By Dan Morse, Staff Writer

 Steven Forage, a software salesman who spends at least five hours a day in his car, juggles a lot on the road: finalizing deals over the phone, sipping coffee, checking e-mail. One thing he no longer worries about, though, is speed cameras.

"Fuzz alert," an electronic voice called out from the console of his Cadillac recently as it approached a speed enforcement camera in Montgomery County.

At 300 feet, another warning: "Ding, ding. Ding, ding. Fuzz alert."

 "It helps you conform," Forage said of the warning system. "If you've forgotten where the cameras are, or get distracted, it refocuses you."

The system, known as PhantomAlert, feeds the locations of speed cameras and red-light cameras into standard Global Positioning System devices and prompts the devices to warn drivers when they are near one. PhantomAlert has subscribers throughout the nation, including more than 2,000 in the Washington region, said the company's owner, District resident Joseph Scott.

Scott said he expects that number to rise because of a new Maryland law that permits cameras, now allowed only in Montgomery, to be installed in work zones and near schools throughout the state. "It's going to be very good for us," he said.

Scott said police should be thrilled by PhantomAlert, particularly because officials say speed cameras are designed not to generate money but to slow drivers.

"Not only should they support us," he said, "but when they mail out citations, on the back they should say, 'Get PhantomAlert.' "

Scott and a handful of employees scour government and police Web sites for camera locations. But subscribers send in most of the locations, which are added to PhantomAlert's database.

Customers also report locations where police often work radar guns. The reports can veer toward the personal.

"Lincolnwood Officer Gordon lies in wait behind grassy knoll as unsuspecting drivers on NB McCormick Boulevard exceed 50 mph," an Illinois motorist advised June 1. "He hits them on radar, and it's easy pickings. . . . Don't risk it!"

In Lincolnwood, Ill., police Sgt. Richard Solomon confirmed that Jeff Gordon, a detective, recently worked radar along McCormick.

Solomon said he has no objection to the PhantomAlert warning, because it could get motorists to slow down.

Local police have mixed reactions to the service.

"If drivers think they only get a ticket when their little device goes off, that could lead them into a false sense of security, which could cause them to speed," said Lisa Sutter, a District employee who is responsible for camera enforcement, overseeing 22 speed cameras and 49 red-light cameras.

In Virginia, which doesn't have speed cameras, PhantomAlert is used by drivers who want to know where police encamp with radar guns.

Corinne Geller, a spokeswoman for the Virginia State Police, said that by publicizing those locations, PhantomAlert could create the perception that there are more roadside police at any given time than is actually the case. "If it's a deterrent, that's a good thing," Geller said.

Maurice Nelson, who runs Montgomery's camera-enforcement program, said the service raises awareness of speed cameras. Still, he said he worries that the product sends a message to drivers that as long as they're not getting alerts, they can hit the gas.

Nelson said he absolutely doesn't like one aspect of the service: an option that warns drivers of places where police operate checkpoints to find drunk drivers. On PhantomAlert's Web site, the DUI checkpoint locations are marked with a tiny martini-glass icon. "That is the worst use of that technology," Nelson said.

Scott, 39, who markets PhantomAlert as a tool to enhance public safety, grew up in Ethiopia and was known as Joseph Seyoum after he moved to the United States in his teens.

Among the subscribers is Forage, the software salesman who spends all that time in his Cadillac. Forage said PhantomAlert hearkens back to a time of citizens band radios.

"It reminds me of back in the '70s, when the CB's were out," he said. "People were networking, trying to keep from getting speeding tickets. . . . This is a high-tech version of that."

Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.