Residents of the Saudi capital Riyadh today received "warning messages" on their cell phones, under the heading "Very emergency warning messages."

At 2 p.m. (Riyadh local time), the Directorate-General of Civil Defence sent out test messages on the National Emergency Early Warning Platform.

The General Directorate of Civil Defence of Saudi Arabia, in collaboration with the Communications and Information Technology Authority, began testing on Saturday, until Monday, the National Early Warning Platform for Emergency Mobile Phones, via cellular messages. The experiment began today in Riyadh, and will be completed tomorrow Sunday in the Mecca region and Monday in the eastern region.

Within the framework of these tests, under the heading "Very Emergency Warning Messages," the phones of residents in the Riyadh area sounded a warning voice because of messages. The letter confirmed that a pilot procedure was in place to test the readiness of the national early warning platform and that the messages required no action.

The Directorate General of Civil Defence urged citizens and residents of those areas to participate in the evaluation of the experience through the link that would reach their phones with a text message (SMS), noting the importance of updating mobile phone operating systems to the latest issue, to ensure that messages and alerts were received, stressing that there was no cause for panic or concern.