Researchers Find Increase In Accidental 911 Butt Dials

It used to be that back in the day when we had phones with physical keypads, accidentally dialing someone because you accidentally pressed their number while the phone was in your pocket was something that could happen. However with smartphones and need for your finger to press the actual numbers, you would think that butt dials would have gone down, right?

Oddly enough according to a recent study by Google (via NBC News), they actually found that there seems to be an increase in accidental 911 butt dials over the years. This is based on the Department of Emergency Management where they noted that a lot of calls were coded as “unknown” or “miscellaneous”, which usually translated into accidental dials.

Based on their estimations, it is suggested that about one in every five calls to emergency services could have been done by accident. Now you might think that it’s not a big deal, but emergency dispatchers claim that such calls are a big waste of time as they have to call back the number only to find out that there is nothing going on.

Previously we had reported that sometimes accidental calls are placed due to certain phone features, like how asking Siri to charge your phone will call 911. At the same time we have also heard stories of how butt dialing might have saved this person’s life. That being said, the FCC has since recommended users to lock their phones when not in use, or turn off 911 autodialing if your phone has such a feature.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Google, study