DHS Says Cellular Outage Reporting is Terrorist Blueprint 421
Tuxedo Jack writes "U.S. landline telephone companies have to file public reports when their networks have major outages, so you would think the same would hold true for cellular providers and ISPs, right? Not if the Department of Homeland Security gets its way. CNN/AP reports that the DHS wants to make cellphone outage reports secret, claiming that they could be used as 'blueprints for terrorists.' I don't know about you, but I'd kinda like to see public disclosure on what happened if my cellphone/Internet access is down for an extended period."
Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Insightful)
- Protecting embarassing localized failures of a cell network from being reported as news, which would of course lower a company's stock price.
- Protecting the cell phone industry from consumer groups keeping stats on outages, which would actually cause companies to have to improve their service in poor areas.
- Allowing Tom Ridge and friends to ask that cell phone service be cut around areas where "National Security Events" are taking place and being able to claim that the tower simply went down rather than having own up to the fact that they interrupted service to the general public based on nothing more than a reasonless fear.
- Allowing the government to take down cell service around any incident that the government would rather not news spread quickly about. By ensuring that the people within the secured zone can't call or send pictures out, and reporters can't get in, they can assure a delay in the release of any account of what's going on in that zone... such jamming would be glaringly clear if all of the cell companies filed reports about the simultainous downtime without any equipment failures.
It is a whole lot easier to cover up a cell service downtime being caused by either company mistakes or government demand if nobody has to file a report on it. And that seems like a much more likely motivation.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Interesting)
Besides, what could terrorists do with the knowledge that cell overage was out? I could see how knowing that cell phones did work in an area could help in, for instance, planning an RF detonation of a bomb. Perhaps we should pre-emptively shut down all the cell networks? That's a bit of a trite over simplification, but I just can't see how not reporting cell outages does anything except ebb the market pressures that would force cell companies to improve service.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Interesting)
Face it, we shot down that airliner. Everyone was focusing on New York City and little attention was paid to the Pennsylvania field. Cheney and Rumsfeld had already authorized shooting down any of the hijacked airplanes and there was plenty of time for armed fighter jets to intercept it from Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, or Kentucky.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's on the net, just not on the 6 o clock news.
Here's another one. That stewardess who allegedly called her husband had to use a phone built into the plane, because her cellphone was in her purse, which she couldn't get to because the terrorists were in the way and stuff....
Well, hooo-kay then, how did she activate it without her credit card, which was presumably back in her purse as well?
If you want more, there are more than a hundred unanswered questions and quite strange incongruities and even stranger coincidences with the governments story about all the events surrounding 9-11. Those above are just two of them.
Happy _legitimate_ researching!
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:3, Interesting)
Wow! Its on the "net"? Damn! It must be true then! The "net" would never lie to us!
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:4, Informative)
One thing to take into consideration, is that if there was a struggle in the cockpit, and the aircraft went out of control, it is quite likely that pieces were ripped from the aircraft by the extreme loads placed on the airframe. An airliner is no fighter jet, one can rip the wings, horizontal/vertical stabilizers off quite easily under extreme maneuvers/speed, or in an uncontrolled dive. As far as accounting for the debris field being so far away, the aircraft could have sustained damage, but actually travelled some distance before impact, as we're talking starting at an altitude of around 30,000-35,000 ft, which means that the aircraft could have been in a fairly steep dive, losing more and more pieces, and still cover 8 miles ground distance. Although not an A&P (Airframe and Powerplant) mechanic or crash investigator, I am a retired senior avionics technician, and have helped in crash investigations before, including black-box voice/data extraction from damaged recorders, and have also worked helping to repair crashed aircraft that were salvageable, so have some experience from which to speak.
Strat
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Informative)
Well, hooo-kay then, how did she activate it without her credit card, which was presumably back in her purse as well?
This is the problem with many conspiracy theories--they ask such simple, obvious questions, that clearly point to no rational explanation besides conspiracy.
