Go in, Stay in, Tune in: Terror Alerts by Text

Feb. 9, 2003
JASON ALLARDYCE AND BRIAN BRADY
jallardyce@scotlandonsunday.com

MILLIONS of Britons will discover they are under attack by bio-terrorists via a warning text message to their mobile phone, under controversial plans being considered by the government.

A message urging people to "go in, tune in, stay in" would be broadcast to the country’s 40 million mobile phone users because ministers fear many will be travelling when an anthrax or smallpox attack occurs.

Plans to sound sirens in the event of a terrorist attack are also under consideration in an echo of the four-minute warning of a nuclear attack planned during the Cold War.

The job of detecting an attack by anthrax, smallpox or other biological weapons could be done by adapting more than 100 pollution detectors, Scotland on Sunday can reveal.

If the attack is confirmed, warning would be given via ‘traditional’ methods such as sirens, loudspeaker vehicles and TV and radio stations.

But the National Steering Committee on Warning and Informing the Public (NSCWIP) is concerned that these methods will not reach enough people, including those who are travelling by car and do not have their radios on.

Using mobile phone text messages - instructing users to get indoors and tune into emergency television or radio broadcasts - is seen as an effective method of warning more people and saving more lives.

Cabinet Office sources have confirmed that ministers are taking the ideas "very seriously".

It is understood that, in exchange for financial compensation, the government would require networks such as Orange and Vodafone to allow the text messages to be sent to all their users.

Alternatively, those known to be close to the scene of an alert could be pinpointed using new location-based technology which is soon to be incorporated into ordinary mobile phones.

A spokesman for mobile phone operators O2 last night confirmed that the company was in negotiations with the government to provide an emergency messaging service.

"The technology does exist and we are speaking to the government at various levels about how it could best be used," the O2 spokesman said.

"If there was a major motorway accident, you could push these messages out to everyone on the roads around the area, alerting them to the dangers ahead.

"The technology will pick up where each mobile phone is in relation to the nearest base-station, so all the users in the area can be alerted.

"The technology has to be used sensibly in order that people don’t get bombarded with useless messages, but if it is information of national importance, there will be no opposition to it being used."

The plans were drawn up after the NSCWIP warned of public ignorance of how to respond to large-scale emergencies and "inadequate arrangements and inconsistencies in many areas".

The ambitious plans to tighten the nation’s defences against terrorism on the home front follow a similar move ordered by President George Bush.

US officials admitted that work has begun on a dramatic and costly programme to ensure many of their 4,000 environmental monitoring stations are equipped to identify deadly germs deliberately released into the air.

An exercise carried out in Washington estimated that one case of smallpox would claim 15,000 lives within two months and 80 million in a year.

But virology experts warn that although a direct attack would affect hundreds of people immediately, the authorities would not be alerted to the danger until the symptoms began to appear several days later.

The British stations, situated in major cities and towns including Edinburgh and Glasgow, produce hourly readings of the levels of pollutants such as carbon monoxide present in the atmosphere.

Officials from the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA), which operates the network, are now thrashing out plans in conjunction with the Scottish Executive to give the automatic monitors a more critical role.

Most of Britain’s emergency sirens - which were designed to give a four-minute warning of nuclear attack - were dismantled at the end of the Cold War. Ministers are considering the possibility of a full-scale national network of sirens once more, but costs could prove prohibitive.

The government’s approach so far has been backed by opposition politicians.

A Tory spokesman said: "Given the recent ricin finds in Britain and the genuine worries of the growing threat of world terrorism, it is right that all contingency plans are examined."

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