This afternoon’s alarm test is slightly sinister

At 3 p.m. this afternoon, our phones will awaken with a screech announcing impending doom. It won’t be for real (unless a terror group decides it is an opportune moment to launch an attack) but an exercise in testing a new civil defence warning system – an updated version of the network of sirens used to warn of air raids during world war two and maintained until the 1990s.   

We should be worried about the long-term implications of the government seizing control of our mobile phones in order to spread emergency messages. True, were Vladimir Putin ever minded to fire one of his nuclear missiles at us it might be useful to be able to warn people about it (at least those who are at least two miles away from where it lands, there being little point otherwise). It might be useful, too, if emergency services were able to warn people in the vicinity of a terrorist on the rampage with a machine gun, or if serious flooding is expected – although it should never be assumed that everyone own a mobile phone or has it on them at all times.