Er, no. First of all, you're begging the question of whether or not the stewardess in question actually had no access to her credit card. How about this--if I were a steward(ess), I'd realize that carrying a purse or backpack while I worked was impractical. I'd also realize that I was travelling all over the country, and that I might end up staying in a strange city on any given night (weather diversion, mechanical trouble, etc.). Lastly, I might realize that my purse/bag/backpack could be stolen while I'm off at the other end of the plane, and I might not know about it until after the passengers were long gone.
What would I do in such a situation? I'd stuff my driver's license, a credit card, and (especially for international flights) my passport into the pocket of my uniform where they would be easy for me to keep track of. I wouldn't carry my phone on me, because a)it's bulkier than the cards, and b)I'm not allowed to use it on the plane anyway.
For that matter, the stewardess could have just borrowed a card from someone seated near the phones. If the plane I was on was hijacked, I wouldn't begrudge someone a few minutes of toll charges.
The question of debris is addressed by a well-written sibling post. Briefly, a struggle for control in the cockpit could easily result in deliberate or accidental rapid maneouvres that result in greater-than-design stresses on the airframe. Consequently, bits shake loose. If you stomp on the rudder pedal of an airliner while flying at anything close to cruising speed, you're going to rip stuff off. (Think about what would happen to your car if you turned the steering wheel abruptly all the way to the right while on the Interstate.)
If those are the best of the 'hundred unanswered questions' and 'strange incongruities', then I'm afraid it's a pretty weak conspiracy. Hint: lack of information does not necessarily mean conspiracy--sometimes it just means that we can't get all of the information.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:2, Insightful)
Hack the pager to do something not only after being called, but by getting a specific page message...
It would be a lot harder to get the pager providers to supress service at the whim and fancy of the govment, because chances are, they would also be denying service to hospitals, etc...
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Interesting)
I heard a wise soul on slashdot say "Terrorism, drugs, and kiddy porn is the root password to the constiuttion."
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:4, Funny)
Thanks, now I have to change my root password, you incestuous clod!
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:3, Insightful)
Even if there was something they could do, what if we simply delay the publication of such outage data by three months? That way, the public still get the accountability, and the terrorists don't get "useful" data.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Insightful)
Terrorist 1: So do I get to suicide bomb today? Do I?!? Do I?!?!
Terrorist 2: No. The cellular service isn't down.
Terrorist 1: Awwwwwww I never get to be the bomb!
Terrorist 2: Cheer up, little guy! You never know...Hey Look!
Terrorist 1: What?!?! What's going on?
Terrorist 2: The cellular service just went down! You see? Now you can blow yourself up in the name of !
Terrorist 1: Hoooray! Hooray!
The Department of Homeland Stupidity is the biggest friggin' joke going in America. At least Hitler's SS had some creative reason's to start trampling rights.
How the hell is this information going to help a terrorist? Terrorist are not spur of the moment. They plan. Just like any other paramilitary self-righteous group of assholes on the planet.
Knowing that cell coverage is out in an area would only be useful to them if they did it themselves.
Conversely, knowing where cell coverage is operational would be good for them if they wanted to detonate a bomb from afar.
I can't believe grown human beings are making these decisions...and people go along with it!
This is almost as silly as not letting homosexuals have equal rights....oh....yeah.
~X~
I support Bush as much as I support terrorism.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:3, Interesting)
And what effect does it have? It makes it so that the involved companies feel the pressure to make sure that the guy across the street doesn't suffer a bunch more outages than you due to t
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's really amazing how well the administration is playing right into Al Qaeda plans. Really amazing. They want to destroy America, and now, via the administrations reactions (creation of DHS, etc, etc), their goal is being accomplished by the systematic distortion and destruction of the U.S. Constitution. There does not need to be any terrorist attack again, only the threat of such and the continuance of the current administration, which will continue on it's misgu
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:4, Interesting)
Decentralized communications are more reliable and flexible, albeit sometimes harder to make efficient.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:4, Informative)
For a little studying and $12 you can get your technician's license which affords you a lot of bandwidth above 50MHz. Check ww.arrl.org for your nearest radio club and get in touch with someone.
