Trump administration to send U.S. cellphones a test alert on Thursday

 

U.S. President Donald Trump holds an Oval Office meeting on hurricane preparations as FEMA Administrator Brock Long points to the potential track of Hurricane Florence on a graphic at the White House in Washington, U.S., September 11, 2018. REUTERS/Leah Millis

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration will send a message to all U.S. cellphones on Thursday to test a previously unused alert system that aims to warn the public about national emergencies.

 

The messages will bear the headline "Presidential Alert", the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said in a statement this week. Phones will make a loud tone and have a special vibration, said FEMA, which will send the alert.

 

The test message, scheduled for 2:18 p.m. EDT on Thursday, will read: "THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed."

 

The test has been scheduled to ensure that the alert system would work in the event of a national emergency. U.S. cellphone users will not be able to opt out.

 

Former President Barack Obama signed a law in 2016 requiring FEMA to create a system allowing the president to send cellphone alerts regarding public safety emergencies.

 

Since the wireless emergency alert system began in 2012, it has issued over 36,000 alerts for situations such as missing children, extreme weather and natural disasters, but never a presidential directive. Cell phone users can opt out of natural disaster or missing children alerts.

 

FEMA said in a statement the alerts can only be used for national emergencies. The president has sole responsibility for determining when the national-level alerts are used.

 

In the event of widespread severe weather or another significant event on Sept. 20, the test will be pushed back to Oct. 3, FEMA said.

 

The administration announced in July that it would schedule the test alert for September. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its role in planning the test alert.

 

The administration will send a test alert via radio and television broadcasters two minutes after the cell phone alert. It will interrupt programming for about one minute, FEMA said.

 

Cell towers will broadcast the WEA test for approximately 30 minutes beginning at 2:18 p.m.

 

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission has approved new rules to ensure starting in 2019 that alerts are more precisely targeted, with links to photos or other important information.

 

There have been issues with prior state alerts.

 

In January, Hawaii issued a false alert of a missile attack that went uncorrected for 38 minutes after being transmitted to mobile phones and broadcast stations, causing widespread panic across the Pacific islands state.

 

In April, the FCC blamed that false alarm on human error and inadequate safeguards.

 

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2018-09-16

5 minutes ago, rooster59 said:

The messages will bear the headline "Presidential Alert", the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said in a statement this week. Phones will make a loud tone and have a special vibration, said FEMA, which will send the alert.

If only they had Orson Welles to send the message, in the style of War Of The Worlds. That would make it more interesting.

 

18 minutes ago, rooster59 said:

"Presidential Alert"

@#Stormy, I want the money back!

36,000 thousand alerts in 6 years!!!

Talk about the boy who cried wolf!

That's about 6,000 alert per year, or 16 per day!!!

 

So nobody cares anymore, and when the real bad news come, such as "Trump to replace the secret service by members of the KKK", people will be caught with their pants down!

 

Will the message also read "WITCH HUNT!"?

Sent from my RNE-L22 using Thailand Forum - Thaivisa mobile app

1 hour ago, Brunolem said:

36,000 thousand alerts in 6 years!!!

Talk about the boy who cried wolf!

That's about 6,000 alert per year, or 16 per day!!!

I assume those are localised alerts, with area covering a town or a city. That's not so much actually.

1 hour ago, rooster59 said:

The messages will bear the headline "Presidential Alert", the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said in a statement this week. Phones will make a loud tone and have a special vibration, said FEMA, which will send the alert.

Technically the headline is fine. It has been part of the phones features for ages in form of flash messages / cell broadcast messages. However I doubt the loud tone and special vibration options. 

 

That requires that all phones have embedded software / firmware which forces the phones to execute loud tones / special vibrations. Perhaps it's part of the specs.

 

Trump is likely to broadcast a FAKE alert pre mid term election warning voters that if the Republicans lose the House and Senate, the stock market will promptly crash, the sky will fall in because "your favourite president" will have lost power and may be impeached. And he will sign off with a message of "No Collusion".

