Heads-up of seconds in Venezuela: How Android smartphones turned into a network of earthquake alerts system
Publish Date: 2026-06-26 01:19:00
Source Domain: www.hindustantimes.com
A Google official confirmed to HT that the company’s Android Earthquake Alerts System detected the initial seismic activity in Venezuela and sent warning notifications to users seconds before the earthquakes struck the South American country on Wednesday evening. The official did not specify how many users received the alerts.
People assist in taking down a wall during rescue efforts, in the aftermath of earthquakes in La Guaira, Venezuela (Reuters)
The system, built into most Android phones, has been used to detect and warn of earthquakes in dozens of countries since 2020. A peer-reviewed assessment of its performance, funded by Google and published in the journal Science, has found that it can detect and warn of earthquakes at a scale comparable to established national seismic networks. Here’s how the system works:
How an earthquake is detected
Android relies on two detection methods. In California, Oregon and Washington, Google partnered with the US ShakeAlert system, which uses a network of 1,675 ground sensors to determine an earthquake’s location and size before passing a signal to Android.
Elsewhere, the system is crowdsourced. Every smartphone has a tiny accelerometer that can sense vibrations. When a phone picks up movement that could indicate an earthquake, it sends a signal, along with an approximate location, to Google’s detection server.
The server pools data from many phones to confirm whether an earthquake is underway, effectively turning millions of Android devices worldwide into a giant network of makeshift seismometers.
Also read: Venezuela earthquakes: Rescue ops enter ‘dangerous’ phase & why Caracas got caught in crosshairs
Two kinds of alerts
Both alert types are sent only for earthquakes of magnitude 4.5 or above. A ‘Be Aware’ alert is issued to users expected to feel weak or light shaking. This behaves like a regular notification and respects volume, ‘do not disturb’ and other notification settings.
But a ‘Take Action’ alert is…