KD5ZEF
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Interesting)
I think this is the main reason. Anybody remember Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six? (the book, not the game.) If you were about to hit a bunch of suspected terrorist cells, and wanted to make sure they were completely isolated (communications-wise), you want to jam the cellular frequencies, or isolate the local towers to make sure that they couldn't warn their buddies when the men in black start kicking in the doors. Suddenly realizing that service in your area is out might be a good tip-off that the hammer is about to fall, and being able to visualize that on a global map would be a great way to figuring out what areas to avoid during an extended operation.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:2)
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:2, Funny)
Now that I think about it, this could explain a lot. I guess there is permanent terrorist activity around my house, my signal is always bad. I'll be watching my neighbors a bit more closely now.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:3)
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:2)
Thank you, your cooperation is appreciated.
Re:Claiming "terror" to justify other things... (Score:2)
more industry protectionism on the way (Score:5, Informative)
People in Washington and elsewhere have noticed that terrorists use the internet in much the same way they do. They point to web sites and even combat games used as "online training camps".
Words like that are usually followed by bombs and at least one person [talkleft.com] has been to jail over it already [samiomar.com] and speech has not been free everywhere forever [prisonplanet.com]. The EFF has a nice list of sites already shut down [eff.org].
More stupid laws can't be far behind a propaganda ramp up like that. The only way to implement the censorship that would be to continue to centralize telecommunications further. The only way to kill free speech is to kill free enterprise.
The pattern is clear. The government is augmenting it's own power by proping up favorites in industry. It's so unAmerican that I want to throw up.
Re:more industry protectionism on the way (Score:4, Interesting)
Wow (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Wow (Score:4, Insightful)
There are a lot of things that could happen. But I personally don't feel this justifies making everything a big secret. National (or Homeland) Security is important, but it shouldn't just be a magic make-anything-you-damn-well-please-a-secret card.
Are you afraid to leave the house during a storm because you might get struck by lightning?
Heh (Score:5, Funny)
This is Slashdot. Welcome. We rarely leave our parents' basement. So, yes, I am afraid to leave my house.
Re:Wow (Score:3, Funny)
Absolutely. I also do not breathe because I am afraid free radicals will kill me.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Funny)
Rush hour is also an unacceptable risk. If terrorists attack during this time it could be disasterous. Consequently, as of next month all work times will be randomly generated. You will be informed when you are due to start working 15 minutes before the start of your shift via the newly secured cellular phone network. Anyone travelling on the roads without prior authorisation via cellular phone will be assumed to be a terrorist attempting to cripple our vital transportation infrastructure.
Re:Wow (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
SBC Communications Inc. reported in January that 43,224 customers lost service for three and a half hours because frozen water pipes burst in a central switching office in Stamford, Connecticut. Water seeped down two floors and "damaged the Symmetr
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
First off, any terrorist attack will likely cause the local cell network to collapse. A network is most likely to be overloaded when it is in use by a large number of people in a small area. Guess where a terrorist is most likely to attack?
Secondly, hiding this information will not make us safer. In fact, it will put us more at risk. Here's why.
Security by obscurity is a problem not just because it's ineffective, but because it can encourage bad/lazy practices in other areas of security.
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
In case you didn't remember, during the September 11 attacks, cell networks were in chaos. Imagine if they attacked during outages or could cause outages.
It's not the network I'm worried about... it's people dying and unable to say they love their families before a ten ton cement block crushes their skulls. Or worse... what if they were buried an
Re:Wow (Score:2)
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
And CNN reports that the huge multinational conglomerate phone companies are *so concerned* for all our sa
Re:Wow (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Wow (Score:2)
They can cause outages. They know that they can cause outages, because they have already done it. All they have to do is what they intend to do anyway -- cause large-scale mayhem.
Sheesh.
