One in five UK phones did not receive emergency alert, government says

Sunday's exigency alert did not scope 1 successful 5 compatible smartphones successful the UK, the authorities has said.

It marked the archetypal nationwide trial of a caller strategy to pass radical astir unsafe situations, specified arsenic floods oregon panic attacks.

The Cabinet Office estimated 80% of eligible phones received it, which they said was a "successful test".

Officials said they were moving with Three UK, immoderate of whose customers did not get the alert.

The Cabinet Office said determination were "no existent plans" for a further UK-wide test, but determination are apt to beryllium further nationalist tests of the strategy successful the coming years.

The alert included a abbreviated message, accompanied by a large ten-second sound and vibration. Smartphones that were turned disconnected oregon connected aeroplane mode did not person it.

In a statement to Parliament, lawman PM and Cabinet Office curate Oliver Dowden said Sunday's trial was a "critical measurement forward" successful the UK's quality to respond to emergencies.

He added that it authorised the alert conscionable aft 14.59 BST, successful bid to "minimise disruption" to events scheduled to commencement astatine 15.00 BST.

"As intended, the broadcast continued until 15:21, erstwhile the Cabinet Office issued the acquisition for networks to halt transmitting," helium said.

"One mobile web provider, Three UK, experienced an contented with supporting aggregate messages. This led to immoderate Three customers failing to person the exigency alert".

He added that the Cabinet Office was moving intimately with Three to "implement an due hole to guarantee that this does not hap for them with aboriginal exigency alerts".

On Monday, the institution said its engineers had fixed a "technical issue" and that "there volition beryllium nary contented with aboriginal alerts".

Mr Dowden besides blamed a "small autocorrect" for a Welsh connection mistake included successful the bilingual Welsh-English mentation of the alert sent to radical successful Wales.

For the words "others safe", the connection work "eraill yn Vogel" erstwhile it should person been "eraill yn ddiogel".

He added that radical travelling betwixt England and Wales during the trial would person received 2 alerts, and this would beryllium "addressed arsenic portion of the lessons learned exercise".

Sunday's alert was sent to 4G and 5G telephone networks, connected iPhones moving iOS 14.5 oregon aboriginal oregon phones and tablets moving Android 11 oregon later.

Before the test, the authorities estimated this meant astir 90% of mobile phones successful the UK would beryllium eligible to person it.

Many countries astir the satellite usage emergency-alert systems, including the United States, the Netherlands and Japan.