| Cult of Mac

Feds test nationwide emergency alert system today

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FEMA and the FCC will send Americans a pair of emergency alerts today.
FEMA and the FCC will send Americans a pair of emergency alerts today.
Photo: FEMA

Your iPhone could send out a pair of alerts this afternoon, but they aren’t ones you’ve set yourself. Instead, they’re from the U.S. government, and both are test messages.

The goal is to try out a pair of systems set up to notify the public of emergencies. Again, these are only tests.

iOS 12 automatically shares your location when you call 911

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iOS 12 911 calls
iOS 12 will help you get faster emergency services.
Photo: Apple

Apple is making it easier for iPhone users in the United States to be located by the emergency services with iOS 12.

When the update rolls out to everyone this fall, users will be able to automatically and securely share their location data with 911 first responders to help reduce emergency response times, Apple confirmed today.

Apple repair centers are accidentally calling 911 dozens of times a day

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Apple Watch Emergency SOS
Emergency SOS isn’t always useful.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Emergency responders in Elk Grove and Sacramento Country have received over 1,600 accidental 911 calls from Apple repair facilities in the past four months.

The calls waste valuable time and resources and potentially slow down the response to genuine emergencies. The problem seems to have been introduced by iOS 11, which added an Emergency SOS shortcut to iPhone and Apple Watch.

Apple urged to bring emergency location feature to iPhone

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iPhone 911
iPhone users are at risk without this feature.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Apple has been urged to bring an emergency location feature that could save countless lives to the iPhone.

Advanced Mobile Location (AML), a technology that allows the emergency services to more accurately locate a person in danger, was brought to Android over a year ago — but it still isn’t available in iOS.

iOS 10.2 brings Emergency SOS feature to iPhone

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iOS 10.2 can help you get out of a sticky situation.
Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Mac

Apple released its second iOS 10.2 beta this week, and while we all got excited for brand new emojis and the TV app, we missed an awesome new feature that’s even more important: Emergency SOS.

Adopted from Apple Watch, Emergency SOS lets you discreetly contact the police in an emergency.

Panic button app could save your life — or go terribly wrong

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WItness gets you help from your own emergency contacts when you need it most.
Photo: George Tinari/Cult of Mac

If you’re afraid of ever being in a dangerous situation without any witnesses or good samaritans nearby, you might want to consider downloading this new app appropriately named Witness. Calling itself the ‘panic button for the smartphone age,’ one tap broadcasts live video and your current location to a list of preset emergency contacts, who can then decide if it’s appropriate to take action.

Of course, if they do nothing, they could potentially have front-row seats to a very morbid and disturbing show.

Siri may have helped this 2-year-old girl save her mother’s life

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siri
Siri's usefulness has stood the test of time, but can 3D Touch?
Photo: Apple

Siri. You love her or hate her. For many of us, Siri is a novelty at best, and an inconvenience at worst: the annoying voice who starts asking you what you want from your back pocket when you accidentally sit on your iPhone. But for those who love Siri, she can be a lifesaver … literally. Because Siri may have just helped a 2-year-old save her mother’s life.

This Magic Script Recovers Your Lost Lightroom Photos

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Here’s a slightly obscure tip that’s worth sharing becasue it could literally save you from a lost photo library. If you use Lightroom, Adobe has a “secret” script you can download that extracts the JPG images from your previews. Why would you want to do this? Say you lose the hard drive with all your original RAW photos on it, or you just get drunk one night and wake up in the morning to find you deleted your Lightroom folder.

This script will rescue you.