Re:Wow (Score:2)
If I were going to try to spread terror, why would I cut off a country's means of communication? Terror spreads by making intentional disasters seem close to home. The only time I could see this being effective is if the terror being spread were pure FUD... Hmm... Who would be spreading terror through FUD? Not Al Qaeda.
I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:5, Insightful)
This Patriot act is getting downright unpatriotic.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2)
I was unaware that access to cellular providers and ISPs outage information was a right. Where exactly was that right given to us again?
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2)
This also means if an ISP or cellular provider is being incompetent, they can just blame it on the terrorists, and it won't be long before it's illegal for you to deny it's terrorists.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2)
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2)
Strangely, in the USA (well, pre-Dubya USA), we basically have all rights that aren't specifically disallowed. Not the other way around. You see, they can only list non-rights, in theory. So, until the Constitution is ammended so that we don't have the right of outtage reports, by defa
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2, Informative)
John Kerry voted for that Patriot Act. So it would seem the US of A is fucked no matter who wins the upcoming election.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:4, Informative)
While voting for it was pretty much indefensible, only 1 (Feingold) out of 100 senators voted against it and it was passed only a month and a half after 9/11. Feingold may have been the only one who actually read the thing.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, John Kerry actually fought in a war. I'd think that counts.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2)
Nowadays, all we get are things like the "Induce Act", which covers the distribution of copyrighted material, and the "Patriot Act", which has nothing to do with patriotism, but rather covers things like spying on citizens, library books, and brid
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't know when it started -- but at some point the conservatives/Republican party decided to use *words* against their enemies. They've been able to insert phrases into the political lexicon which are inflamitory; "tax and spend democrats", "liberal" (said with disgust), "Clinton recession", "Activist Judges" ... There's a million others but I can't think of them at the moment.
They aren't the only ones to do this, but they sure are the most active.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:3, Funny)
"Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism" = USA PATRIOT.
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I'm tired of losing rights.... (Score:2)
It's an acronym for the descriptive name:
So, not only does the name of the act describe it, but it one ups other lesser acts by being an acronym!
Well, obviously... (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
This is a follow-up story to another story... (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, that'd be something that's only of geek interest. It becomes a whole lot more newsworthy when the Department of Homeland Security has come in to claim terror fears should be reason enough to not publish such reports along side the service providers who would be expected to grasp at any reason they'd have to object.
Re:This is a follow-up story to another story... (Score:2)
Re:This is a follow-up story to another story... (Score:3, Insightful)
The reason why cellphone
This just in.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously folks, this is getting f@*&ing ridiculous. The word 'terrorist' is becoming the modern version of 'communist' and 'witch.'
Re:This just in.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Since Bush has been in power the Geneva convention is more or less void, a country has been overrun (ok, with a wrong leadership), the country is spending billions (more) on weapons, Israel gets a "do whatever you like" card, rights have been taken away from citizens, corporate america has been placed above the law, the VN was almost invalidated, money for good causes is being withdrawn and you think it is _getting_ ridiculous?
America, get yourself another president, _please_.
Cell/mobile phones don't measure up in many ways (Score:2)
Re:Cell/mobile phones don't measure up in many way (Score:2)
It's true that... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It's true that... (Score:2, Interesting)
No more Bitorrent, Kazaa or edonkey, and none could even report it on slashdot.
Better hoard your maps! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Better hoard your maps! (Score:2, Insightful)
-- Stupid restrictions on anything.
-- Access to innocent information closed due to concern.
-- A lot of "Good" citizens that will gladly rip your head off as soon as you will do something "SUSPICIOUS" (like taking a photo of popular landmark) and even feel proud afterwards.
-- More and more power to absurd authorities that are supposed to
USA - USSR (Score:3, Insightful)
1. Where are the Gulags? I know some consider the prison system to be gulags, but honestly they aren't. There are no Federal or State prisons or jails
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulag
"After the Bolshevik revolution in 1917 Lenin announced that any "class enemy" could not be trusted and should be treated worse than an ordinary criminal. The Gulag was a reformed extension of earlier labo
Re:USA - USSR (Score:4, Insightful)
2. You said "so where is that closed information" -- find out anything about that plane yet? Yeah. And just because guys didn't come knocking on your door in this one case doesn't make all the cases [uncletaz.com] of "homeland security" gone wrong that have happened over the last few years go away.
