In this article, I’ll show you how you can turn on emergency and government alerts on your iPhone when you may be in harm’s way. Doing so will enable you
to keep abreast of emergencies and warnings.
Your country, state or local authorities may issue various alerts in the event of an emergency such as a natural disaster. The aim of these officials is to issue
the public with life-saving information as fast as possible. Examples of these alerts include the following:
- Active shooter alerts.
- Presidential alerts.
- AMBER alerts (If a child goes missing).
- Alerts for extreme conditions such as storms and more.
- Public Safety Alerts.
- Other critical alerts.
If you want to, these warnings can be delivered straight to your iPhone. When you enable emergency and government alerts on your iPhone, you will receive these alerts on your iOS device. These alerts will resemble
a regular text message with a distinct sound (similar to an alarm) and vibration to differentiate from a text message.
When you enable this feature, there is no any sort of payment, there is no subscription and there is no need to download any app. Wireless carriers offer this service
free of charge. And you can turn it off if wanted, any time you want by following the steps below.
Emergency alerts
Follow these steps:
- Go to settings on your
iPhone. - TapNotifications.
- Scroll down until you see the Government Alerts section.
- There will be three options: “AMBER Alerts,” “Emergency Alerts,” and “Public Safety Alerts.” Turn on the one that you want.
Government alerts
So, you turn this on and you don’t know what to do when you receive an emergency message? It’s pretty easy. The alert will tell you what
to do. Follow the advice issued by the alert. Also consider contacting your local authorities.
Test alerts
There are also other alert types which are just tests. These messages will clearly read “test”. By default, this feature is turned off. However, if you want
to Turn on test alerts, simply follow these steps:
- Launch the phone app on your iPhone.
- Tap the Keypad tab on the bottom of the screen.
- Type in : *5005*25371#
- Tap the green phone icon. You will receive a message that says “test alerts enabled”:
If you receive too many test alerts, you may want to turn it off. To turn off test alerts, simply follow these steps
- Launch the Phone app on your iPhone.
- Tap the keypad tab and type in: *5005*25370#
- Tap the phone icon. Again you will get a message saying “test alerts disabled”.
It’s worth noting:
- When you turn on Do Not Disturb, emergency alerts won’t be silenced, unlike the other messages you may get.
- It’s not possible to customize the alert sounds.
- These alerts are specific to a particular geographical locations.
- These alerts will not interrupt your phone calls.
See also:
How to use iPhone notifications like a pro: no here