Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#251

Post by Nilef » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 10:37 AM UTC

gregsadetsky wrote: post #93

This is an extraordinarily important and interesting “space” ripe for innovation. A few weeks ago, I was awarded one of the highest civilian public awards from the Commandant of the US Coast Guard in DC for my volunteer web mapping work during Harvey. That work helped coordinate 700 helicopter sorties and save 1700 lives. I’ve been thinking — and talking with Emergency Responders — about what an up to date 911 would…

Build software that integrates with popular 911 centre software; a local muncipality somewhere will trial it. Work with them to get it in the hands of the citizens there and let it grow out.

Simultaneously, get it in to small rescue outfits (For example, a 26 mile lake close to my home has a volunteer boat rescue service) for free and promote it around closed communities (Hillwalkers, climbers, or in my case, marina members) where it can easily spread.

Building the software upfront for 911 integration means when the big boys finally take notice, you're ready to get involved with them asap, before anyone else can

Its a risky upfront strategy but it helps with what others have discussed in this thread - When you need Apple to support you to integrate further with them, you're the one holding the cards and presenting an easier option than building out their own alternative.

Chew the world up one city at a time

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#252

Post by giancarlostoro » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 11:05 AM UTC

e40 wrote: post #109

VonGuard wrote: post #63

Oakland needs this help so badly. Call 911 on a cell in Oakland, and you're going to wait on hold for 30 minutes, most of which will be you being transfered to the wrong departments over and over. You start at a call center somewhere in middle America with a person who does not know where Oakland is. They pass you to CA CHP, who don't know Oakland either, because their dispatcher on the line is out of Sacramento. Fin…

Just FYI, if you are ever in Oakland and have trouble, DO NOT CALL 911. Call the police directly at 510-777-3333 I recommend that whatever city you are in, you have a shortcut to the police on your home screen (perhaps buried a little, so you don't accidentally butt dial it).

Is there some sort of app for this sorta thing? I mean with numbers of police departments by city... I often wonder, sometimes depending on the trouble its a little smarter to call the police station directly especially if you know you need police and not... an ambulance or fire department.

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#253

Post by josefresco » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 12:24 PM UTC

jonknee wrote: post #144

josefresco wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the data is only accessible to emergency calling centers This same argument is use to justify why we shouldn't allow encryption back doors. The reasons include: access will leak, law enforcement cannot be trusted. I don't see anything in this announcement that addresses those concerns.

The location is also only sent during the 911 call, so if you don't dial 911 your location isn't in the database and the security of the database doesn't matter, your location is "safe". https://info.rapidsos.com/blog/bringing-apple-device-locatio... > When this feature is made available later this year in an iOS software update, Apple phones will send fast and accurate device location to the NG911 Clearinghouse when…

My point was that despite policy/law, the arguments against back doors for encryption rely on the assumption that "the system" and those that control it cannot be trusted. So while it's great that Apple and others are telling us that the location is only shared when calling 911, critics of encryption backdoor would claim this "promise" is just that ... a promise. If good guys can access this data, that means bad guys can too (just like encryption backdoors!)

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#254

Post by nateberkopec » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 12:55 PM UTC

gregsadetsky wrote: post #93

This is an extraordinarily important and interesting “space” ripe for innovation. A few weeks ago, I was awarded one of the highest civilian public awards from the Commandant of the US Coast Guard in DC for my volunteer web mapping work during Harvey. That work helped coordinate 700 helicopter sorties and save 1700 lives. I’ve been thinking — and talking with Emergency Responders — about what an up to date 911 would…

FYI, most US SAR teams use websites which basically just call "getCurrentPosition()" to get GPS coordinates from lost subjects. i.e. they leave a voicemail/text subject with a link to a website, and they can push a button on that site to send coordinates from the Geolocation API to SAR.

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#255

Post by 4ad » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 1:27 PM UTC

macintux wrote: post #186

dwild wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What scare you? That by calling 911 you allow them to see and hear what you do? It's easy to extrapolate and use the "slippery slope" argument but that doesn't make sense here. It's an emergency, you are calling an emergency line. That line should have priority access to information while you are calling for help. Don't want any of that?... Well I guess don't call the emergency line... or whatever...

There are valid reasons to call the emergency line when you are not the one experiencing the emergency, and thus you don't wish your privacy to be compromised. I'm reminded a bit of the sanctuary city debate. Sanctuary cities are doing their best to let anyone call for help without worrying about whether immigration will be the first responders. Anyway, I think there's some excessive paranoia in this discussion, but…

In fact the only times I ever called 911 I was calling for someone else, and I wanted my identity protected. If 911 would have broadcasted my identity I would not have called.

