The United States will abandon a colour-coded system for warning Americans about the likelihood of a terrorist attack, the chief of homeland security said Thursday, dpa reported.
The colour warnings will be phased out over the next three months in favor of a new advisory system designed to provide more specific information about credible threats, said Janet Napolitano, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security said.
"When a threat develops that could impact you, the public, we will tell you, we will provide whatever information we can," she said.
The new alerts will have a "clear statement" of an imminent or elevated threat along with a concise summary of a potential plot and how it is being managed, Napolitano said. She said the current system was outdated and offered "far too little practical information."
The system created after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks used five colours denoting severe, high, elevated, guarded and low to warn of the probability of an attack. It has been sitting on yellow - or elevated - for four years.
The new practice will also incorporate social media like Facebook and Twitter, Napolitano said.