It would give an expected journey time, with automatic alerts sent to emergency contacts such as friends and family if the person fails to reach home by the given time.
This is great…but I am getting sick and tired of the onus being put on the public to be afraid, and to keep ourselves safe. 
Are the calls to 888 free? Or, is it a premium priced number
It hasn’t been released yet, but I should blinkin’ hope so! 
Imagine having no credit in your phone…eeek!
I don’t see where the “protection” comes in … 
Unless I’m mistaken, the alert goes out when, in the event of an “incident”, it’s already happened … 
Maybe the proposed 888 phone service is a start and the link below is the technology we could be facing in the future? It is said that what happens in America will be happening here in around 10 years:
Yes, great for giving a feeling of being safer but nothing beats the way there used to be police doing what they should be doing. That is being around ensuring people are safe, not just women but also men as violence on our streets seems to be getting worse year by year.
The problem of women not feeling protected, men also are being targeted in various ways, goes far deeper than this I beleive. It’s the way society has gone for many reasons and continues in this way. Maybe if those ‘in power’ looked at what ‘basics’ have changed in the last 20, 30 or 40 years they would find the answers.
If a person gets in trouble and dials 888, do three fat Ladies come and sort it out? 
Yet again - it presupposes that the world and his dog have mobile phones!
Nice one!
Only if the mobile phone signal is good enough to make that call though. Here in the ‘rural sticks’ mobile phones often cannot be used as there’s no signal or reception is very poor. The other day I was using someone’s broadband and the speed was only 12Mb/s and that was just five or six miles from a city of around 200,000 people. Talk about living in the Third World, thanks to BT.
No mobile phone, and living in the countryside? How dare you both! You should know by now, that in order to live and participate in a fully functioning society you need to live in a little box within boxes, and have your lives governed by a screen. Get yourselves sorted out the pair of you…jeez!
this comment was brought to you courtesy of sarcasm and lack of accompanying emjoi 
I couldn’t find an emoji for sarcasm either, useless technology!
I think you see the future being exactly the same as I do Pixie! 
This phone service may save a lives, and I hope it does, but what if it had been around when the murderer spoke to Sarah Everard. Would he have let her dial 888 in her phone & he would have had enough knowledge to ask for her phone till they got to the station… then dump it somewhere before he killed her elsewhere!
This problem would be better dealt with if they found reasons for all these violet crimes & stopped them before they happen.
Exactly Twink…
If a potential rapist or murderer now approaches a girl with a phone in her hand, the first thing they will do is take the phone & destroy it. Then if he rapes her & doesn’t kill her, just leaves her badly injured… how will she call for help to save her life?
No idea at all Twink…I mean, from what I understand, it only sends alerts for people who are on the way home. So if you don’t arrive home when expected…only then will things be actioned. By which time its clearly too late
Yes I definitely agree there, see my earlier post as outlined in bold text below.
Something has changed and I am sure many of our age group will have a very good idea of what this is, but does anyone listen if those comments are made? No, of course they don’t as there are far too many ‘do-gooders’ who will disagree for this or that reason. That does no good at all as the spiralling crimes just continue and still nobody sees what needs to be done!
Strangely, none of the press reports make any comment about that. There is also little information on how they will use the data this system will collect & if the system will work outside of cities.
As the current Police system has GPS & as that will obviously continue with the new mobile phone system. I wonder if they link that to the 888 system, so women know if the police officer in front of them is genuine? That would be a massive step forward in improving the Police image & womens confidence when talking to them.
Not sure what you mean by that? As in “on duty”?
The radio the police carry with them, whilst on duty & the Police owned mobile phones they use have GPS on them. So the guys in the control room can see who is where & thus even at what speed they are travelling at.
During a visit to my County Police HQ, with the Amateur Radio Emergency Network group. They showed us how they can bring up the mobile speed cameras, or the community officers for a specific area etc etc on a map. If that system was linked into 888, but with the option for some oficers, who are certain duties, to be blind to the system. It would enable someone who is confronted by an alleged officer to quickly & without a phone call, to check if the officer is genuine.
It is perfectly possible to make only those officers within 1000 meters show, like that even in rural areas, the police will show up on it. So as you drive home, if someone turns blue lights on whilst someone is driving on a dark & quiet rural road, a quick glance at the screen will show if it’s safe to stop or not.
As the 888 system will be GPS centred. It could very easily be designed to work with a mobile phones gps, route planning system. Imagine how reassuring it would be for women who drive after dark in rural areas. No street lights, no passers by & no knowing who owns those blue lights behind you.
Edited to add in rural area, mobile phone GPS is much less accurate than in rural areas. So in a city it may pinpoint your exact location. But in a rural area, it can be within many hundreds of meters.
Further edit. The officer who murdered Sarah Everard was a genuine officer, with a genuine warrant card. But he was not on duty & he would not have had a Police radio or mobile phone. By linking 888 to the police gps data, Sarah would have known something was wrong.