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#256

Post by mseebach » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 1:30 PM UTC

It would be quite useful in a general sense to develop a technique to transfer modest amounts of data over a voice call - location, obviously for 911, but also for plenty of other applications where installing an app (never mind developing it) is overkill. Such a technology could also be used for automatically transferring reservation/membership numbers when calling customer service, or even enabling some kind of secure challenge/response for calling your bank.

I suppose it could work with some kind of low-speed acoustic modem combined with an "intents"-style protocol. You'd hear a short sequence of beeps, your phone would vibrate and show a dialog "Caller wants to know your GPS location", and when clicking OK, your phone would send back your location. In the other direction, when initiating a call with metadata, the receiving party would play a beep when ready (like a fax) and your phone would play off the metadata for the call -- this would basically be implemented like query string parameters on the phone number URL.

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#257

Post by falcolas » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 2:47 PM UTC

reaperducer wrote: post #132

VonGuard wrote: post #63

Oakland needs this help so badly. Call 911 on a cell in Oakland, and you're going to wait on hold for 30 minutes, most of which will be you being transfered to the wrong departments over and over. You start at a call center somewhere in middle America with a person who does not know where Oakland is. They pass you to CA CHP, who don't know Oakland either, because their dispatcher on the line is out of Sacramento. Fin…

Sadly, this is not unique to Oakland. Several of the cities I've lived in have been plagued with 911 hold times of 10-20 minutes or more. In one city, the mayor threatened to put a checklist on the ballot so people could decide which types of emergencies would be responded to, and the top vote-getters would be funded. In another, a city council member publicly told his constituents "the police are not here to protect…

> In another, a city council member publicly told his constituents "the police are not here to protect you. If you want to be safe, get a gun and a dog."

Well, they aren't there to protect you (at least not in the US). There is no protection requirement for police. Police are there to investigate crimes and catch criminals.

"The Supreme Court ruled [...] that the police did not have a constitutional duty to protect a person from harm, even a woman who had obtained a court-issued protective order against a violent husband [...]"

https://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/28/politics/justices-rule-po...

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#258

Post by frockington » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 4:25 PM UTC

VonGuard wrote: post #63

Oakland needs this help so badly. Call 911 on a cell in Oakland, and you're going to wait on hold for 30 minutes, most of which will be you being transfered to the wrong departments over and over. You start at a call center somewhere in middle America with a person who does not know where Oakland is. They pass you to CA CHP, who don't know Oakland either, because their dispatcher on the line is out of Sacramento. Fin…

Where does all of the money in California go? I live in a low tax "poor" state and have never had any issues with police/fire/ems answering promptly and arriving in time

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#259

Post by pxlpshr » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 4:58 PM UTC

gregsadetsky wrote: post #167

pxlpshr wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I built this about 6 years ago with Lloyd's of London as the underwriter for medical evacuation and search & rescue services. We were way to early for smartphone market, but the GEOS response team behind FindMeSpot.com can be contracted by anyone. http://www.geosworldwide.com/ The challenge for any private company is that the solution needs to be completely integrated into both the device and behavioral patterns need…

I absolutely agree that any new solution will need to be transparent / obvious / non-3rd party app based. While getting Apple and Google on board may seem like a tall order (I’m sure it is), both have implemented 112’s AML spec natively. Google is also driving this with their Android ELS efforts. Having emergency responders, and public opinion, on the side of this happening should convince both A and G to look into t…

https://info.rapidsos.com/blog/bringing-apple-device-locatio...

Re: Apple sets up iPhones to relay location for 911 calls

#260

Post by hawkesnest » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 5:13 PM UTC

e40 wrote: post #109

VonGuard wrote: post #63

Oakland needs this help so badly. Call 911 on a cell in Oakland, and you're going to wait on hold for 30 minutes, most of which will be you being transfered to the wrong departments over and over. You start at a call center somewhere in middle America with a person who does not know where Oakland is. They pass you to CA CHP, who don't know Oakland either, because their dispatcher on the line is out of Sacramento. Fin…

Just FYI, if you are ever in Oakland and have trouble, DO NOT CALL 911. Call the police directly at 510-777-3333 I recommend that whatever city you are in, you have a shortcut to the police on your home screen (perhaps buried a little, so you don't accidentally butt dial it).

I had an eye-opening experience with this. My android phone's home screen was locked, but somehow I managed to butt-dial emergency services. It wasn't until the police knocked on my door that I looked at my device to see what had happened. They were able to accurately find me at my house in an average suburban neighborhood. While I was pleased at the response, I was also quite embarrassed to have taken these folks away from more urgent matters.