None of this should be happening without the user's knowledge and consent. Swap out your phone carrier for Facebook and it should be plainly obvious why the current state of affairs is undesirable.

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KellyCriterion 11 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I think this feature is required for emergency calls if your specific carrier is not available/in reach - in emergency mode after the phone is restarted, it does connect to any carrier when calling 911, not only yours?

	▲	wolvoleo 7 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		It does indeed. When making emergency calls a phone can switch carrier though generally it will only do so when the main carrier is unavailable or overloaded.
	▲	10 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		[deleted]

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MagicMoonlight 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What is it’s a mentally ill person who is about to kill themself?

That’s the majority of uses for the system in the UK. People love to run away and waste police time.

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iamnothere 12 hours ago | parent [-]

That’s not a good excuse for mass privacy violation.

	▲	hedora 8 hours ago \| parent [-]
		“A mentally ill person called 911 and said they were going to kill themselves” is a much better justification for pulling GPS data off a phone than any of the rationales I’ve heard from US companies or the government.

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cosmicgadget 14 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

You know about it because your regulatory body requires the system exist.

	▲	TheNewsIsHere 13 hours ago \| parent [-]
		And it’s typically disclosed in one way or another. Between buying a phone and reading the OS EULA to providing an E911 address to my carrier, I can count at least three disclosures of this feature. Nothing is secret or magic here.