It really makes no sense to use it for emergency calls. 999/911 can already access your location by GPS.
I think the issue is that other less emergency numbers can't (like 101). That's why they tell you to hang up and call 999 rather than transferring you.
But I don't know why they just don't add more numbers to the "allowed to geolocate you" list. Or even build in a "send my location" button in phone calls. You wouldn't even need to modify the phone system - it could send DTFM tones.
Really GPS on the device or just tower trangulation data? Is there information availae on how this works?
In Austria emergency services can not access GPS directly afaik.
Note that GPS can be often unreliable or not precise enough. For example, it would be pretty useful to specify correct side of river/road/railway. Arriving at wrong side may result in needing to do very long detour.
> Note that GPS can be often unreliable or not precise enough.
But the W3W app identifies your position by GPS, meaning it is subject to the same general reliability problem via inheritance. Yes, it displays a map as well, so you can identify that you need to quote a different square, but in an emergency situation I'd posit that people are more likely to just read off the words and not really take in the displayed map. And the same solution works for GPS alone anyway – if you are reading your position using a phone app it is likely displaying an approximate map also.