Quote

FEMA said in a statement the alerts can only be used for national emergencies. The president has sole responsibility for determining when the national-level alerts are used.

Given Trump's record of distorting the meaning of "national security" to impose unconstitutional bans on immigration and tariffs, we can expect "national emergencies" to include "Hillary is a crook", "Obama is a Nigerian Muslim" and "get me a diet coke".

2 hours ago, rooster59 said:

Phones will make a loud tone and have a special vibration, said FEMA, which will send the alert.

How about this one:

 

Hopefully, the networks don't crash?

 

And some 400-pound guy in his basement doesn't figure out how to hack this capability.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not seeing a huge need for this capability given the instantaneous nature of today's communication networks, social media, the internet, etc?

 

What natural disaster will need to be instantaneously communicated to the entire country?

3 minutes ago, mtls2005 said:

What natural disaster will need to be instantaneously communicated to the entire country?

Trump was reelected.

 

Maybe a "Made in America" coup.  Oh, wait, that is not a "natural disaster".

18 minutes ago, zaphod reborn said:

"get me a diet coke"

Oh my, this got me! ?

 

2 hours ago, bluesofa said:

Phones will make a loud tone and have a special vibration

Now he's sending loud tones "moans?" and "special vibrations" by cell phone!

And when they do, US cell phone subscribers should form a class-action suit against the orange brat for unsolicited messages a.k.a. spamming

34 minutes ago, wayned said:

Now he's sending loud tones "moans?" and "special vibrations" by cell phone!

 

Gotta give the man-child some credit, he's definitively progressed from the simple and crude p***y grabbing!

This Presidential alert technology has already been in place as I have been using it for well over a year. It is a dreaded warning which appears on your phone requiring you to scramble ahead of all others to protect yourself and your assets before becoming obliterated in the resulting mayhem.  It is called a 'Trump Tweet'. 

I think it'll just be a message from Melania

....."Help Me"

This is so "trump." He wants every American to be thinking about him 24/7. He's largely succeeded. That's what dictators do. 

8 hours ago, Brunolem said:

"Trump to replace the secret service by members of the KKK", people will be caught with their pants down!

 

That has to wait until his next dream.

8 hours ago, DM07 said:

Will the message also read "WITCH HUNT!"?

Sent from my RNE-L22 using Thailand Forum - Thaivisa mobile app
 

No collusion 

Keep in mind in his demented POV he himself is the nation. So when he is in peril, the nation is in peril. As things get worse for him, don't be totally shocked if he uses this system to mobilize people to defend him in extrajudicial ways. Of course, he probably won't ever do that, but this "test" is a way to inform people that he has such powers. 

Gotta be a joke somewhere in there about the Beach Boys, but I'll buggered if I can think of one.

 

At which time all phones for registered democrats will have a different special vibration causing a mental reset back to sanity and cause a nationwide switch from a democrat to the republican party.

34 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

Keep in mind in his demented POV he himself is the nation. So when he is in peril, the nation is in peril. As things get worse for him, don't be totally shocked if he uses this system to mobilize people to defend him in extrajudicial ways. Of course, he probably won't ever do that, but this "test" is a way to inform people that he has such powers. 

 

It's amazing to me how an ordinary news story about testing the emergency alert system turns into the usual childish Trump bashing. He is so in people's heads it's amazing. I'd rather focus on Parmesan cheese and Thai girls feet.

 

However, I am interested in seeing what my US number cell phone does over here. So I welcome the alert. 

Don’t see how it will help Donald he can’t have a cell phone in Leavenworth 

3 hours ago, GinBoy2 said:

I think it'll just be a message from Melania

....."Help Me"

Or Melania looking for some "Good Vibrations" (title of Beach Boys song).

Given that the message will be coming from Trump, will anyone believe it?