36 APRIL 2023 WorldWide Drilling Resource® False Alarms from Your Phone by Britt Storkson Owner, P2FlowLLC For some time now, we have been getting false alarms from fire and burglar alarm systems; in response, law enforcement agencies are fining or otherwise penalizing excessive false 911 calls. These fines are designed to discourage false alarms and reduce the staff time needed to deal with them. If this wasn’t bad enough, now we are getting false alarms from our phones. From a Fox News article entitled “Apple crash and fall tech inundating 911 dispatchers with automated calls,” we learn some Apple iPhones feature crash and fall detection and, if activated, will call a 911 dispatch for you - even if there isn’t a problem. This is one of those things like many in the world of computer automation where this would be a great feature if it works right, but it doesn’t always work right. Regarding the false alarm 911 calls, Summit County (Colorado) Sheriff Jaime FitzSimons told the publication, “we are seeing as many as 20 a day and it’s a tremendous drain on our resources.” When contacted about the issue, Apple spokespeople said they are aware of the problem and give the caller ten seconds to cancel the call. Even though false 911 calls from any source can be annoying at best and life-threatening at worst because it ties up resources and prevents them from giving legitimate 911 calls the attention they need, this system has been credited with saving several lives. Also according to Fox News, two people who crashed their car by driving it off the edge of a mountain road in California used this Apple feature to alert authorities and were rescued a short time later. How does this systemwork? The iPhone is equipped with one or more sensors called accelerometers, which measure G-forces on the iPhone and “report” the information back to the microprocessor by (in most cases) outputting a voltage representative of the G-forces measured. Just like any computer control system, the system is only as good as its sensors. If the sensors are not accurate enough or output flawed data, then all bets are off. Likewise, the system is only as good as the software monitoring accelerometer outputs, and if the software is flawed, we have problems as well. Or both could be a problem. In this case, the software developer needs to define what outputs of the accelerometer(s) constitutes a problem and what do not. Not an easy task, considering all conditions like temperature, humidity, dust, dirt, and even product aging which could alter the accelerometer output as well. Also, there are times where a satisfactory determination of what is or isn’t a problem just isn’t consistently possible no matter how good the sensors and software are.As I’ve stated before, computers must address every possible condition and some of those conditions are not possible to predict with any accuracy. In that case, I believe a computer should not be expected to deal with those scenarios. The playwright Oscar Wilde once said, “Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go.” This concept could apply with computer controls development, as often the product is better and easier to work with if some of the features would just go away. Britt Britt Storkson may be contacted via e-mail to michele@ worldwidedrillingresource.com
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