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Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

arstechnica.com

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Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#41

Post by jsnell »

kramerger wrote: post #10
topherPedersen wrote: post #6

I saw this happen to someone recently. Their phone was having other issues, so we were trying to reboot it, and Google changed which buttons you have to push to turn your phone off. You used to be able to just press the one button to turn the phone off, but now you have to press 2. So I think people might be pressing the power button a bunch of time now because they're trying to turn their phone off and don't realize…

Wait, Google is A/B testing the emergency dial? What the hell is wrong with these people? We are humans, not a data science project.

Neither the GP nor the article suggest there's an A/B test, you've made it up.

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#42

Post by notmyuserlogin »

It isn't just a problem with Android. I volunteer for a small fire department. We respond to about 500 calls a year. Since January I can think of three times the automatic crash detection on iOS devices has called us out by mistake. 1) A person left their phone on their car and it fell off. Being a small town one of the volunteers was able to find the owner and bring them the phone. 2) A gps location in the middle of a lake. The best we figure is one of the people on a jet ski or wake boarding. 3) Some people jumping on a trampoline.

Each of these means 2-6 volunteers responding from home to the station and then spending 30-60 minutes driving around in large trucks looking for non-existent emergencies. Each call also gets an ambulance staffed with career paramedics.

On the other hand someone's Apple watch did call us and we found he had fallen and gotten stuck down in some bushes and did need our help.

There is lots of promise, but also the tax payers are footing the bill for the false positives, not to mention the added risk to responders.

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#43

Post by soco »

sowbug wrote: post #11

Possibly related: I've noticed that when I'm in humid weather and I stick my phone into a damp pocket, it basically monkey-tests until I pull it back out again. Flashlight might be on, string of gibberish might be queued up on a text message, etc. I'm normally really good about locking the screen when I'm done, but something with fingerprint or face recognition or lock screen quick actions behaves poorly.

Don't believe it's only a phone thing. My Lenovo Thinkpad touchpad goes crazy as soon as my fingers are humid, be it from hand washing or sweating (hello, summertime). For some reason it will jump wildly around and also keep a mousedown event like forever then nothing will help: wiping it dry or crazy tapping or anything. Reboot it and it will work again - until the next wet touch.

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#44

Post by projektfu »

notmyuserlogin wrote: post #42

It isn't just a problem with Android. I volunteer for a small fire department. We respond to about 500 calls a year. Since January I can think of three times the automatic crash detection on iOS devices has called us out by mistake. 1) A person left their phone on their car and it fell off. Being a small town one of the volunteers was able to find the owner and bring them the phone. 2) A gps location in the middle of…

I have to register my building's alarm with the county and pay a fine after 3 false alarms, or not register and the police won't respond. I also pay an annual registration fee.

I wonder if too many "smart" false alarms will lead to similar regulation.

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#45

Post by kthejoker2 »

notmyuserlogin wrote: post #42

It isn't just a problem with Android. I volunteer for a small fire department. We respond to about 500 calls a year. Since January I can think of three times the automatic crash detection on iOS devices has called us out by mistake. 1) A person left their phone on their car and it fell off. Being a small town one of the volunteers was able to find the owner and bring them the phone. 2) A gps location in the middle of…

Are these false positive data points logged in a database?

Are your records shared or aggregated up to a central agency?

Wondeing how we might calculate the cost/benefit analysis.

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#47

Post by forky40 »

I have a Samsung S20 FE and the touchscreen will occasionally become unresponsive. The way I found out Android has a panic 911 call function was by fiddling with the power button trying to reset my phone. Then the 911 countdown started and I couldn't cancel it because the touchscreen was still unresponsive :(

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#48

Post by MishaalRahman »

danpalmer wrote: post #12

iPhones have exactly the same feature, activated in almost the same way, except that it requires one fewer interactions with the device to trigger, and yet, there's no reporting about this happening too much with iPhones, nor was there any when the feature came out a few years ago. Additionally, this doesn't seem to have been a problem when it rolled out on Pixel devices a year and a half ago, Pixels are certainly co…

Google made including the "emergency SOS" gesture a GMS requirement for Android 12 but left it up to OEMs to decide whether or not to enable it by default. I suspect this spike in emergency calls stems from a few factors:

1) Due to the general lag between Google pushing a new release out to AOSP and OEMs pushing out updates, many devices have only recently been updated to Android 12. OEMs with outsize market share pushing out updates will result in many more people - who probably don't know this gesture was added or how it's activated - accidentally triggering it.

2) Some OEMs may have flipped the switch in an OTA to turn the gesture from off by default to on by default.

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#49

Post by MishaalRahman »

kramerger wrote: post #10
topherPedersen wrote: post #6

I saw this happen to someone recently. Their phone was having other issues, so we were trying to reboot it, and Google changed which buttons you have to push to turn your phone off. You used to be able to just press the one button to turn the phone off, but now you have to press 2. So I think people might be pressing the power button a bunch of time now because they're trying to turn their phone off and don't realize…

Wait, Google is A/B testing the emergency dial? What the hell is wrong with these people? We are humans, not a data science project.

No, Google is not A/B testing the emergency dialer. What the previous commenter is referring to is a change in Android 12 where, by default, long-pressing the power button no longer brings up the power menu but rather the default Assistant app.

Not realizing that the way to bring up the power menu now is to either access it through Quick Settings or press the power + volume up buttons, the previous commenter's friend started pressing the power button multiple times. (Not blaming that friend, just summarizing what happened.)

Re: Android’s emergency call shortcut is flooding dispatchers with false calls

#50

Post by Terr_ »

krzyk wrote: post #35
sowbug wrote: post #11

Possibly related: I've noticed that when I'm in humid weather and I stick my phone into a damp pocket, it basically monkey-tests until I pull it back out again. Flashlight might be on, string of gibberish might be queued up on a text message, etc. I'm normally really good about locking the screen when I'm done, but something with fingerprint or face recognition or lock screen quick actions behaves poorly.

I have the same thing, I tried to disable all functions of my Pixel 4 that would do that. It amazes me that the simplest thing is not done here: if proximity sensor senses your screen is covered - do not enable the screen ever. When I'm jogging my phone sometimes sends texts, runs apps etc, same when I have phone in my pocket. Why don't they use proximity sensor?

> amazes me that the simplest thing is not done here: if proximity sensor senses your screen is covered - do not enable the screen ever.

The sensor is prone to false positives, such as when you have the phone in a waterproof pouch while hiking or boating.

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