Item — HN Reader

Will it be possible to make an anonymous 911 call?

There can be scenarios, I think, where we (society) do not want to deter someone from reporting an emergency due to fear of being identified. Off the top of my head, consider a situation involving organized crime taking place, where call centre staff (or law enforcement) may be compelled to leak the identity of a witness.

8 comments

I don't think it's possible to make an anonymous 911 call unless you're using a public phone. I think this is ok, since 911 is specifically for emergencies and you generally want the police/EMS to know where you are immediately since seconds can count. I think of it a bit like implied consent in first aid: by calling 911 you are inherently consenting for your location to be shared since it is likely you are in some form of distress requiring that information.

You're mentioning things like organized crime reporting, which are not emergencies. In that case, I'd expect someone to talk to someone in the police department in person, or through an intermediary lawyer - not 911.

edit: added the implied consent thought

> You're mentioning things like organized crime reporting, which are not emergencies.

I may have been unclear but I said crime "taking place", implying crime in progress. I think any serious crime in progress (theft, assault, murder, etc.) deserves urgent attention, regardless of it being undertaken by mafia or gangs or amateurs or professionals.

There are also tip lines that you can call from payphones and such.

Buy a cheap phone with cash. Call 911.

Better yet, use the victim's phone if possible.

Hey dying person, whats your PIN code?

Every cell phone has a way to bypass the lock to call 911 or local equivalent emergency number. It'll even work if the phone line is disabled for some reason, or if the phone doesn't have a SIM.

I’m curious want the statistics are for this usage. Does anyone do this in practice?

I know.

They have an emergency mode for a reason...

If it is a 911 call then I would imagine the location of the call would always be required to help with the emergency services. I couldn't see that giving away a persons identity as you would naturally expect the 911 call to be the same proximity as the incident being reported.

For other types of reports where you have the luxury of calling from an alternative location, you might call the local police or other services rather than the national emergency number (or at least that is how the emergency services are designed to operate in the UK)

However if anonymity is your primary concern then you're much better off using a burner or pay phone rather than your primary handset - regardless of the number you choose to dial.

The scenario in your example is served by anonymous tip lines, not by 911. 911 is for immediate emergencies, usually involving imminent danger.

There's no such thing as an anonymous cellphone call. Period.

If you want to report organized crime that involves the upper echelons of power, don't use cellphones at all.

> There's no such thing as an anonymous cellphone call. Period.

I think that depends on which country you're in. In some places it's possible to buy a phone and SIM card with cash while wearing a baseball cap and hoody, and if you're prepared to pay huge pre-pay roaming charges you could use that phone in countries where it's not so easy to obtain a phone anonymously. Authorities will get a log of approximately where the phone was whenever it was switched on, so you'd only switch it on while calling from a crowded place. It's not perfect, but is it worse than restricting yourself to public telephones?

An anonymous 911 call is possible if the phone itself is anonymous.

911 will always get your phone number, to make call-backs possible.

Really how? Remember you don't need a number or SIM or service to call 911.

If you have no number, I'm sure they'll get some placeholder and callbacks won't work. They'll also get your approximate location if you're calling from a cell.

Some tip lines have anonymity policies. I think 911 generally isn't anonymous because of the abuse potential.

Burner phone?

Get one of those credit card-sized phones like AIEK just for 911? They should be able to call 911 even without SIM card.

Right, so that's not even remotely a plausible solution for the OPs senario.

Why not? Those phones can fit into a purse, they are really credit card-sized, don't look like phones at all, and 911 can anyway identify persons by their speech when they run them through any modern voice recognition system if they need to de-anonymize them.

Because the people who would be deterred from calling 911 to stay anonymous aren't the type to buy another phone expressly to call 911 anonymously.

What global db do you envision that has everyone's accurate voice print?

We should not be naive. The tech is already there, I don't expect such DBs won't be built as it's already doable. And accuracy can be improved as algorithms get better.