dialed 911 on never-activated VZW Galaxy S3 and reached 911 dispatch 1500 miles away???

BuyOneGetFour

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Dec 5, 2012
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I have a never-activated VZW Galaxy S3 that I keep as a spare.(use my other line to upgrade for $0, but kept the old phone on the line)
There is no SIM card inside... in fact, it has never had a SIM card inside, since the day I received it brand-new from Best Buy.

Anyway, I use this S3 on wifi-only. Since I only have VOIP phones at home, I also use the S3 as a back-up phone to dial 911 in case of emergency.

My home VOIP phone had problems with 911 dialing configuration which took a couple of days to get sorted out. I made a test call to 911, after getting permission from the police dept.(they told me to do it between 3AM and 5AM and identify the call as non-emergency immediately) It went through to my local 911 dispatch.

I figured I should do the same with my Verizon Galaxy S3. So I dialed it a few minutes later(around 4AM). Imagine my surprise when I asked the lady which 911 I had reached. It was a small town I've never heard of.. in the middle of Texas. 1500 miles away from where I was calling from. I apologized and hung up. Well... there goes my hope of using this never-activated S3 as a back-up phone for dialing 911.

What I'm really concerned about is this... was the problem caused by Verizon Wireless, Samsung, or someone else? I have always believe that all cell phones are required to be able to reach the nearest 911 dispatch center, regardless of the activation status of the phone. (even if its ESN or IMEI is blacklisted) Or was I wrong?
 

jdk2

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Is GPS turned on? Maybe since it's never been activated, the phone needs to get some sort of lock on GPS in order to properly utilize the E911 part of the phone.
 

AxlMyk

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Is GPS turned on? Maybe since it's never been activated, the phone needs to get some sort of lock on GPS in order to properly utilize the E911 part of the phone.
Location info should be coming through the tower you are connected to. Strange that the call went that far.
 

hell_on_heels

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Oct 29, 2012
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I have a never-activated VZW Galaxy S3 that I keep as a spare.(use my other line to upgrade for $0, but kept the old phone on the line)
There is no SIM card inside... in fact, it has never had a SIM card inside, since the day I received it brand-new from Best Buy.

Anyway, I use this S3 on wifi-only. Since I only have VOIP phones at home, I also use the S3 as a back-up phone to dial 911 in case of emergency.

My home VOIP phone had problems with 911 dialing configuration which took a couple of days to get sorted out. I made a test call to 911, after getting permission from the police dept.(they told me to do it between 3AM and 5AM and identify the call as non-emergency immediately) It went through to my local 911 dispatch.

I figured I should do the same with my Verizon Galaxy S3. So I dialed it a few minutes later(around 4AM). Imagine my surprise when I asked the lady which 911 I had reached. It was a small town I've never heard of.. in the middle of Texas. 1500 miles away from where I was calling from. I apologized and hung up. Well... there goes my hope of using this never-activated S3 as a back-up phone for dialing 911.

What I'm really concerned about is this... was the problem caused by Verizon Wireless, Samsung, or someone else? I have always believe that all cell phones are required to be able to reach the nearest 911 dispatch center, regardless of the activation status of the phone. (even if its ESN or IMEI is blacklisted) Or was I wrong?

A lot of emergency calls now go to call centers, those calls are then dispatched to whatever town you live in. Ridiculous I know. I don't know why it went so far unless your call center was very busy or that's where your phone was shipped from and since it's not activated it just went by whatever state the ESN is registered to. Most phones are shipped to a large state, and then REshipped to other states, but they have to scan the barcode which registers the device n that state, it's for tracking, which also includes registering EVERY number connected to the device.....and u are correct, ALL cell phones whether activated or not, are required to allow emergency calls. Did u get the phone from a store or online? when the phone is activated at your store, it reregisters in your state, this is probably what has happened.

o_O WISHING I HAD WAITED AND GOT THE NOTE 2, ANYONE WANNA TRADE? o>_
 

worwig

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Dec 29, 2010
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Are you making the call via a WiFi app of some kind? that would make sense.
If you made the call with the normal VZW voice dialer over Verizon's towers, that doesn't make any sense. the cell tower obviously knows where you are.
 

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