SOS is the international distress signal (three short, three long, three short) and is said to stand for Save Our Souls.
The idea was that SOS in SOS Alarm would stand for Samhällets Olycksfalls- och Säkerhetstjänst (Society's Accident and Safety Service). This never came to be and today SOS (in the name SOS Alarm) does not have any particular meaning.
Other questions in the category About SOS Alarm
SOS Alarm was founded in 1973 and opened its first SOS center in Västerås in 1974. A government inquiry showed that this would streamline society's emergency response service, which at the time consisted of over 300 local alarm centers.
At its peak, SOS Alarm had 20 SOS centers but today consists of 14 SOS centers, from Luleå in the north to Malmö in the south.
SOS Alarm was an early adopter of a computerised telephone and case management system. The SOS center in Stockholm had such a system already at its opening in 1979.
In 1994 the first emergency response agreement was signed between the state and SOS Alarm, regulating SOS Alarm's commitments regarding 112. Since 2009 the emergency response agreement has also included a responsibility for SOS Alarm's role regarding society's crisis preparedness and civil defence.
SOS Alarm is responsible on behalf of the state for the emergency number 112 in Sweden. The emergency number 112 was introduced in Sweden on July 1, 1996, and SOS Alarm receives approximately four million calls to the emergency number annually.
SOS Alarm has exactly the same role in peacetime as in wartime. This means that calls to the emergency number 112 shall be answered and handled, we shall dispatch rescue services, direct ambulances, forward calls to aid organisations such as the police, monitor the surrounding world to notify preparedness authorities and other important actors regarding events that concern their areas of responsibility, handle Important public announcements, and more.
SOS Alarm is, on behalf of the Swedish state, responsible for the emergency number 112 and have a central role in the crisis preparedness of our society.
