Amber Alert Wakeup Call in New York

By Jeff Deminski

Imagine you've worked a long shift. Imagine you have to get up again in a few hours. Now imagine at 4:00 AM, your smartphone goes off scaring the hell out of you. Has it been a tragedy in your family? No.

You're in the state of New York where they've joined the National Wireless Emergency Alert System unbeknownst to you and they're sending you an Amber Alert about a baby boy who had been snatched from a child-welfare agency in Harlem. The system allows agencies to send emergency notifications to newer model smartphones in specific areas. Like it or not.

The 7 month old baby boy who was the subject of the Amber Alert was found safely by the way. His mother, with a troubled history, had lost custody of him and was having a supervised visit with him at the welfare center when apparently the supervision was a miserable failure and she slipped out of the building with the child.

I'm a parent. I love kids. I get it. But the vast majority of people receiving a 4:00 AM Amber Alert will be asleep in their homes and utterly useless in any search.