the people get rid of the lizards?"
"It honestly doesn't occur to them. They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates the government they want."
"You mean they actually vote for the lizards."
"Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course."
"But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?"
"Because if they didn't vote for a lizard, then the wrong lizard might get in." September 12, 2018, 08:26 AM
henryazI've had them turned off on my phone since they first appeared a few years ago, and I got my first alert. Scared the crap out of me until I figured out what it was. Turned out to be a weather alert for the PHX area, specifically for an area about 90 miles from Wickenburg. Now I have an Apple Watch and you cannot disable them, even if you set it to "mirror my phone settings". The best I can do is set the Phone app on the watch to custom and disable the sound for alerts, but they still appear annoyingly on the screen, and stay there until you "dismiss" them. I hope Apple fixed this crap in a future OS release.
September 12, 2018, 09:46 AM
Jimbo54What bothers me about the alert system is that I get alerts from 3 states. Yeah, 3 states. I wish I could limit it to my immediate area. As it is now I usually don't pay any attention to them when I see they are from Idaho, Montana and western Washington. Geesh!!
I'm not going to disable it for now because it only occurs maybe 3-4 times a month.
Jim
________________________
"If you can't be a good example, then you'll have to be a horrible warning" -Catherine Aird
September 12, 2018, 12:06 PM
PASigI turned that crap off almost immediately after getting my first iPhone.
It's getting overdone and defeating the purpose of them, most people I would imagine are ignoring now or turning off.
September 12, 2018, 12:20 PM
bendablefor some reason I have gotten an amber alert and a stormy weather alert , both from Connecticut !
both while sleeping
Safety, Situational Awareness and proficiency.
Neck Ties, Hats and ammo brass, Never ,ever touch'em w/o asking first
September 12, 2018, 01:12 PM
gpbst3I got an amber alert from OH yesterday. It had no information and said to check my local news.
September 12, 2018, 02:10 PM
cheesegritsquote:
Originally posted by LS1 GTO:
Wait until you and your wife each have a personal and a work phone and said alarms happen in intervals.
I was at a gun show a couple of years ago when an amber alert went out. All those phones alarming at once seemed to unnerve a lot of folks. I'm sure the guys over at the Confederate memorabilia display were more than ready to take up arms.
September 12, 2018, 04:09 PM
KravasheraI don’t know about other phones, but on my iPhone 6 I have it set so that I get the alerts, but there is no sound or vibration if I have it on silent or do not disturb.
“You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having both at once.”
- Robert Heinlein September 14, 2018, 11:17 PM
CoolRich59quote:
Originally posted by Jimbo54:
What bothers me about the alert system is that I get alerts from 3 states. Yeah, 3 states. I wish I could limit it to my immediate area.
This. At first I thought: Wow, this is a great use of technology. Then I realized I was getting alerts from hundreds of miles away.
Yeah. I get it if it’s a radius of 20, 30, even 50 miles of the incident. But, the chance of a perp showing up on my street when the incident was 300 miles away is nuts.
Make these alerts relevant or everyone will ignore them.
_____________________________________________________________________
“Civilization is not inherited; it has to be learned and earned by each generation anew; if the transmission should be interrupted for one century, civilization would die, and we should be savages again." - Will Durant
September 15, 2018, 05:48 AM
V-Tailquote:
Originally posted by CoolRich59:
Yeah. I get it if it’s a radius of 20, 30, even 50 miles of the incident. But, the chance of a perp showing up on my street when the incident was 300 miles away is nuts.
Thinking about this. I wonder whether the selection of phones to receive these alerts is made on the basis of the phone owner's registered address, or is the selection based on current location, per GPS, tower triangulation, etc.
Do "burner" phones get these alerts?
הרחפת שלי מלאה בצלופחים September 15, 2018, 07:00 AM
henryazquote:
Originally posted by V-Tail:
Thinking about this. I wonder whether the selection of phones to receive these alerts is made on the basis of the phone owner's registered address, or is the selection based on current location, per GPS, tower triangulation, etc.
I believe they base it on the location of the phone switch/exchange. And they encompass too wide an area for my liking. Apparently the PHX area alerts encompass outlying areas, like Wickenburg to the north and Casa Grande to the south. The first, and only, alert I received was a severe weather alert for the Casa Grande area (some 110 mile south of me). It was for a severe dust storm (Haboob). Useless to me, and I turned them off right after that.
September 15, 2018, 07:37 AM
shovelheadI disabled Amber Alerts a long time ago. I did sign up for this one:http://www.nixle.com/
Specific city and or county, I get messages relevant to this area. I can get alerts across the town or the country as the alerts are telephone or email specific.
The Amber Alert, it's one thing if it was local. But one occurring fifty or more miles away issued at three A.M. is not going to make me want to get up and search my neighborhood. That is after I remove myself from the ceiling. I gave up quickly responding to "tones" when I turned in my Motorola Minitor in 1990.
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————————--Ignorance is a powerful tool if applied at the right time, even, usually, surpassing knowledge(E.J.Potter, A.K.A. The Michigan Madman)
September 15, 2018, 08:38 PM
sjtillAmber Alerts are like the Prop 65 Cancer Warning on everything in California. Talk about crying wolf! Of course people ignore it, and well they should or they couldn’t get on with their lives.
How about if the only have the Ambers sent out to phones that are moving—you know they could do that if they cared.
_________________________
“ What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.”— Lord Melbourne
September 15, 2018, 10:15 PM
egregorequote:
Originally posted by V-Tail:
Do "burner" phones get these alerts?
If you mean pay-as-you-go like TracFone, yes, they do.
September 17, 2018, 08:48 AM
snipesthanks for the heads up. Just turned them off ahead of the broadcast test from our fearless leader on Thursday.
September 18, 2018, 07:50 AM
Kskeltonquote:
Originally posted by Perception:
quote:
Originally posted by egregore:
I don't. I wouldn't mind them if they didn't go off at 0330 in the morning loud enough to wake the dead when a simple text message would suffice. I'm no more likely to look outside to notice anything when you wake my sleepy ass up than I am when I'm asleep.
The whole loud alarm probably does more harm than good, as most people turn them off as soon as possible, whereas they would still see them in the morning if they were quiet like other notifications.
I agree with the fact that if it wasn’t a crazy alarm it would be more useful. Here in Phoenix amber alerts are crazy loud and the weather alerts are ALWAYS dust storm warning. Of course there’s a dust storm warning... we live in the desert I don’t think we need this obnoxious alert to let us know it’s dusty outside.