• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
• /
• v.28 no.1
• /
• pp.45-68
• /
• 2022

The central and local governments of the Republic of Korea provided information necessary for disaster response through wireless emergency alerts (WEAs) in order to overcome the pandemic situation in which COVID-19 rapidly spreads. Among all channels for delivering disaster information, wireless emergency alert is the most efficient, and since it adopts the CBS(Cell Broadcast Service) method that broadcasts directly to the mobile phone, it has the advantage of being able to easily access disaster information through the mobile phone without the effort of searching. In this study, the characteristics of wireless emergency alerts sent to Seoul during the past year and one month (January 2020 to January 2021) were derived through various text mining methodologies, and various types of information contained in wireless emergency alerts were analyzed. In addition, it was confirmed through the population mobility by age in the districts of Seoul that what kind of influence it had on the movement behavior of people. After going through the process of classifying key words and information included in each character, text analysis was performed so that individual sent characters can be used as an analysis unit by applying a document cluster analysis technique based on the included words. The number of WEAs sent to the Seoul has grown dramatically since the spread of Covid-19. In January 2020, only 10 WEAs were sent to the Seoul, but the number of the WEAs increased 5 times in March, and 7.7 times over the previous months. Since the basic, regional local government were authorized to send wireless emergency alerts independently, the sending behavior of related to wireless emergency alerts are different for each local government. Although most of the basic local governments increased the transmission of WEAs as the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 increases, the trend of the increase in WEAs according to the increase in the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 was different by region. By using structured econometric model, the effect of disaster information included in wireless emergency alerts on population mobility was measured by dividing it into baseline effect and accumulating effect. Six types of disaster information, including date, order, online URL, symptom, location, normative guidance, were identified in WEAs and analyzed through econometric modelling. It was confirmed that the types of information that significantly change population mobility by age are different. Population mobility of people in their 60s and 70s decreased when wireless emergency alerts included information related to date and order. As date and order information is appeared in WEAs when they intend to give information about Covid-19 confirmed cases, these results show that the population mobility of higher ages decreased as they reacted to the messages reporting of confirmed cases of Covid-19. Online information (URL) decreased the population mobility of in their 20s, and information related to symptoms reduced the population mobility of people in their 30s. On the other hand, it was confirmed that normative words that including the meaning of encouraging compliance with quarantine policies did not cause significant changes in the population mobility of all ages. This means that only meaningful information which is useful for disaster response should be included in the wireless emergency alerts. Repeated sending of wireless emergency alerts reduces the magnitude of the impact of disaster information on population mobility. It proves indirectly that under the prolonged pandemic, people started to feel tired of getting repetitive WEAs with similar content and started to react less. In order to effectively use WEAs for quarantine and overcoming disaster situations, it is necessary to reduce the fatigue of the people who receive WEA by sending them only in necessary situations, and to raise awareness of WEAs.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
• /
• v.21 no.4
• /
• pp.93-102
• /
• 2021

The world is facing an unprecedented economic, social and political crisis with the spread of COVID-19. The Corona Virus (COVID-19) and its global spread have resulted in declaring a pandemic by the World Health Organization. The deadly pandemic of 21st century has spread its wings across the globe with an exponential increase in the number of cases in many countries. The developing and underdeveloped countries are struggling hard to counter the rapidly growing and widespread challenge of COVID-19 because it has greatly influenced the global economies whereby the underdeveloped countries are more affected by its devastating impacts, especially the life of the low-income population. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) were particularly useful in spreading key emergency information and helping to maintain extensive social distancing. Updated information and testing results were published on national and local government websites. Mobile devices were used to support early testing and contact tracing. The government provided free smartphone apps that flagged infection hotspots with text alerts on testing and local cases. The purpose of this research work is to provide an in depth overview of emerging technologies and recent ICT developments to combat COVID-19 Pandemic. Finally, the author highlights open challenges in order to give future research directions.

• The Journal of the Institute of Internet, Broadcasting and Communication
• /
• v.21 no.5
• /
• pp.1-9
• /
• 2021

In Korea, various information related to COVID-19 has been provided to the public through an EAM (Emergency Alert Message) service using CBS (Cell Broadcast Service) technology to respond to COVID-19. In particular, local governments have been actively using the EAM service as a major means of responding to COVID-19. However, since excessive use of EAM service has caused the inconvenience of the people rather than the positive effects, the authority to be able to send EAMs has be limited. In this paper, with the purpose of providing primary data for establishing a plan to properly operate EAMs, we compare and analyze the number of EAMs issued and the incidence rate of COVID-19 cases during the period from 2020 to the present. In addition, the monthly EAM usage and incidence rate of COVID-19 cases are compared in detail and correlation analysis is performed for local governments that have issued many EAMs. We expect that the analysis results of this paper will be used as primary data in establishing strategies for EAM service to counteract the prolonged COVID-19.

• Knowledge Management Research
• /
• v.22 no.2
• /
• pp.227-246
• /
• 2021

In the context of the global pandemic caused by COVID-19, emergency alert text messages can violate the privacy of confirmed corona positive cases. This study used conjoint analysis to identify the essential information factors and the privacy invasion information factors of local government initiated safety notices. As a result of this study, we found eight essential information factors, including all routes of the confirmed case and ten privacy invasion factors of safety notices. In addition, we found that there is a similarity between the combinations of information perceived to be the most essential and perceived as the most significant privacy invasion; both combinations include the confirmed case's personal and route information. This study ultimately tried to suggest a way to lower the concern about privacy invasion of the confirmed cases without damaging the emergency alert text messages' essential information. We expect that this study will provide researchers and policymakers interested in disaster communication with valuable theoretical and practical implications.