New York City works with messaging service to start emergency alert pilot program

| 12.06.2007 | 09:19:589683 |

December 6 '07: EWeek.com reported a new voluntary locally-targeted pilot project in New York called Notify NYC being launched December 10 which will "give New Yorkers in the pilot communities' access to [emergency alert] information while serving as a proving ground for different technologies," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. New York-based Send Word Now will provide the digital messaging service.

Send Word Now's technology will provide messaging through email, telephony, and text messaging "to determine the best way to launch a city-wide program" the Notify NYC website said. The four pilot communities - Lower Manhattan, Northeast Bronx, The Rockaways, and Southwest Staten Island each will be targeted using different media, a city press release read.

Lower Manhattan and the Rockaways will test email and text messaging alerts "and the pilots for the Northeast Bronx and Southwest Staten Island will test email alerts and auto-dialing - also called reverse-911," Mayor Bloomberg's press release read.

On its website, Send Word Now said its SWN Alert Service was already being used by the Bank of New York, the United States Postal Service, Tiffany, Wal-Mart, United Network for Organ Sharing, AXA Financial, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and Palm. The company said its messaging technology could be "easily integrated into existing applications without changing operations processes," in hours.

New York City Assemble Speaker Sheldon Silver said in the mayor's press release that the recent Deutsche Bank fire showed the importance of "an effective and reliable notification system ... to notify the Lower Manhattan community of potential emergencies."