Reuters has a piece on mobile alerts, covering a system for checking identities for criminal records for police to alert systems for emergency situations at institutions to home alarm systems. This sort of thing is raised periodically, especially after a tragic event of some kind (“Until you have a crisis, the sense of urgency around doing something with it just isn’t there”, as the story notes)...the important thing is for the systems to be hard to imitate, so that people can be sure they’re getting a legitimate message. A couple of examples from the article:

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—“Honeywell recently upgraded a system used by schools to meet the needs of universities in alerting students to potential danger. The Instant Alert Plus technology can make 100,000 30-second phone calls and send 125,000 text messages within 15 minutes.”

—“InGrid, a company that has developed a Web-accessible home security system...[the] technology is based on wireless sensors placed at many points inside a home that are linked to both a handheld device and a password-protected Web site…The sensors provide real-time information not only on whether the house is safe from burglars, but whether children, parents or babysitters have entered the premises using their passcodes.” It can also be used to keep track of elderly relatives.