Twitter Alerts Bring Vital Emergency Info, 70+ Organizations On Board

Twitter Alerts is a new feature that allows organizations to get out important information during emergencies.

Announced today, users can sign up to receive text messages or push notifications from special accounts who have tweeted an update using #alert.

So far, over 70 organizations are involved with most based in the United States, and you can check out the full list here.

Setting up Twitter Alerts is very simple, and if an organization is involved, you can simply go to their Twitter profile, and add “/alerts” to the URL.

For example, FEMA would be twitter.com/fema/alerts.

Press Enter, and you should now see a page that looks like the one pictured above.

Click the blue button that says “Activate Alerts from @organization,” and a page will load to enter in your mobile phone number.

If you do not want to receive alerts via text message, simply click “No phone? Skip this step.”

Now, any alerts from that organization will appear highlighted on your Twitter timeline, and if you have the official Twitter app for iOS or Android, you can receive them as push notifications.

To turn off Twitter Alerts, you can visit the organization’s alerts page again, and click the red button that says “Stop receiving Alerts from @organization.”