3. Let's take your example: You said "Would news about casualties in Iraq even make it out?" Did you miss the story about the government trying to block pictures of coffins from making it into the media? During the Vietnam war, the nightly news on all major networks showed the body bags, gave the casualty count, showed graphic footage of the war, every day. The US government learned its lesson from this and has had policies in place ever since to hide the ugly side of war to keep support from eroding. Until Fahrenheit 9/11 came out, many people had never seen photos of the dead and wounded from the Iraq war!
Besides, the guy's point is that major media is require to act like lapdogs to whomever is in power at the moment, or they will get their "access" taken away. No more interviews, press passes, or anything. Bye-bye business. Do a little research on this -- it's been going on for quite a while now.
Re:USA - USSR (Score:3, Insightful)
How do you know that?
yes, (Score:2, Funny)
Therefore, I demand that all architectural project blueprints be destroyed immediately!
Also, this means that UML is a terrorist threat.
Re:yes, (Score:2)
I'm a structural Engineer.
Architectural blueprints will show you the layout of the rooms, the way that the windows have waterproofing, and the cladding system. They wont show you how the building is held up, or allow an intelligent mind to devise a way of bringing down the building beyond what a calibrated eyeballing of the building could not provide.
If you want to know how to pull down a building in an elegant manner, you'll be looking at the structural engineer's plans. There is some merit in lim
Vote! (Score:4, Insightful)
This November vote and put an end to this nonsense!
Unless of course the voting is postponed due to terrorist threats.
Michael. [michael-forman.com]
i quit (Score:5, Insightful)
Screw you homeland security, why not cover the county with soft fluffy pillows so when we (or at least "the children") fall down they don't get hurt. Look damit, terrorist are not backwater ignorant bucktoothed country folk, there are eductated (usually in the U.S.) religious zelots or crackpots or both. They do not need to use these reports to generate a blue print, they already have one. Security through obscurity has nor, does not, nor will it ever work. Go ask Microsoft if you don't believe me. Besides i would love to see real time reports so that way we can send in a team of heavily armed drunken red necks in their 57 chevy to all the big outages just incase the outage was due to a terriost attack, be casue no matter how much of the religious zelot they may be, no one can stop Zek and Earl after they've downed a case of Highlife.
The first rule... (Score:2)
The larger picture (Score:3, Insightful)
Presumably, one of the concerns here is that terrorists would be able to determine the locations of vital cell-phone network equipment and thereby disrupt that network. This made me think of the other news we've seen lately, particularly the concept of a P2P cell network, where cell-phones participate on a swarm-like network. Potential of disrupting such a network? Very, very low.
It's easy to leap to other conclusions here as well. Telecommuting is another example of a technology where it would be difficult to kill a large number of people working in an office building simply because they're suddenly geographically distributed over a large area.
So yeah, a little offtopic, admittedly (that ought to attract the mods), but an interesting future for what may or may not be an actual problem in the present, don't you think?
The Fuhrer at Homeland Security (Score:2)
Re:The Fuhrer at Homeland Security (Score:2)
May I refer you to Godwin's Law [astrian.net]?
Better living through better surveillance! (Score:2)
That's why omnipresent surveillance is such a great force for advancing the cause of equality. For example, if we tap everybody's phones, the unreliable elements of society need no longer feel as though they've been singled out for their political views!
