How To Disable Amber Alerts On Your Smart Phone

On By John GrubbIn Android, iPhone, Smart phones

In this post, I’m going to share how to disable Amber Alerts on your smart phone. However, a word of caution: this is something you should do only on a temporary basis.

What Are Amber Alerts?

Although you probably already know the definition for “Amber Alert,” I’ll just reiterate it. An Amber Alert is an emergency message issued by a law enforcement organization whenever a child is abducted or in some kind of imminent danger. AMBER is actually an acronym for America’s Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response.

What you might not know is that “the AMBER Alert system is being used in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Indian country, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and 33 other countries. As of April 2021, 1,064 children have been successfully recovered through the AMBER Alert system.” (Reference: https://amberalert.ojp.gov/)

Amber Alerts and Smart Phones

When an Amber Alert is issued, it’s primarily broadcast via TV, radio, road signs and cell phones. If you’ve ever received an Amber Alert on your smart phone, you know it’s pretty difficult to ignore. Of course, law enforcement doesn’t want you to ignore it!

Why You Might Want To Disable Amber Alerts On Your Smart Phone

There are situations where receiving an Amber Alert on your phone might be disruptive. You could be in an important meeting that demanded your full attention. Or, you could be in church, synagogue or some other religious surrounding. In these and similar scenarios, you might want to disable Amber Alerts. However, as I mentioned above, this should only be for a temporary time period. If you disable Amber Alerts, be sure to enable them again.

Disabling Amber Alerts On An Android Phone

Here’s the procedure you need to know:

  1. Open the Android phone Settings.
  2. In the search field, search for wireless emergency alerts.
  3. If more than one result appears, choose the one labeled “Connections > More connection settings.”
  4. On the “Connections > More connections settings” window, tap “Wireless Emergency Alerts.”
  5. The next window will show you previous alerts. Skip those and, instead, click on the three vertical dots on the right.
  6. Choose Settings.
  7. At the top of the next window, tap Alert Types.
  8. On the Alert Types window, you can turn Amber Alerts On or Off. (Other alerts are there, too.)

Disabling Amber Alerts On An iPhone

Here’s the procedure you need to know:

  1. Open the iPhone Settings.
  2. Tap “Notifications.”
  3. Scroll down to the very bottom.
  4. Turn Amber Alerts On or Off. (Other alerts are there, too.)

Seeing Is Believing

If you’re more a visual person when it comes to instructions, here’s my YouTube video on how to disable Amber Alerts on a smart phone:

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