Katrina and the folly of trusting cell phones

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren () vortex com>
Date: September 1, 2005 12:27:52 AM EDT
To: dave () farber net
Cc: lauren () vortex com
Subject: Katrina and the folly of trusting cell phones



Dave,

In watching the interviews from the areas devastated by the aftermath
of Katrina, one warning comes through loud and clear, and while it's
not a new one, it's still critically important: Trusting cell phones
to work in many emergency situations can be dangerous or fatal.

Over and over we hear people saying how their cell phones became
useless (except perhaps for snapping photos).  And it wasn't a
"simple" matter of call traffic overloading.  Even in areas where
equipment wasn't flooded, power cutoffs led to microcell batteries
running down within a couple of days.  With so much reliance on
these small, seemingly ubiquitous cell sites, power failures can turn
regional cellular networks into largely useless hardware in short
order.

It's particularly upsetting to hear people noting that this agency or
that organization depended more than ever on inexpensive cell phones
rather than the expensive dedicated radio equipment that they used to
use, and when the cellular network went down their communications
were disrupted in major ways.

--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren () pfir org or lauren () vortex com or lauren () eepi org
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
  - People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, EEPI
  - Electronic Entertainment Policy Initiative - http://www.eepi.org
Moderator, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
DayThink: http://daythink.vortex.com



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