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SRA International, Inc. Strategy and Performance Group (formerly Touchstone Consulting Group)
This past January, AWARE posted an article summarizing our visits to the big four carriers’ (AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon) retail locations on the Upper East Side in New York City. This week, we visited some additional retail locations in New York City – this time in downtown Manhattan – to learn about the four carriers’ current efforts to inform customers about CMAS and how it relates to the carriers’ services and devices. Continue reading »
We recently had the opportunity to interview Mike Gerber of the National Weather Service (NWS) about the NWS’s plans for the Commercial Mobile Alert Service (CMAS), also known as Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA). As you may know, CMAS/WEA enables alert originators to send geographically targeted alert messages to mobile devices across the country, currently to a space as small as a county. Though local and state emergency management offices are able to originate alerts (and have been signing up with FEMA to do so), many expect the NWS to originate the vast majority of all CMAS messages sent, due to its role in alerts and warnings around weather events.
Following up to our November article about the initial wireless carrier announcements around the upcoming Commercial Mobile Alert Service (CMAS) launch, it looks like all four major carriers now sport information on their websites explaining the system and how it will work. Of note, it looks like the preferred term for the system is “Wireless Emergency Alerts” rather than CMAS, but most use both terms interchangeably. (The term “Personal Localized Alerting Network” or “PLAN” does not appear.)
AT&T
AT&T‘s website offers a guide to CMAS with several frequently asked questions.
Sprint
Sprint‘s website provides information about the overall CMAS system, as well as a link to the FEMA website. Their list of WEA supported handsets is included (as of 1/4/2012):
- Sanyo Inuendo
- Sanyo Vero
- Sanyo Milano
- HTC EVO 3D
- Samsung Galaxy SII 4G Touch
- LG Marque
- Kyocera DuraMax
- Kyocera Duracore
- Kyocera Brio
- Samsung Trender
- HTC EVO Design 4G
- Samsung Transform Ultra
T-Mobile
T-Mobile‘s website also provides a series of questions and answers about the WEA system, and a list of supported devices (as of 1/4/2012):
- LG DoublePlay™
- T-Mobile® myTouch®
- T-Mobile® myTouch® Q
- T-Mobile® myTouch® 4G
As an added flourish, T-Mobile has included a “CMAS” feature checkbox on its phone shopping page, so customers can compare CMAS support alongside other features they might be interested in such as QWERTY keyboards or 4G. Their website also includes the “Wireless Emergency Alert Capable” logo:
Verizon Wireless
Verizon Wireless‘s website includes a lengthy list of frequently asked questions, as well as a specific list of handsets that support Wireless Emergency Alerts (as of 1/4/2012):
- Droid 2 Global by Motorola
- Droid Pro by Motorola
- Droid X2 by Motorola
- Motorola Citrus™
- LG Cosmos™ 2
- LG Revere™
- LG Enlighten™
Their website also includes the “WEA Capable” logo like the T-Mobile website, and further states that this logo will appear on “Devices capable of receiving Wireless Emergency Alerts”.
