Report: Apple Repair Center Inundating 911 With Calls

Emergency dispatchers in Elk Grove, Calif. accept been dealing with a troubling problem over the past several months: a inundation of erroneous emergency calls traced dorsum to a nearby Apple tree repair facility.

CBS Sacramento reported Thursday that Elk Grove Police take received effectually twenty erroneous calls from Apple tree devices at the facility every twenty-four hours, on average, since October. That adds up to around 1,600 false alarms, which are taking precious time abroad from real emergencies.

"We're able to encounter quickly where the call is coming from, so when we go one from Apple tree, the address will come up with their location," Constabulary Dispatcher Jamie Hudson told the news outlet. "The times when it's greatly impacting us is when we accept other emergencies happening and we may accept a dispatcher on some other 911 call that may take to put that call on hold to triage the incoming call."

In a statement to PCMag, an Apple tree spokesperson said the company is looking into the issue.

"We're enlightened of 911 calls originating from our Elk Grove repair and refurbishment facility," Apple tree's statement reads. "We take this seriously and we are working closely with local police force enforcement to investigate the cause and ensure this doesn't continue."

After answering, dispatchers can sometimes hear Apple tree employees working in the groundwork, unaware they are on the line with 911.

"It sounds like people talking most Apple, or devices, or mostly nearly maintenance and repairs," Sgt. Shaun Hampton with the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department told the news outlet.

At this point, it's unclear which Apple devices are placing and so many calls to emergency services, or why this is happening. As the study suggested, the problem could have something to practise with the Cupertino tech giant'south Emergency SOS feature, which can be activated on the iPhone 10 and 8 by pressing and holding the side button and 1 of the volume buttons. On iPhone vii and earlier models, you can call emergency services by simply pressing the side button 5 times. On Apple tree Watch Series three, this feature tin can be triggered past simply pressing and holding the side button.

About Angela Moscaritolo

Angela Moscaritolo

Angela Moscaritolo is PCMag's expert on fettle and smart dwelling house products. Instruction yoga for most ten years has helped her in evaluating a range of connected health products including fitness trackers, heart rate monitors, rowers, smart scales, stationary bikes, strength grooming machines, treadmills, and more than. Angela as well tests smart dwelling devices from her ranch in Florida, including air purifiers, kitchen appliances, and robot vacuums, just to name a few.