It is a tragedy what is unfolding in Ukraine and with millions of innocent people under attack from bombing they have had to rely on air strike alerts to get themselves to safety — wherever that may be. Now Google is rolling out their own Air Raid Alerts system for all Android phones in Ukraine to help Ukraine citizens get their alerts in enough time to get themselves to safety.
Using the low latency alerts system originally developed for earthquakes the new Air Raid Alerts system is supplemental to the alerts already provided by the Ukraine government. It uses the same trigger the Ukraine government uses for their air raid alerts to push immediate alerts to Android phones within Ukraine with the aim to get the alerts out to all Ukrainians.
This solution was implemented in quick time to bring yet more support from Google to the people of Ukraine. Google are also removing pro-Russian propaganda from their platforms with apps from Russian state-funded media such as RT and Sputnik already removed from Google Play. Searches for these within the EU will also result in no result for them as a consequence of the EU’s Council Regulation 2022/350. Google Ads have also been suspended in Russia along with a “vast majority” of Google’s commercial activities — Search, Gmail and YouTube are still operating in Russia.
With Ukraine under constant attack from Russia we can only hope that some of this pressure from Google and other companies and governments around the world brings this war to a swift and peaceful end. In the meantime hopefully Google’s new Android Air Raid Alerts system will keep more Ukrainians safe as it rolls out to all Android phones in the country over the “next few days.”
