by Sjors van den Dries
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sjors van den Dries joined PublicSonar in 2015 to lead commercial operations for PublicSonar. Promoted swiftly to Chief Operating Officer in 2019 and CEO since 2020, Sjors has been instrumental in the company’s rapid international growth, which now serves police, public safety bodies, security specialists, and those responsible for emergency response, transportation, and critical infrastructure.
AI-powered Social Media Intelligence for 911 Centers
PublicSonar and RapidSOS recently announced a partnership to bring real-time AI-powered social media intelligence to 911 Centers. We wanted to share our thoughts on why this is such a high-impact opportunity for emergency communication centers to improve situational awareness.
It’s Time to Incorporate Social Media into 911 Center Operations
NENA’s Standard for Social Media Emergency Requests aims to help Emergency Communication Centers (ECCs) establish standards for incorporating social media in their operations. These guidelines signal that 911 centers need to incorporate social media into their 911 operations today. And the reasons are clear.
Over 70 percent of adults in the U.S. use social media, and many use it to report high-risk situations. Often, these messages contain valuable information that could improve situational awareness. But sadly, much of this data never reach emergency services.
While NENA’s standard document provides a helpful overview, there is more opportunity for ECCs to leverage next-generation technologies to integrate social media monitoring to strengthen their emergency response capabilities.
Where to Start?
Attempting a home-grown solution to 911-related social monitoring could be a folly. You’re likely to suffer long set-up times, delays to see value, and swiftly fall behind rapidly shifting technology and regulatory changes.
You’re also likely to overwhelm 911 telecommunicators—causing information overload and inefficiency.
That’s where PublicSonar fits in and why our partnership with RapidSOS is so important.
What is PublicSonar Social Media Intelligence?
PublicSonar Social Media Intelligence is an online monitoring solution for incident and crisis management. Our partnership with RapidSOS connects 911 professionals with eyes on the scene.
We use artificial intelligence to identify social media messages from multiple channels that relate to 911-relevant incidents, events, and emergencies in your area. We plot relevant Tweets directly on the map within RapidSOS Portal, and telecommunicators can quickly click through and access other relevant social posts.
How PublicSonar Social Media Intelligence Can Help Your 911 Operations
When every second counts, you want every type of life-saving information at your fingertips. Social media posts from eyes-on-the-scene often contain valuable information that could help first responders better deal with emergencies.
But all the information in the world is useless if it overburdens 911 telecommunicators. You neither want them “drinking from a fire hose” nor “searching for a needle in a haystack.” This is where PublicSonar Social Media Intelligence excels. We strip out the noise to serve actionable, real-time, relevant social data in a way that telecommunicators can use.
Artificial Intelligence and Compliance are Built-In
PublicSonar was developed in collaboration with international public authorities and has real-time, compliant connections to numerous online data sources. Our search algorithms are programmed to recognize signals related to emergency situations and can be quickly tailored to your jurisdiction and the specific risks, incidents, and keywords you require.
Why did PublicSonar Become RapidSOS Ready?
Our partnership with RapidSOS strengthens our offer to ECCs. It guarantees seamless integration of our technology into the user experience trusted by over 5,200 public safety agencies.
That means fast set-up, fast time to value, and the scale to offer an extremely accessible price-point. Through RapidSOS, an innovative AI-powered social media intelligence platform is now within reach of all ECCs.
Visit www.rapidsos.com/publicsonar to see how Social Media Intelligence can enhance situational awareness, improve your emergency response, and save lives.
About PublicSonar
Social media intelligence for a safer world
PublicSonar’s mission is to put life-saving information at the fingertips of emergency services. We serve police, public safety bodies, security specialists, and those responsible for emergency response, transportation, and critical infrastructure. Since 2012, we’ve harnessed the latest advances in artificial intelligence to extract real-time information from social media and other public data sources. By instantly providing relevant data in the right context, we help emergency services reduce risks and save lives.
Learn more about PublicSonar at www.publicsonar.com.