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Senate bill could bring emergency alerts to streaming services
You knew it was only a matter of time before legislators pressed for additional reforms to prevent another false missile alert like the one that rattled Hawaii. US Senators Brian Schatz and John Thune have introduced a bill, the READI Act (Reliable Emergency Alert Distribution Improvement), that would both reduce the chances of mistaken alerts and explore ways to bring those alerts to more people. It would "compel" FEMA to create best practices for emergency alert systems, encourage states to review their systems and create a false alert reporting method, but its most notable inclusion is the possibility of receiving alerts in more places -- including streaming services.
Hawaii officials fire officer who triggered false missile alarm
On January 13th, an officer of the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency (HI-EMA) triggered a missile alert that plunged residents statewide into temporary chaos before the alarm was called off as a mistake. While news emerged yesterday that the employee actually believed the attack was real after misinterpreting a message, and therefore didn't trip the alarm in error, that wasn't a good enough reason to panic the nation. The officer has been fired and the emergency management leader responsible for the agency, Vern Miyagi, has resigned.
Hawaii senator wants feds to handle future nuclear attack warnings
On January 13th, a statewide alert warned Hawaiians about an incoming nuclear attack -- which turned out to be a mistake caused by human error. Whoops! The resulting finger-pointing revealed serious shortcomings about the state government's disaster response, including the governor's difficulty logging in to his Twitter account to tweet out an all-clear. But US senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii doesn't think fixes are enough: He wants to take the responsibility for nuclear warnings away from local and state governments and give it to the feds alone.
Hawaii governor couldn't log in to Twitter after false missile alert
For most of us, forgetting a password means spending five minutes messing around with authentication emails and reset links. It's annoying, but it's not the end of the world. It was a different story for Hawaii governor David Ige earlier this month, though. After an employee at the state's Emergency Management Agency accidentally sent out a mass text warning of a "BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT", it took Ige 17 minutes to send out a reassuring tweet -- because he couldn't log in to Twitter.
