Speed Breakthrough — The Enigma Alert Network Just Got a Massive Upgrade

When something unusual happens overhead, every second counts.

Few cases illustrate this better than the famous Belgian Wave of 1989. Hundreds of people reported massive triangular objects hovering overhead. But most of those reports were filed days or weeks later, causing confusion. Memories had blurred. Details conflicted. Investigators struggled to match eyewitness reports with radar data or reconstruct a coherent timeline.

We now have the technology to change that. With smartphones in every pocket, we can activate a network of observers as events happen — turning isolated sightings into corroborated evidence. If the Belgian Wave happened today, witnesses could track and verify it simultaneously, creating an irrefutable record on the Enigma network.

That's exactly why we've spent the past year building the Alert Network from the ground up. We've slashed the time between when a sighting is reported and when nearby observers are notified. The result: a network fast enough to enable real-time corroboration when it matters most.

Origins of the Alert Network

In Enigma's early days, we operated as a repository — receiving reports and processing them over several days. Then two realizations happened:

• Our users deserved better. Sighters were trusting us with deeply personal experiences, often anxiously waiting for responses while their submissions sat in the queue for days. Technical glitches made it worse—media upload errors could trap reports in limbo. We had neither the operational efficiency nor the bandwidth to move faster, but we knew we had to. Cutting analysis time became a top priority.
• The reporting window was smaller than we thought. When we analyzed our data, we discovered something striking: at least 25% of submissions described aerial sightings from the previous two hours. People weren't just reporting—they were reporting fast.

These two things together created a huge opportunity. If witnesses are submitting quickly, and we're processing in near real time, there's a chance the object is still visible or the event is still unfolding. Speed wasn't just about better user experience anymore — it became essential to capturing corroborated evidence while it still exists.

What is the Alert Network today?

The Alert Network delivers real-time alerts when anomalous aerial activity is reported in your area.

Here's how it works: When a submission meets our quality standards and gets approved, it immediately becomes a candidate for nearby alerts. Our round-the-clock human moderation team—supported by automated tools—reviews and releases qualifying sightings as push notifications to Enigma app users within a targeted radius. These alerts do one simple thing: prompt people to look up.

When multiple observers respond and report, isolated reports become corroborated datasets and the event gets boosted credibility through independent confirmation.

For our community, alerts aren't just notifications—they're invitations. Each one is a chance to help solve a mystery unfolding in real time, transforming curious observers into active participants in the quest for something much larger. A quest for answers.

The Scale of the Network

As of February 2026, over 560,000 people have downloaded the Enigma app, giving our network significant geographic reach when something breaks. This expansion has enabled us to achieve these numbers with the alert network:

• 411,700+ alerts sent
• Alerted on 2,264 unique sightings or incursions
• Delivered 1 alert per person per month, on average

High User Participation Rates

The Alert Network's effectiveness depends on participation—and our community has responded enthusiastically.

91% of Enigma iOS users have enabled location permissions—nearly double the 51% industry average. This demonstrates both strong trust and interest in receiving these alerts. 65% have enabled push notifications, far above the 44% industry standard. 

These opt-in rates are critical. Every skywatcher who grants permissions expands the geographic coverage and increases the odds that someone will be positioned to corroborate a sighting the moment an alert drops. More coverage means faster verification, richer multi-observer datasets, and a more robust network that can respond when something truly anomalous appears overhead.

From Review to Alert in Minutes

Speed isn't optional for an effective alert network—it's everything.

So we rebuilt our system. Enigma now runs moderation 24/7, with algorithms that prioritize the most recent reports. Our median time from approval to alert: just 4 minutes.

This enables rapid corroboration for short-lived events and sustained awareness for longer or ongoing incursions.

We're not stopping here. In the coming months, we'll continue driving latency down through automation, computer vision, and streamlined operational workflows—because every minute we shave off increases the chance that someone looks up in time.

Flaps and Incursions — When Multiple Witnesses See the Same Thing

An exciting result of our growth and these operational improvements, is the rise of documented "flaps" or "incursions", or clusters of independent observers reporting the same or similar aerial events within the same geographic area and timeframe. Our system automatically detects these across 10, 25, and 50-mile radii.

Most flaps resolve into prosaic explanations. The stunning SpaceX spiral—caused by a Falcon 9 rocket venting excess propellant at high altitude—generated dozens of reports that seemed extraordinary until the source of the phenomenon became clear.

But some don't resolve. A small percentage of flaps remain unexplained, even after investigation. This includes the NJ drones situation of November 2024 - Jan 2025. These unresolved flaps (and flaps that persist over days or weeks, which we sometimes refer to as "incursions") have driven some of our strongest community growth and engagement—because when multiple credible witnesses see something inexplicable, the question becomes impossible to ignore.

Europe Incursion (September–October 2025)

When unexplained aerial activity in NATO airspace caused alarm across Europe and forced several airport closures, skywatchers turned to Enigma to understand and corroborate what was happening in real time:

New Jersey Incursion (November 2024–February 2025)

When swarms of UAPs or drones appeared in NJ and captured national attention, Enigma’s findings and alerts translated into real-world situational awareness:

Why Speed Changes Everything

A slow alert is just a notification. A fast alert creates a network effect. What we've built is a tighter feedback loop between observation, verification, and understanding. Speed is what turns a collection of individuals into a network. When alerts go out in minutes, not hours:

• More observers remain in position with cameras ready
• Corroboration rates climb
• False positives resolve quickly before confusion spreads
• Genuine anomalies emerge from the noise

This is the difference between blurry hindsight and sharp situational awareness. Each minute we eliminate increases signal quality. And as the network scales, these gains compound.

These improvements are just the start. Our focus now: continue compressing response times while expanding globally, without sacrificing quality or credibility.

Because when something anomalous is happening overhead, every minute matters.