On April 23 the UK government will send emergency alerts to every phone across the UK.

This means that an alarm will sound from your phone regardless of whether your phone is on silent or not.

The reason for this is to trial a new emergency system which will provide us with alerts on extreme weather, flooding and fire.

However, for various reasons, there may be some people who do not wish to receive the alerts, and some who may wish to turn them off on hidden devices, for example, those who are living in abusive domestic settings and may have a second phone.

The gov.uk website does advise on how to opt-out of emergency alerts, but it also says: "You can opt out of emergency alerts, but you should keep them switched on for your own safety."

Opting out of emergency alerts is simple and straight forward.

First, go to your phone's settings and search for 'emergency alerts' then switch off 'severe alerts' and 'extreme alerts'.

Bury Times:

For iPhone users, you will need to go to settings, search for ‘emergency alerts’, hit 'notifications', then scroll to the very bottom where there will be two options which read 'extreme alerts' and 'severe alerts'. These can then be swiped off, meaning you won't get any emergency alerts.

The emergency alerts will only be sent by emergency services as well as government departments, agencies and public bodies that deal with emergencies.