Don't squander public trust on bullshit

Perceived misuse of alert systems

• Many see statewide “blue alerts” (injured officer) and Amber Alerts as misuse of a scarce, high-salience channel that should be reserved for immediate, life-threatening dangers to nearby people.
• Complaints focus on irrelevant geography (e.g., alerts hundreds of miles away), non-urgent content (custody disputes, missing elderly far away), and night-time alerts that wake entire regions.
• Some argue that even intra-family abductions can be traumatic and serious; others say this still doesn’t justify hijacking an emergency broadcast channel.

Consequences: alert fatigue and trust erosion

• Repeated low-value alerts lead many to disable all alerts entirely, even in tornado- or hurricane-prone areas, undermining genuine emergency response.
• Users describe strong annoyance, sleep disruption, and fear (thinking it’s war, nukes, or earthquakes) only to learn it’s minor or irrelevant.
• Several point out this is exactly how to squander public trust and create “cry wolf” conditions.

Design, policy, and liability issues

• Some participants think overuse is driven by liability/CYA: if something goes wrong, agencies want to show they “did everything.”
• Others blame underinvestment, lack of clear written criteria, and absence of accountability or feedback loops.
• Technical notes:
  • US system uses cell broadcast with severity levels (including non-disableable “presidential alerts”).
  • Some jurisdictions misuse top-level codes (e.g., for Amber Alerts), effectively forcing everyone to receive them.
  • Geofencing by tower or region exists but is often underused; some states (e.g., Texas, Illinois, Ontario) reportedly send alerts statewide.

UX and opt-out problems

• Alert UX is widely criticized: extremely loud, hard to silence without dismissing content, hidden logs, and coarse-grained on/off controls.
• People want finer controls: by type (weather vs. crime vs. child abduction), severity, and quiet hours.

International experiences

• Reports from Europe, Asia, Canada, and Australia vary:
  • Some countries use tightly localized, infrequent alerts and annual or monthly siren tests that remain trusted.
  • Others are already seeing overuse (e.g., frequent non-urgent alerts in Korea, bear SMS alerts in Romania, a controversial missile alert in Taiwan).

Broader themes

• Thread connects this to Goodhart’s law / tragedy-of-the-commons: any effective channel (alerts, email, SMS, reviews) gets spammed until it loses value.
• Parallel distrust extends to media, politicians, and even COVID policies and vaccines, with sharp disagreement over effectiveness vs. overreach and liability waivers.