COSPAS-SARSAT originated as a collaboration between the US and the Soviet Union (COSPAS is a romanization of the Russian acronym), with several other countries

COSPAS-SARSAT originated as a collaboration between the US and the Soviet Union (COSPAS is a romanization of the Russian acronym), with several other countries joining shortly after (France, Canada) and ownership ultimately migrating towards the UN. In many ways it's a remarkable example of successful collaboration between not-so-friendly powers in the typically tense domain of space systems. The EU Galileo system includes an enhanced SAR capability which will be integrated with the COSPAS-SARSAT system. In the future, properly equipped transponders will be able to receive a confirmation message transmitted from Galileo satellites to provide the user reassurance that their call was received. There are also subscription services available, such as Spot and Garmin InReach which rely on commercial satellite networks. They're not really that expensive (Spot as low as $18/mo) and depending on the provider include position tracking and two-way text-messaging. These extra features can be very useful, but coverage of these commercial providers is not necessarily as good as COSPAS-SARSAT, especially near the poles. This is particularly true since COSPAS-SARSAT is augmented by a small set of geostationary satellites (NOAA's GOES) which provide "worst-case" coverage, while the commercial networks are LEO.