NYC Will Be First to Launch Emergency SMS System
May 10, 2011, 11:05 AM by Eric M. Zeman
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg today announced that the nation's largest city will be the first to deploy an emergency alert system that will notify users of mobile phones in the city if/when there are emergencies. The initiative will be called PLAN — the Personal Localized Alerting Network — and it is a free service that will allow inhabitants of NYC to receive geographically-targeted, text-like messages alerting them of imminent threats to safety in their area. Bloomberg and the Federal Communications Commission said that the system will avoid the typical trappings of wireless networks, and will be able to push messages through despite network congestion to make sure alerts are distributed. This service will be available in New York City by the end of 2011. The system will be deployed nationally by the middle of 2012.
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