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Official warning apps: The urgency of the warning did not reach all recipients
Photo: Jens Kalaene / dpa-Zentralbild
The high number of victims in the flood disaster fueled the discussion about the previous alarm system: In addition to the installation of sirens, more and more politicians are now calling for the introduction of so-called "cell broadcasting", in which warnings are sent directly from the mobile phone providers to all devices within reception range .
The Federal Office for Civil Protection and Disaster Aid (BBK) has the introduction of such a system examined, as the President of the authorities Armin Schuster told the newspapers of the editorial network Germany (RND) on Tuesday. "My goal is to use a feasibility study to determine whether the introduction of cell broadcasting is sensible and feasible." A result can be expected in the fall.
The system also receives support from the government as a supplement to emergency apps such as NINA or Katwarn. Chancellor Angela Merkel was open to the introduction of the system. FDP leader Christian Lindner is also calling for the population to be warned via text messages after the storm disaster. »In the future we will have to deal with many of the consequences of global climate change - and we have to prepare for them. This includes a low-threshold and digital early warning system, «Lindner told the newspapers of the Funke media group.
The start-up investments are estimated at between 20 and 40 million euros. Federal Transport Minister Andreas Scheuer (CSU) supported the introduction of cell broadcasting. "I am in favor of us also sending these push messages to citizens via the mobile phone providers," he said on the broadcast "Bild live". "But that always failed because the political will was missing in some places." So far, the sending of warning SMS directly to the citizens has failed due to data protection.
But there is actually no problem here: In contrast to SMS, with cell broadcasting the text messages are sent to all recipients of a radio cell at the same time.
The citizens warned in this way only receive data, but do not send any data back themselves.
This also prevents the radio cells from being overloaded.
The technology is already supported by most modern cell phones and is used in other countries such as the Netherlands, Japan and the USA.
tmk / dpa