You might recall that last Wednesday your phone sounded a long, loud alarm courtesy of FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) which was testing the Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) and the Emergency Alert System (EAS) in the U.S. Before the test, there was concern that someone in an abusive relationship who owned a hidden phone that could be used to call authorities or to help them escape the abusive relationship, would have their device discovered and taken away from them.
Hopefully, the people in that unfortunate position were able to turn off their phones before the alarm sounded. The key was getting the right information about the test to those who would have been impacted.
But other people were not allowed to own a phone and when the alarm sounded, they were caught with what was considered to be contraband. These are the inmates in prison who might not have access to the latest information about government tests and thus were blindsided by the alert that came out of their hidden handsets on the afternoon of October 4th. A New York State Prison official told TMZ that two phones were confiscated at Sing Sing prison after the test. Likewise, two phones were snagged by prison officials at FCI Coleman Low in Florida.
BlackEnterprise.com spoke with the Federal Bureau of Prisons which commented, “The Federal Bureau of Prisons does not elaborate on specific internal security procedures for safety and security reasons.”
Another community affected by the alert was the Amish. The New York Post reports that some members of various Amish communities were shunned because the alert revealed that they owned some modern technology that they were not allowed to have. When shunned, a member of the Amish community is ostracized and isolated.
@yodertoter40 Several Amish men get shunned by the Amish church when the emergency alert system went off. Lol.
A TikTok video created by an ex-Amish community member named Eli Yoder explains how some of his buddies were shunned after being caught with smartphones that he had helped them obtain. “Over the few years, there’s been quite a few Amish men that reached out and wanted phones, so whenever they request to have a phone I’ll do everything I can to try to get them a phone.” Yoder added in the comments section for his TikTok video, “From now on, I guess I have to remember to give all my Amish buddies a heads up if there is a planned emergency alert test lol.”