I don't understand the logistics... (Score:4, Insightful)
Personally I think people give "terrorists" too much credit, and the DHS makes them out to be more resourceful than they really are. If terrorism relied on such precise and surgical strikes as the DHS would like us to believe, then we wouldn't need an absurd Terror Alert Level to tell us when we've got something to worry about; if the U.S. had as much to fear as the government tries to proclaim, I'm sure we'd all be feeling the effects firsthand. The attack on the WTC happened nearly 3 years ago, and to this day we have seen how many more massive "terrorist" attacks on US soil? It seems to me that the most damage we've suffered is the extreme paranoia and collective uncertainty fostered by a government that continually proclaims to be keeping us safe with it's "expertise".
This proposal by the DHS just seems like another two-pronged attack to feed a self-inflicted sense of fear and victimization. Make people feel like the DHS can actually do something about those few terrorist groups who can actually get their shit together and carry out something as horrific as the WTC, and at the same time put some more power in government hands. Ya know, just in case...
The primary difference is... (Score:3, Insightful)
(But, if they did, it should definitely be public
Reminds me of... (Score:3, Insightful)
'Nuff said.
The Picture Caption Tells It All... (Score:2)
EXACTLY. Wireless phone companies and Homeland Security officials. It sounds like another case of the "Bush Inner Circle" doing what big business wants despite the fact that other branches of government want to do the "right thing".
There have been many examples of this recently. The Bush Administration really seems to be "open for business", and they make no apologies for it.
Among other things... (Score:2, Insightful)
Why should any company providing a service vital to the country not be subject to the same rules about information disclosure as the government? (I intended to say that without irony, but considering how Jr. has been trying to hide everything lately...)
We've gone way beyond 'ridiculous' now. (Score:5, Interesting)
That sounds like something a terrorist would say! Quick! Call John Ashcroft, this man is hiding something! What exactly would you do with this information you Amurrika hatin' terrorist you!
Actually though if you want to see how useless, stupid and ridiculous our "war on terrorism" has become (hope this one goes better than the "war on drugs" cuz last time I checked drugs were winning big time), check out the story of Ian Spiers. Here is the link [brownequalsterrorist.com] to his website describing his run-in with Homeland Security types or you can read this story [nwsource.com] from the Seattle Times or this column [nwsource.com] from the Seattle Post Intelligencer. For those of you who don't want to read the articles Spiers was harrassed by the local police and Homeland Security types because he was taking pictures of the Ballard Locks, oh, and he's kind of not-white looking, but that never figures into the actions of our Homeland Security Overlords.
Re:We've gone way beyond 'ridiculous' now. (Score:5, Insightful)
They got a tip that a dark-skinned person was taking pictures and notes. If they had *not* followed up and those locks were bombed next month, would you want their heads? I bet you'd be outraged.
It's worth noting that those locks are a military installation run by the US Army Corps of Engineers.
The Ballard Locks a military installation. Yeah, I guess that those Sockeye salmon are really valuable to our national security, as is the ability for those boat owners on Lake Washington and Lake Union to get their boats to and from Puget Sound. My God! The whole country would collapse if the locks were damaged! Quick! Suspend the Constitution!
So what if people calling in tips to the DHS use profiling? I don't recall any WHITE people bombing us. When someone says the word terrorist, you know, like when we're at a heightened security alert, what mental image do YOU form? Thought so.
You don't recall any WHITE people bombing us? Do you have memory problems as well as being completely stupid? I guess that you don't recall the bombing of the Murrah federal building in April of 1995, which was done by a couple of white guys, one of whom, Timothy McVeigh, was executed for it. I guess you don't recall the bombings of abortion clinics that were done by WHITE right-to-lifers. I guess you don't recall the bombings of churches in the south by WHITE KKK members.
The mental image I form is of the Department of Homeland Security crying wolf again and again and again. The terrorist alerts, which weren't that great of an idea to begin with, have been so overblown as to become meaningless. I'm also beginning to form an image of Homeland Security releasing these to distract our attention from other events, and so are a lot of other people. Witness the latest Homeland Security alert which contained no new info and was a rehash of information from several months ago.
Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, lieutenant Taco? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Spiers, and you curse the Department of Homeland Security. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know -- that Spier's questioning, while tragic, probably saved lives; and my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives.
