Advanced Mobile Location

Widely implemented caller location for emergency services From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Advanced Mobile Location (AML) is a free-of-charge emergency location-based service (LBS) available on smartphones that, when a caller dials the local (in country) short dial emergency telephone number, sends the best available geolocation of the caller to a dedicated end-point, usually a Public Safety Answering Point, making the location of the caller available to emergency call takers in real-time. AML improves the time taken by emergency call takers to verify the location of callers and can improve the time taken to dispatch an emergency response.

AML is a protocol to transport data with SMS and/or HTTPS from the phone to the emergency call centre in all countries that have deployed AML; it is not an app and does not require any action from the caller.[1] AML is supported in many countries, and by all smartphones running recent versions of Android or iOS, although it can be disabled in user settings.[citation needed]

AML was standardised by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) Emergency Telecommunications Subcommittee (EMTEL)[2] in 2019 as Technical Specifications.[3]

History

AML was developed in the United Kingdom in 2014 by British Telecom, EE Limited, and HTC as a solution to problematic caller location in emergencies.[4] When a person in distress calls the emergency services with a smartphone where AML is enabled, the telephone automatically activates its location service to establish its position and sends this information to the emergency services via an SMS.[5] The services use either a global navigation satellite system or WiFi depending on which one is better at the given moment. It was estimated that this technique is up to 4000 times more accurate than the previously used system.[6]

Mobile phone support

Supported operating systems

Google announced in July 2016 that all Android phones running version 2.3.7, Gingerbread (released in December 2010) or later include AML. Google calls their implementation Emergency Location Service (ELS) or Android Emergency Location Service (AELS); this needs to be enabled in phone settings.[7]

Apple devices, since March 2018, running iOS 11.3 or later also support AML.[8]

Regional requirements

From March 2022 all smartphones sold in the EU Single Market must be equipped with AML, following a delegated regulation supplementing the Radio Equipment Directive.[9]

Geographical availability

Summarize
Perspective

As of October 2024 AML was deployed in:[10][11]

More information Country, Region ...
Country Region Operating SystemNote
 Australia Oceania [12]
 Austria Europe Android onlyNot all local emergency numbers supported; 112 supported
 Belgium 112, 1722, 1733 supported
 Brazil South America Android, iOS 190 (Police), 192 (SAMU) and 193 (Fire) supported[13]
 Bulgaria Europe
 Croatia
 Czechia Android, iOSWi-Fi supported
 Denmark
 Estonia Android, iOS, HarmonyOS, Jolla
 France
 Finland
 Germany Most PSAPs
 Greece
 Hungary
 Iceland
 Ireland
 Latvia
 Lithuania
 Mexico North America Android onlySome PSAPs
 Moldova Europe
 Montenegro Android only
 Netherlands Android, iOS, HarmonyOS
 North Macedonia
 New Zealand Oceania Android, iOS Known as Emergency Caller Location Information[14]
 Norway Europe
 Philippines Asia Android only Not all local emergency numbers supported; 911 supported[11]
 Portugal Europe
 Romania Android, iOS, HarmonyOS
 Slovakia Android, iOS, HarmonyOS
 Slovenia [15][16]
 Spain
 Sweden
 Switzerland Android, iOS, HarmonyOS
 United Arab Emirates Asia
 United Kingdom Europe
 United States North America Some PSAPs
(PSAPs) - Public Safety Answering Points
Close

The European Electronic Communications Code mandates that all EU states were required to implement AML by December 2020.[17]

AML also works when using emergency SMS service on Android phones in some countries.[18][better source needed]

Functionality

AML automatically turns on Wi-Fi and location services on the handset, collects and computes location data, then sends an SMS to the emergency services containing the caller's location, before turning location services and Wi-Fi off again.[1]

The service can also send the data via an HTTPS POST request to the specified endpoint. The country implementing AML decides whether to use an SMS endpoint or an HTTPS endpoint or both.

Integrating AML with emergency services' computer-aided dispatch (CAD) systems can be hard which has led to the development of other systems like What3Words.[19][better source needed]

References

Loading related searches...

Wikiwand - on

Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.