Who is really behind the UK Emergency Alerts system – and why you might have not got the alert

On Sunday 23rd April at 3pm, there was a national test of the UK’s new Emergency Alerts service. A number of people were left confused when they did not receive the alert on their mobile phone, and others question who is really behind the alerts.

Who is behind the alerts system

Many inaccurate posts have been shared on social media in the UK that indicate the company contracted to carry out the alerts is Fujitsu and Infosys, and this has caused many people to be angry at the UK Governments decision to use Fujitsu or Infosys for such contracts.

A few years ago the Fujitsu’s Horizon IT system caused the sub-postmasters of this country to be shamefully accused of things that they had not done. Some went to prison, some took their own lives and all those accused were humiliated in the eyes of their own communities. This contract is already costing the Government hundreds of millions, potentially more after providing compensation for those affected. Also the NHS terminated two contracts with it back in 2008-09, then Fujitsu sued the NHS for £700 million and did not settle for 10 years.

Documents studied by SystemTek show that the UK government has paid Fujitsu £1.6 million for the mobile alerts contract, which in the grand scheme of government contacts is very low. A cabinet office minister has stated “Fujitsu has had a small role in the development of the UK’s emergency alert system, initially providing a subject matter expert to support early development by DCMS.”

The test on Sunday was run in co-ordination with the major UK mobile networks, with technical assistance from Fujitsu. The test was performed using software from US firm Everbridge with alert messaging composed on the GOV.UK Notify system developed by the Cabinet Office.

The description of the contract between Fujitsu and the UK Government stats :

The Supplier will iterate and support the Emergency Alerts Service as it gets officially launched and used in a number of emergency scenarios. The Buyer will maintain overall accountability for the service. The Supplier will be responsible for all the technical delivery, design iterations and 24/7 operational support of the service. The Supplier will work as part of a blended Agile, multidisciplinary team with 2 permanent civil servants who will provide the strategic direction and will be responsible for the prioritisation decisions for the service. The blended team will report on delivery progress, risks and issues through established GDS governance processes.

For those who don’t understand contract wording the above means that Fujitsu are responsible for the technical aspects of the design, installation and support, they will also be on hand and working during the launch (testing) phase. The Buyer, the UK Government is responsible for the day-to-day use and operation of the service.

A Cabinet Office spokesperson acknowledged to the BBC that the alert did not reach some mobile phones, adding it “will be looking at this as part of our review of the test”. The department also said engineers had spotted a trend of phone functions failing to work afterwards, adding that officials were in the early stages of analysing the results of the trial run.

The Three Problem

Many people on the Three mobile network reported that they did not receive the alert, more than other mobile networks. A spokesperson for Three UK acknowledged the issue: “We’re aware that a number of customers have not received the test alert. We’re working closely with the government to understand why and ensure it doesn’t happen when the system is in use.”

The Infosys involvement

Many posts shared on social media indicate that a company called Infosys is involved in the alerts system, and this company is linked to the UK prime misters wife.

Infosys are known to have worked with Fujitsu on a few projects in the past, the company’s are not linked or part of each other as has been incorrectly reported on social media. We have so far not seen any evidence to suggest they are involved in the UK alert system. It is however common practice in the IT world to contact out certain aspects of a project to other company’s. Due to the complex nature of IT and Telecoms certain specialists are often required to work on certain aspects of a project, even a company the size of Fujitsu may not have specialist skills in all IT and Telecom areas.

Infosys is India’s second biggest IT company, that employs over 250,000 staff in offices around the world and was co-founded by Rishi Sunak’s father in law Narayana Murthy in 1981. Narayana Murthy is no longer involved in the direct management of Infosys, after resigning from a senior role in 2014. 

The UK prime minister’s wife, Akshata Murty is a minor shareholder of the company and she will receive nearly £6.7m in dividend payments from her shares in the technology company this summer, she owns a 0.94% stake in company, and has no management role.

Moving on to other reasons why many people did not get the alert Uswitch.com mobile expert, Catherine Hiley, provides her input on why people missed out on the alert and what we can expect from the emergency alert service in the future: 

“Millions of people across the country received the alert at 2.59 pm on Sunday, a minute earlier than expected. But a significant percentage of people did not receive the alert at all, due to network errors. Tweets shared highlighted concerns from Three customers, with a widespread failure from the network to transmit the alert. Smaller providers that use Three’s network, including SMARTY, iD Mobile, FreedomPop and Superdrug Mobile, were also said to be affected.

“It’s concerning to see that the alert failed to trigger across so many devices and entire mobile networks. But that is why these trials are so important. By highlighting network errors during the test alert, this should help to ensure teething issues are worked out ahead of time. 

“The alerts were designed to work on all 4G and 5G phone networks in the UK on Apple devices that are compatible with iOS 14.5 or later and on Android devices that are able to run Android 11 or later. But it appears that a number of mobile devices that fit the criteria failed to trigger the alert. 

“Unless you had changed your mobile’s setting to stop the alarms manually, your device should have only failed to trigger the alert if it was turned off, on airplane mode or connected to a 2G or 3G network. You should still have received the alert if your mobile was on silent and the alarm should have sounded regardless. 

How do emergency alerts work? 

“If there is an emergency, mobile phone towers in the surrounding region should broadcast an alert using 4G and 5G networks. The alert should be communicated to every compatible mobile phone or tablet in the tower’s range. It should come in the form of a text message, detailing the emergency and the actions people need to take.

“Once established, the government and emergency services will be able to raise alerts if there is ever a threat to life on a regional or national scale. This could include serious weather-related events, such as wildfires or flooding. 

Will there be another test of the emergency alert? 

“The national alert system has been more than a decade in the making, so it is likely that we will continue to see further developments over the next few months. Mobile phones that did not receive the nationwide emergency alert are also going to be part of a review into the trial of the alarm. 

“If you want to opt out of the alerts in the future, simply search for ’emergency alerts’ in your device’s settings and turn off ‘severe alerts’ and ‘extreme alerts’”.