Can't stop AMBER Alert from continually going off!

[Newtons Apple]

I turn off amber alerts long ago due to it going off in the middle of the night telling me I need to be looking for a tag number . . . While in bed!

Our government is so poor at administering anything. They have spent billions on the Emergency Broadcast System so we are alerted on our TV. What a joke it is. Most the time we get a few beeps and then no sound and no video description as to if it is a test or what. Next time the volume is over amplified to the point it is garbled and you can not here it.

Maybe they need to take the EBS finds and put it into a working cellphone emergency notification system that we can control the notifications.

 

[rugmankc]

First of all, this is a 4 year old thread. Second, if it's your job to follow people discreetly, you're pretty bad at it if you don't know how to properly silence your phone beforehand. The other scenario is probably not so likely either weighed against the likelihood of the alert helping to find a kid. In either case, this is why the alert can be turned off in the settings.

Again, new folks finding buried threads for their first post---

 

[Newtons Apple]

Some old threads are still useful.

 

[Thomas Veil]

Some old threads are still useful.

You can say that again. I searched for “Why do I get repeated Amber Alerts?” and this page came up.

It can’t have been fixed, because after having my iPhone for two years, when Amber Alerts we’re repeated only once (about an hour later), all of a sudden today I’ve been getting a blast every half hour—the same info over and over again. It’s not even info—just that an alert has been issued and to turn to local media for further information.

What’s weird is that everyone I know got this one, but so far I’m the only one who’s received it, like, twelve times in a six hour period and counting. I can’t keep my ringer turned off forever; restarting my phone doesn’t help; so I reluctantly had to turn off my Amber Alerts.

 

[B's iPhone]

I turned them off for similar reasons stated a few years ago. I don’t mean to sound insensitive but if I get hit with 20 messages while I’m asleep for an issue that’s close to a thousand miles away than my phone gets turned off. I’m no Hero. Anyone is free to shame me all they want but because of the poor setup of the amber alerts I turned mine off for good.

 

[Newtons Apple]

In the end I turned mine off.

 

[Steve686]

Anyone ever been in an airport when a local Amber Alert goes off? That is kind of an eerie feeling when you hear hundreds of phones alerting at the same time.

 

[JackieInCo]

Anyone ever been in an airport when a local Amber Alert goes off? That is kind of an eerie feeling when you hear hundreds of phones alerting at the same time.

I was at my job one night when this happened only it was a severe weather alert.

Last week, the city of Denver tested it their outdoor emergency alert sirens and it was also set to trigger the alert on everyone's phones if you were within the city. I have two carriers, T-Mobile and at&t and the alert went off on my at&t phone and although I'm located in Denver, I'm not in the county of Denver so it wasn't supposed to happen on my phones. I turned off all emergency alerts on my phone now.

 

[Steve686]

I was at my job one night when this happened only it was a severe weather alert.

Last week, the city of Denver tested it their outdoor emergency alert sirens and it was also set to trigger the alert on everyone's phones if you were within the city. I have two carriers, T-Mobile and at&t and the alert went off on my at&t phone and although I'm located in Denver, I'm not in the county of Denver so it wasn't supposed to happen on my phones. I turned off all emergency alerts on my phone now.

I thought about turning the alerts off. But, if I hear them all around me I'd rather know WTF is going on than trying to ask around. There should at least be differing levels of the alerts. National emergency would be continuous for X amount of time or until interrupted, of course. But the Amber Alerts could be a simple text tone with a message window onscreen that won't disappear until you acknowledge it...something along those lines that are set by the user.

 

[Newtons Apple]

I thought about turning the alerts off. But, if I hear them all around me I'd rather know WTF is going on than trying to ask around. There should at least be differing levels of the alerts. National emergency would be continuous for X amount of time or until interrupted, of course. But the Amber Alerts could be a simple text tone with a message window onscreen that won't disappear until you acknowledge it...something along those lines that are set by the user.

I was like you until in the middle of the night my iPhone went off and did it three times. That was the end for me. The system is good but run by our government, it will never be what it should be.

