The United States is replacing its color-coded terror threat alerts with a new advisory system that will inform the public about specific threats.
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced the National Terrorism Advisory System on Wednesday, and said it goes into effect next week.
She said the new alerts are designed for when there is a specific, credible terrorist threat.
The Homeland Security department says the alerts may include the geographic region, mode of transportation or type of infrastructure potentially affected by the threat, as well as steps individuals and communities can take to help prevent, mitigate or respond to the threat.
The alerts will be shared with the public through the media and online.
The current advisory system, in place since 2002, was established in response to the September 11, 2001 attacks. It assigned color rankings to indicate how severe the national threat level was at any given time, with red being the highest and green being the lowest. Critics of that system said it provided information that was too vague to be of any value.
The Homeland Security department says the new system will include information specific to the particular threat and will not use a color-coded scale.
If authorities have no specific information about the timing or location of a threat, the advisory will label the threat as “elevated.” If authorities believe the threat is impending, it will be referred to as “imminent.”
Napolitano said the alerts will expire automatically in two weeks unless the intelligence community recommends they be extended.
