Cell Phones as Toys (Rant/Plea)
 

Part of my job involves answering 911 calls. In the past three weeks, I've received calls from kids calling 911 on a cell phone just for fun. In one case, the kid tells his 2 year old sister to say hi or plays music. In another case a kid claims to be hit by a car. Thankfully, no one was hit by a car but it took some time to make that determination.

The one common thing in every case is that the kids are playing with a cell phone their parents gave to them as a toy after buying a new phone. An interesting thing about cell phones is that they can still dial 911 as long as they have power. Disconnected your service, it doesn't matter. Took out the sim card, it doesn't matter. The only way to prevent the phone from dialing 911 is to take off the battery. Better yet, don't give them the phone at all.

We have to investigate all reports of an emergency, even if we think it is a prank. The process of obtaining cell phone owner/caller information is complicated and ties up a 911 operator for at least 5-10 min. That is one less person to answer your real emergency. You may ask about caller id or cell phone tracking. While the reality is that most 911 centers in the U.S. are not yet equipped with the proper systems to track these types of calls, that really isn't the point. Even if we were able to track the call, we would still need to send an officer to the location of the call to determine if there is an emergency.

If you children have a real cell phone for a toy, please either take it away or remove the battery. If they absolutely need a phone that makes noise, buy a toy. There are plenty of cell phone toys out there.

I'm not so sure about that... If I had children and they were of phone-dialing age, I think I'd be very happy for the to be able to call 911 if they legitimately needed to. And, as their parent, it would be my job to ensure that they were responsible about it.

It's really not the phone's fault that there are brats who misuse vital public saftey services.

Who said it was the phone's fault? All f6twister is saying is to take the battery out of the cell phone if you're going to give it to your kid as a toy.

Huh...I did not know that. Not that my kids play with old cell phones, but it is useful to know that all a phone needs is a charged battery to be able to call 911. My guess is, not a lot of people do know this. I should imagine that if more did, less kids would get old cell phones to play with. Chalk that up as my one thing learned today, to keep the day from being a total loss. Thanks, f6twister.

I'm not against giving phones to kids in case of emergency when they are out playing etc etc...

But I tell you, if I had a cop come to my house because my kid made a prank call to 911, there would be one of those "teach them a lesson" spankings they wouldn't forget

Then I bet they'd only use it in an emergency.

There are several charity organizations that colllect old cell phones for that very purpose, to give to women who might be in less than perfect conditions to call 911 when they need it, or other folks who might be in less than ideal situations.

I can't imagine any parent giving their kid a cell phone to play with. Especially a young kid, who more than likely will use it as a teething implement.

My daughter plays with our old cell phone all the time... She likes to call us when we are at work. We took the battery out for exactly that reason.

That's exactly what people should be attempting to do with their old cell phones--donate them to charities who need them. They're a great thing for victims of domestic violence to have.

I think that kids having a phone to use in the case of an emergency may be a good idea; but only if it is explained to the child before hand what the phone is and isn't for. The child obviously wouldn't realise the harm that is caused by prank calls, so cannot really be blamed.
On the other hand, do children really need to be able to dial 911? A better option would probably be to call a parent or a friend of the family - of course in that situation you need a fully functioning phone, which is probably not an option.

Parents need to instruct children that calling 911 is a VERY serious matter and is not a number to be prank called. I don't think the problem is as much the old cell phones but parents not talking to their kids about this.