 

[Thomas Veil]

FWIW, when restarting my iPhone didn’t work, I was able to stop my repeated alerts by syncing my phone in iTunes.

We’ll see what happens the next time an alert is issued, though. If it starts repeating again, it’s going off for good.

 

[tbone7467]

To clarify some confusion:

Amber alerts will only go off once per situation, unless information is being updated. If you are in the LA area, you probably recently got a handful of them. Why? Because they were updating vehicle make/model/plates information as they got more. It might be the same abduction case, but as new, pertinent information becomes available it gets pushed as a "new" Amber alert. That is how it is supposed to work anyway.

The same goes for weather alerts by the way. Weather alert warnings always give an estimate by time, down t the minute. If/when that estimate is updated it is treated as a new alert. Those complaining that you are getting flood alerts while there is no flooding in your area really don't know how a flood works. It doesn't even need to be raining in YOUR area for a flood to come through. Weather alerts exist so that you can prepare yourself IF the need arises. The fact that there is a risk of flood does not mean there will be one. The fact that there is a risk of tornado does not mean one will touch down. Etc....

Not trying to trivialize the annoyance of an Amber/Weather alert waking you up while you sleep. And I am the first to say that the alert sound is something out of a horror movie. Just trying to explain why you likely got what you assumed was the same alert over and over again.

I think there is logic in your position. What I fail to see is how when I'm around others no one else gets the alerts over and over but me (an no they don't have the feature disabled). SO ANNOYING.... I asked AT&T about it and they were like just turn it off. I want to be aware I just don't need the same message over and over and over again. In 24hrs I've gotten same message 20x and 4 times in the last 30 min. which means now they are coming sooner and sooner

 

[Jpscloud]

I thought I was dreaming last night when my phone went off in the middle of the night and it was an AMBER alert. I silenced it and went back to sleep, only to be woken up two more times! It's continued to go off all day and won't stop... about once every couple hours. HOW DO I STOP IT?
There is no click/swipe action available when the alerts pop-up on my lock screen, and when I pull down notification center to view them, I can't click/swipe either. I now know I can turn-off all AMBER alerts in Settings, but I'd like to keep them active... just have them only go off once per "situation", and hopefully respect my silent hour settings as well. Is that too much to ask of Apple & ATT?

There's a setting within the emergency alerts app (after updating your phone) that says "alert reminder" which for me and this morning was set for every 2 minutes. So if you still want it to go off you can set it to once. I think you have to hit "ok" on the emergency for it to stop going off. And Do Not Disturb does not stop it from going of. Hope this helps someone.

 

[Rachelkk12]

Settings > Notifications > amber alerts off/on

Edit - I guess you can keep the phone on silent if you want to keep the alerts on but do not want the loud alert noise too.

Uhhh I did this and it doesn’t work I keep hearing the noise but the actual notification pop up isn’t there it only got rid of the notification pop up deal

 

[WilllliW]

To clarify some confusion:

Amber alerts will only go off once per situation, unless information is being updated. If you are in the LA area, you probably recently got a handful of them. Why? Because they were updating vehicle make/model/plates information as they got more. It might be the same abduction case, but as new, pertinent information becomes available it gets pushed as a "new" Amber alert. That is how it is supposed to work anyway.

The same goes for weather alerts by the way. Weather alert warnings always give an estimate by time, down t the minute. If/when that estimate is updated it is treated as a new alert. Those complaining that you are getting flood alerts while there is no flooding in your area really don't know how a flood works. It doesn't even need to be raining in YOUR area for a flood to come through. Weather alerts exist so that you can prepare yourself IF the need arises. The fact that there is a risk of flood does not mean there will be one. The fact that there is a risk of tornado does not mean one will touch down. Etc....

Not trying to trivialize the annoyance of an Amber/Weather alert waking you up while you sleep. And I am the first to say that the alert sound is something out of a horror movie. Just trying to explain why you likely got what you assumed was the same alert over and over again.

All the same, no updated info. I know how to turn them off. I don’t want to turn off the alerts totally as I see the benefit of them. But this non stop going off (especially when it’s not an info update) is going to drive more people it disable the alerts all together.