AT&T Announces Wireless Emergency Alerts-Giant Battery Drain?

Thanks for the link. My wife and I have a 3GS with iOS 6.1.3 so the screen shot in the provided link does not match the Settings->Notifications->Government Alerts Turn on and off on my phone. Guess this will not apply to iPhones prior to 4S?

How did you check the data being sent?

You can turn off Governmenet Alerts except Presidential Alerts. What's a Presidential Alert? Barry declaring Marital Law? LOL. Barry has to push his propoganda to the sheeple through their Obama phones. Suckers vote.

What is the model number of your iPhone?

What have you tried so far to remedy the situation?

Your phone was pushing "little chunks of data" from the day you got it. This has nothing to do with the carrier update.

I've seen no such problems on our iPhone 5's that have received the update from AT&T. Why don't you check the location services settings to see what's keeping them active? it's most likely NOT the update you got. AT&T has no need to track the location using location services. Location specific alerts are sent to any devices connected to the cell towers in the affected area. It does not use location services at all.

Model number is MC640LL/A

I was curious about the message because it did not look like the standard update from Apple. I called AT&T technical suppot and they said Apple pushed something to my phone. I was skeptical of that claim given AT&T's enabling role in the NSA's spying on Americans. I saw the link above and see this is something the carriers are required to do by law. AT&T pushed the update to my phone because it had 6.1.3 even though the device does not support that feature according to Apple and AT&T.

I gave AT&T tech support very low scores. Tried to blame it on Apple.

I was actually responding to trebber requesting the model number.

Here is official information about WEA: http://www.fcc.gov/guides/wireless-emergency-alerts-wea

AT&T had Apple push the carrier update to all phones to keep the settings the same but only WEA capable phones, for our purposes the 4s and 5, are WEA compatible.

If you do just a bit of searching you will discover AT&T was the only cell provider to go to court and try to prevent access to metadata.

I just got my first Emergency Alert. Quite distinctive sound. It was a local Flash Flood Warning. I've subscribed to these via text; it's nice to get them without having to pay for texts.

Then look at the location services settings and see what's keeping it active. It is NOT because of the update.

Have you Reset your iphone?

Restored it from backup?

@deggie

My beef with AT&T's technical support was lack of knowledge on asking Apple to push their updates to all phones, even devices that both Apple and AT&T state are not supported. Apple and AT&T state that iPhone 3GS does not support this update. I've found that to be the case even after the updates were pushed to my phone.

I have kept an eye on battery discharge while the iPhone has been sitting on my desk. It's gone from 79% around 8:00 a.m. EST to 51% by 3:00 p.m. EST. I have no idea if this is excessive drain on the battery as I usually have mine plugged in all day while in use.

I haven't noticed a change in battery life yet. But it's only been a day and a half. since the update.