FC: Canada TV; Tapping cell phones "easy" in Lebanon

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

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[For early-rising Canadian politechnicals: I will be on Canada Television's
"Canada AM" show today (Friday) at 7 am et. --DBM]

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[from db]

> The Daily Star (Lebanon)
> 2/10/99
>
> Tapping cellular phones 'is easy'
> Zeina Abu Rizk
> Daily Star staff
> A confidential report submitted to the government by 
> telecommunications experts suggests that tapping cellular telephones 
> is both easy and affordable.
> Western-Bekaa MP Sami Khatib, who with state prosecutor Adnan Addoum 
> comprises a committee charged with investigating tapping, warned last 
> month that even when completely switched off, a cellular phone could 
> still serve as a microphone.
> He said technical experts had been allowed into cellular switchboards 
> to discover if lines were being monitored. Addoum declined to comment.
> According to the confidential report, a copy of which has been 
> obtained by The Daily Star, cellular manufacturers provide tools for 
> tapping with each system they sell.
[...]
> It added that the Swedish Ericsson company had been producing 
> electronic equipment and computer programmes which facilitate tapping 
> cellular lines, without affecting the quality of services, for more 
> than ten years. Detection was said to be  extremely hard.
[...]
>  After receiving a list of the lines to be tapped, the switchboard 
> initiates its part of the process and sends the data to a tapping 
> centre. Reports include the date, time and length of a communication, 
> as well as the numbers with which the tapped line connected.
[...]



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