Android adds support for sending accurate location to emergency services, live now in Europe
10 replies, posted
[QUOTE]While the FCC is still working on E911 in the US, European carriers are beginning to roll out an equivalent service to send your phone’s location to emergency services when you dial an emergency number. Google announced today that support for this possibly life-saving feature is already built into Android as part of Play Services.
Unlike landlines, smartphones do not provide an accurate location to emergency services even though over 70% of emergency calls are made on mobile phones. Cell tower location has a radius of several kilometers, while assisted GPS fails indoor. In its push to improve location accuracy, the FCC estimates that E911 response times could be reduced by a minute and save 10,000 lives annually.
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[URL="http://9to5google.com/2016/07/25/android-emergency-location-service-europe/"]Source[/URL]
[QUOTE=Morgen;50772666][URL="http://9to5google.com/2016/07/25/android-emergency-location-service-europe/"]Source[/URL][/QUOTE]
now watch apple add the exact same thing in a few months and call it revolutionary
It may also reduce prank calls made to emergency services.
Just FYI- E911 is completely embedded and operational. They're not still working on it other then tightening the accuracy. They're working on NG911.
This stuff won't come to the US until the FCC approves it for PSAPs. Then people will still argue it about privacy, etc.
[QUOTE=Sam Za Nemesis;50773053]Are you [B][I]really [/I][/B]going to push the pointless fanboy card with such a nice feature? It doesn't matter if they copy if because it would save lives
Also sucks that Google is putting it behind the Play Services wall instead of AOSP but it makes since if they want to push to existing devices[/QUOTE]
I fully support them implementing these features.
I don't want them running ads and pretending they invented it though.
[QUOTE=Sam Za Nemesis;50773053]Are you [B][I]really [/I][/B]going to push the pointless fanboy card with such a nice feature? It doesn't matter if they copy if because it would save lives
Also sucks that Google is putting it behind the Play Services wall instead of AOSP but it makes since if they want to push to existing devices[/QUOTE]
Why is it not part of AOSP?, this is a core feature, there's no justification to put it in play services.
Possibly depends on how it works? Perhaps it is using data from your Google account somehow.
But if it's simply reporting GPS coordinates, it should be part of AOSP.
[QUOTE=eirexe;50777054]Why is it not part of AOSP?, this is a core feature, there's no justification to put it in play services.[/QUOTE]
Think of it this way, if they added this feature to Android 6.0, about 9 months ago
[img]https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-1Sid8NGBbpM/V5dL9gSB0pI/AAAAAAAAOuo/4um9VZRMDoA/s0/2016-07-26_21-39-35.png[/img]
According to this, 86% of phones still won't have it
Meanwhile if they push the update in Google Play Services, 93% (According to an old keynote) of users would have it within a few weeks.
AOSP versions have extremly slow adoption rates because of carrier / OEM specific versions, forced obsolescence by manufacturers and people not wanting to update. Google Play Services meanwhile is immediately pushed out to every device regardless
[QUOTE=Slender|Man|;50772991]It may also reduce prank calls made to emergency services.[/QUOTE]
Or increase them by using GPS spoofing
[QUOTE=rndgenerator;50777211]Or increase them by using GPS spoofing[/QUOTE]
Which requires more effort than the average prankster will put out.
Operators will deal with prank calls the same way they always do.
Personally the idea of using my phone as a beacon is great. Always wanted the option to do that.
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