If fucking retards such as yourself are the only thing standing between me and Osama Bin Laden then I'm fucked. Oh BTW dickhead, I spent 13 years in the National Guard as an M60 and M1 tanker, what are your credentials? A four digit /. ID number? A high score playing America's Army, a John Ashcroft Junior G-man badge? Sitting through all 24 episodes of 24 without having to get up and go to the bathroom?
Quite frankly your existence is grotesque and incomprehensible to me. Why didn't your mother abort you? Why didn't your dad drown you in a bathtub? Why don't you shoot yourself in the head?
I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it.
You provide me with my freedom? Did you write the Constitution? Did you fight in WWII, Korea, Afghanistan? Were you a first responder on 9/11? If not then you haven't done shit, pigfucker. You're either some sort of fucktard poseur who has spent too much time playing with his George W. Bush flight suit action figure or you actually do work for one of the idiot bureaucracies that is concerned with "homeland security". If it's the latter then I have news for you old son, you and your buddies haven't done jack fucking shit for our security. Osama Bin Laden is still out there, so is Mullah Omar and Zarqawi. What have you fucktards achieved other than harrassing US Citizens and trashing the Constitut
Re:We've gone way beyond 'ridiculous' now. (Score:3, Insightful)
Forgot the anthrax mailer did we?
And wisely, you qualify that with "attack on America" because terrorism has increased worldwide.
Given that prior to 9/11, the last time Al Quaeda had launched a terrorist attack on American soil was 8 years before in in 1993, citing the lack of terrorist attacks in the past 3 years is hardly proof of anything.
Re:We've gone way beyond 'ridiculous' now. (Score:3, Funny)
'Nuff said.
How soon we forget... (Score:3, Insightful)
ODD... I seem to remember a very WHITE person bombing us... I think his name was McVeigh (sp?)
This all puts me in mind of the aphroisim about history repeating itself when we fail to learn from it, and I dare-say remembering is a big part of learning.
On September 11 I lost a bet. I bet my roommate that it was a melitia group protesting "The Military Industrial Complex." I figured I'd lose though, because WHITE Terroritst rarely consider the suicide apro
Reason (Score:3, Interesting)
If the outage is reported by civilians, in case of public access to these reports there is a possibility to analyze and reconstruct path and timing patterns of such security procedures, without need of a large grid of measure equipment or observation.
Of course, real terrorists will probably resort to real measure equipment, because of public database could be easily falsified by spooks, but for government a more useful effect of such denial of information is keeping population in fear.
in related news (Score:3, Funny)
Street maps will be banned, and to render older street maps obsolete (and therefore ineffective), existing street names will be randomly shuffled around.
Independent monitoring is better anways. (Score:2)
Pointless response (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Pointless response (Score:2)
Why? EMS depends on Cell Phones these days (Score:5, Insightful)
Flushing Your Tax Dollars ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe they should propose more competition and diversity as a way of ensuring redundancy.
After-the-fact reports on cellular outages... (Score:4, Insightful)
The same, of course, applies to landline services, and anyone with experience on the technical side of the 'outside plant' world can probably tell you a half dozen low-risk ways to disrupt service over selected areas...
I dislike the idea of 'hiding' the root cause of cellular outages, but I can also understand a part of the desire to do so for security.
*adjusts tinfoil propellor beanie*
Tomas
RTFA! Please just RTFA! (Score:5, Informative)
The brunt of the argument is that
DHS is not concerned about "the network is currently down" notifications being "blueprints for terrorists". DHS is concerned about the ones like this:
That's what the DHS means by "blueprints for terrorists" - they're concerned that the level of detail in the fault analysis would be enough for someone to cause an outage on purpose, thus preventing people calling in or out of that mobile coverage area.
So please just read the damned article before harping on about "how could a network outage possibly benefit a terrorist"?
As it stands, a network outage could be of great benefit to terrorists, if they can cause the outage at will.
TRANSMISSION ENDS