My cell phone rang. My first thought was that it was the test message leaking over, but it was just tax scammers with a robotic voice and a forged caller id threatening to arrest me over the phone.
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I won’t be surprised at all if Trump finds a way.
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I was thinking of hackers but Trump is not any better
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The task I do most on my phone is add phone numbers to my spam contact. This will be there as well.
Yeah, I know.
It’s actually a shame that Trump wasn’t a better actor back in the day. Maybe then he would’ve been content with the narcissism-feeding mirrors provided by show business.
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It’s not going to come from a particular phone number. It’ll probably look something like this (minus the French):
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You can always send out an alert that the Russians have launched their missiles and see how many get killed or kill themselves in the ensuing panic. As a terrorist attack it would be rather devastating. Sure, sensible people would double check with media, but not everyone is sensible.
Jeebus H. Christo people, CALM DOWN. It’s the cell phone version of the Emergency Broadcast System (if you have a TV and were alive anytime after 1990, you are probably aware of it.)
It’s a full nation-wide scale test to see if the system actually works, because to my knowledge, it’s never been tested before. IIRC, the original intent was to provide national-level alerts for things like the upcoming invasion of our reptilian overlords from the center of the earth.
Yes, the headline is absolute clickbait; that’s to be expected from the Boings anymore.
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From the CREDo article:
What can you do? Join us in protesting by turning off your phone during the alert and by sharing this message with your friends.
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That was exactly the analogy I was thinking of posting. Better to stress test the hardware and software involved during a time of (relative) quiet and fix the failures that occur before an actual emergency than to wait until they need it and find out it’s busted.
Besides, FEMA has a vested interest in making sure it can’t be used for anything other than an actual emergency (hurricane, tornado, earthquake, blizzard, terrorist attack, explosion caused by a problem with gas pipes, etc.) [Though now that I think about it, because of its local scope the gas explosion messages would probably have come from MEMA, the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency, rather than the Federal Emergency Management Agency.] If the ability to send these messages gets abused people will tune it out or block it permanently (the boy that cried wolf.)
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It’s important to test this service in case we find ourselves embroiled in a hot war or a climate change caused natural disaster. Scenarios that seems more likely under this administration.
Hmm. What sort of climate change caused natural disaster would pose sudden, imminent danger to everyone in the entire country? Danger that’s imminent enough to warrant alerting everyone to it this way?
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Our fearless leader’s current disaster plan is to have everyone send thoughts and prayers.
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- Jesus is back.
- Aliens have landed.
- Kiss your ass goodbye.
(Pick one or more.)
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and @RickMycroft
“I’m telling you folks, this tornado that’s coming is HUGE. We’re ALL gonna have to dive into our basements. Sharks and everything! Biggliest tornado ever, is what they’re telling me.”
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All at the same time!
Come to think of it, I guess a returning Jesus would indeed be classifiable as an alien.
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Something like the Underarm Incident, then?
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Imagine my son’s high school at 11:18am when hundreds and hundreds of cellphones all go off in the middle of class.
I told my kid to turn his off but he’s even more glued to it than most so I doubt he will.
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My Android is rooted. How can I disable this? Anyone know?
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They would never notice (or allow him in the country).
They wouldn’t want anyone to know that “Space Force” had failed to keep them out.
Probably. Though there wouldn’t be much point in telling everyone - they’d just clog up the roads on the way to the not-so-secret government bunkers.
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