Odds are someone within your force is using a consumer communication app—WhatsApp, iMessage, SMS, Facebook Messenger—whether or not you know it. The list of convenient and familiar messaging apps is nearly as endless as the apps are problematic. When record retention and schedules can cost municipalities like yours hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines each year, you can’t afford to be unsure if your force is compliant. Genasys Protect CONNECT, formerly Evertel, reimagines and reinvents a First Responder Communications App—the first app of its kind—that guarantees FOIA compliance and clear, instantaneous communication for your agency.
Worst Communication Compliance Risks
First responders have a tremendous responsibility to protect the public, and they are watched with increasing scrutiny.
Evertel founder and former Chief of Police for Fort Worth, TX, Jeff Halstead, recently sat down for a nationally syndicated podcast to discuss this issue. Halstead sympathizes with the amount of multi-tasking that patrol officers must constantly juggle and even confessed to riding in patrol cars once a month to keep his finger on the pulse of current challenges. Among his findings is that when information comes from multiple media platforms, it can be overwhelming. When there is no specified app for first responder communication, officers are fielding intel from all directions. It’s too easy to miss information and overwhelming in high-stakes situations.
Aside from being overwhelming and under-informing, consumer messaging apps come with high price tags in fines and investigations every year. When tragedy strikes and media frenzies descend on police agencies, records are too often lost or compromised, which can result in fines up to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Communication Compliance Solutions
Halstead took into account the challenges of his officers in the field and his own experience as Chief of Police in DFW. To that end, he ensured that Evertel, now CONNECT, would streamline information and make communication instant and thorough. Think instant messaging for first responders—with already established chat rooms and detailed intelligence sent in under a second. You cannot afford to have overwhelmed and under-informed officers at any level in your force.
Consumer communication apps are familiar and convenient, but information is easily lost between platforms, and first responders are left playing catch-up in high-stakes situations. Not only that, these everyday apps are not guaranteed to be secure, encrypted, or FOIA-compliant. Data integrity is assured to be pristine, with all data being automatically stored on a private cloud. Even messages that are retracted are stored on the cloud, complete with time stamps.
Evertel, now CONNECT, took all of the challenges unique to first responders into consideration when they created the first responder messaging app for first responder communication that was truly created to serve the public servant.
See CONNECT in action!
Schedule a live demo and get answers to your specific questions. See how CONNECT can drastically improve communication and collaboration in your agency.
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