The Israeli App Red Alert Saves Lives—but It Just Might Drive You Nuts

Red Alert, which alerts users every time a rocket is fired into Israel, has already been downloaded 780,000 times. It could give you peace of mind. Or it could make you hysterical.

People here have adapted to a way of life that seems almost incomprehensible to those living in other parts of the world. They’ve swapped their leather work shoes for sneakers; those sharing shelters have learned to sleep in their clothes. Showers, which have always been rather short in this desert land, have  become even shorter—not so much to conserve water but to avoid having to encounter neighbors while wrapped in a towel. Worry has become as automatic a reflex as breathing in your sleep.

Red Alert, an app that goes off every time a rocket is fired into Israel. It’s quickly become one of the most popular applications in the country, with 780,000 downloads, most of them in the last week alone.

So Red Alert came as a relief to Chen Shitrit, whose mother died of a rocket attack in 2008 when she was driving home from a gym class and the siren sounded. Since she was on a major highway, there was nowhere to hide. The rocket landed nearby, and she died shortly afterward in the hospital. “I downloaded the app last week, as soon as the attacks began,” said Shitrit. “I’m not taking any chances.”

During 2012’s Operation Pillar of Defense, as Israel was being bombarded with hundreds of rockets every day, software developer Ari Sprung and his partner, Kobi Snir, worried that some in the affected areas wouldn’t be able to hear the newly established “Red Color” emergency sirens, created to warn residents of incoming rocket attacks. As a backup, they developed Red Alert, an app that sounds a warning siren on the user’s cellphone at the same time the real sirens go off.

“People were having a hard time,” said Sprung. “They couldn’t really sleep because they were too afraid they were going to miss the sirens. The app allows them to go to bed knowing the phone will wake them up in case of an emergency.”

Red Alert—which combines up-to-the-minute, real-time information from the Israel Defense Forces and Homefront Command,  the Israeli version of Homeland Security—gives people a 15- to 90-second warning, depending on their proximity to Gaza. And it has quickly become a lifesaver.The app also is proving to be a powerful alternative news source for people around the world who are growing tired of traditional media outlets such as CNN or Fox News and want to get a taste of life in Israel under rocket fire.

“When you get a ping every other minute, it really allows you to get a sense of control and awereness.  Perhaps the Israeli government just wants a piece of the app’s meteoric success—Homeland Command is coming out with its own version later this year, as is another Israeli startup company. Both could give Red Alert a run for its money.

The new government app not only would alert people of incoming rockets but also would give them information and instructions on what to do in case of emergency. Caught in one of the danger zones? One press of a button and the app will bring up driving directions to a safer location. “This is just the beginning,” said Saab Anwar, former IDF colonel and CEO of Licompass, a disaster management company. Anwar’s firm won the exclusive rights to a new government-sanctioned app called Raz106, which he says will be more accurate and more secure than Red Alert.