Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Collecting Feedback From Dispatchers Receiving False 911 Calls From Skiers
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
My favorite roller coaster is over 4 minutes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beast_(roller_coaster)
Exactly. It just seems like a further waste of their time. I'm not sure Apple can fix this. I'm sure in time they can make it more accurate, but it seems like there will always be situations where it will be nearly impossible to distinguish between an actual crash and an activity.
If it works with an iPhone without an Apple Watch, I wonder if it is also triggered if the phone detects a crash without the owner being close to it.
My take is that Apple has tested this feature behind closed doors as much as they reasonably could. Now that the feature is out in the real world, they will get more data, and continue to iterate and improve on said feature. That’s simply the nature of tech.
Come to think of it, Google likes to boast about android sporting a similar feature, yet we have never seen reports of false reports coming from android handsets. Is Google’s implementation simply that much better, or are android users simply not using it due to a lack of awareness?
Either way, I see this as a happy problem. Apple will go on to refine said feature, while articles like this raise further awareness that their iOS devices sport it. Google can only resort to taking pot shots at Apple in order to fight for what limited mindshare is left.
I’ve had fall detection go off while I was skiing. Arguably I actually fell over, so it wasn’t exactly a “false detection”, but I didn’t know about it until my emergency contact called me back when I was at the café, because the watch was under clothing so I didn’t hear anything from it at the time.
Nothing, because you‘d had to turn off crash protection to stop it bugging you with false positives while you were skiing.
I am completely sceptical of new "features" these days. I think that features that reduce convenience began with Maps in iOS 6...
Simple fix, skiing/snowboarding/rollercoasters are all very distinct profiles of motion that can be detected and could have separate ways to respond for those modes. They could also have a thing that says 'if they get up and keep moving at a normal pace, don't do anything'. They could also allow you a larger grace period, it seems like 30-60 seconds would be 3-6x more time to respond and wouldn't be that detrimental to response time.
It seems this is just a matter of not testing enough as others have noted.
It seems this is just a matter of not testing enough as others have noted.
Apple loves to save money by using their user base as beta testers. No reason to have this feature on by default.
Skiing is an edge case. The crashes are usually okay, but not always. It’s very difficult to know if a crash is severe. Face smashing a tree and falling on to a snow bank is exactly the same. Don’t throw away the baby with bath water.
Just like Apple Watch may send you a high heart rate notification when you see a crush or getting really turned on while someone is going down on you. How would Apple know that’s actually safe? That’s challenging from the engineering stand point.
Nor do I recall it’s been reported that googles feature saved a life or resulted in a rescue either.
Probably like usual they must have a system to know if calls are in the same area for the same thing. There were people fighting in the street once. We called 911, but they said they already got calls.
If one of the worlds biggest and smartest and safest tech companies release a feature, but don't actually test it irl before releasing it, then they are not the biggest and smartest and safest tech company, they are a joke. And anyone here willing Apple to hurry up and fix it have jumped a step.
There is 100% no way Apple would not have known about this kind of issue because of something in the design process called 'Brainstorming'. It is a practice used by all design engineers/design teams during the design process of a product whereby the design team all get together in one meeting and throw out ideas/suggestions/thoughts as to what could go wrong with the product. Every and all is considered regardless of how ridculous the idea/suggestion/thought is and then one by one each idea/suggestion/thought is discussed at length to determine if it's valid or not. I've been involved in design process and thus seen it in action first hand.
The ONLY way skiing and rollercoasters would have not featured in crash detection is if someone senior in the decision making removed them from the results of 'Brainstorming'.
The ONLY way skiing and rollercoasters would have not featured in crash detection is if someone senior in the decision making removed them from the results of 'Brainstorming'.