Wednesday, April 9th, 2008 -- The FCC wants to implement a new National Alert System, and it should be interesting to see how well the idea goes over with the major carriers, especially after the large amount of money spent on E911 systems, and the resulting fines that occured when target deadlines weren't met.
I personally think the idea of a national defense system is a good idea, my main concern is that the networks will crash when emergencies occur, like they did in New York when every citizen in the city tried to place a phone call at the same time, it appears that the system itself will require a buildout of current infrastructures that could be costly to carriers, yet many carriers have already opted in, including AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless, so it looks hopefully this early in talked.
I should probably explain the program. Here is a quick overview of how the emergency cellular network would work. Government agencies would be allowed to mass send text messages to Americans during emergency situations. The situations according to the FCC will be broken down into three crucial areas. The first type of cellular alert would be triggered by a disaster or attack that could injure Americans or threaten
their health; The second cellular alert would be sent during natural disasters such as earthquakes, hurricanes or tornadoes, while the third type of message would send out
Amber alerts or child abduction alerts.
It seems like a sound system, only time will tell how well it is implemented and how long that implementation will take.
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