Slashdot Log In
FCC Won't Release Cell Carrier Reliability Data
Posted by
Zonk
on Fri Dec 15, 2006 05:39 PM
from the sooper-seekrit dept.
from the sooper-seekrit dept.
imuffin writes "MSNBC is reporting that the FCC has been collecting data on the reliability of different cell phone carriers in the US. This data could be invaluable to consumers trying to choose a company to sign a lengthy contract with. Just the same, the FCC won't release the data to consumers, citing national security risks. The data collection on cell services began in 2004, but were simultaneously pulled from public view. FOIA requests to obtain the data have been denied, and commentators feel this is simply for the government's convenience." From the article: "'There is nothing mysterious behind it, it is corporate competition protection,' said [terrorism analyst Roger Cressey] ... 'The only reason for the government to not let these records get out is then one telco provider could run a full-page ad saying 'the government says we're more reliable.'' Cressey added that he couldn't imagine a scenario where the reports would be valuable to terrorists."
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
they've pretty much proven.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Once again, confirming the fact that "national security risks" and "risks to corporate profit" are the same thing.
Re:they've pretty much proven.. (Score:4, Insightful)
If the figures were published the effect would presumably be that the profits of the worst carriers might suffer and the profits of the best carriers might improve as customers migrate to the better carriers.
Why would the Bush administration care who wins and who loses?
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Because one of the carriers that would be losing was one of the Republicans' biggest contributers, maybe?
Bush or no Bush, your entire post was on how releasing the information would hurt some companies' bottom lines, while it contained no information whatsoever on how it would be useful to terrorists, and therefore does nothing to refute the assertion that "risk to national security" was codespeak for "risk to corporate profit".
Re:they've pretty much proven.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:they've pretty much proven.. (Score:5, Interesting)
More likely, somebody is an idiot and actually believes that data is sensitive, somebody thinks calling the data sensitive will make them seem more important, thus advancing their career, or the report is so poorly done that they want to bury it before people realize their incompetence.
This culture we have of pinning things we don't like on politicians we don't like even if there is no evidence or connection is absurd. It is *the* reason that the leaders of both our major political parties are complete morons who's sole talent is pinning blame on somebody else. We get it. You don't like Bush. But stand up and have some principles. Otherwise you are no better than he is.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I think there is more behind the scenes than people realize. There have been complaints about unreliable cell coverage and other telecommunications issues filed with the FCC for years. Maybe they're gathering evidence to determine if charges or additional legislation are required.
If that's the case, it's pretty clear why they don't want to release the data: it's evidence.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Why would the Bush administration care who wins and who loses?
Maybe one of the lesser reliable carriers made large campaign donations?
I don't see the big deal since if the report said that carrier Z had the best quality and tons of customers migrated to carrier Z, it would add additional strain to their system and they would end up with lesser reliablity. Of course, the people leaving carriers A through Y would leave those carriers with a lighter load and probably better service, so it would all balance out in the end.
The point is that people should be able to get a
Bush? (Score:3, Insightful)
The FCC is an independent agency that answers to Congress, not the president. See USC Tile 47 151 [cornell.edu] and 154 [cornell.edu]
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Completely independent, I'm sure. Just like Congress has been completely independent for the last half decade.
The President can do a lot w/o Congress (Score:3, Insightful)
When you read article II you realize the president can't do shit without Congress's approval.
The mandate of the Commander in Chief, as we've seen lately, is rather broad. The U.S. Constitution is one of enumerated powers, but where the separation of powers is unclear, history has demonstrated that politics is the deciding factor. Whichever branch of the federal government jumps in first is likely to control, at least until they screw up. Witness our Fearless Leader. For years Congress didn't want to exe
Mod parent +5 funny (Score:5, Informative)
Wow, thanks for the laugh, that's the funniest thing I've read all day.
FWIW, the commissioners are appointed by the President, and then confirmed by congresscritters. 3/2 split by political party.
Source? The FCC website [fcc.gov] The congressional oversight is a joke.
Parent
Re:they've pretty much proven.. (Score:5, Insightful)
That's not to say this data should be kept secret, or that the "national security" banner isn't used to hide thing for political purposes, but it's silly to pretend that the economy plays no part in security.
Parent
Isn't it obvious? (Score:5, Funny)
Except, say, if they're trying to pick a quality cell phone provider?
Re:Isn't it obvious? (Score:5, Funny)
Osama: Hello? Hello? Mustafa, are you still there? WTF! I should've heeded that government report and gone with Sprint!
Parent
Won't somebody think of the terrorists? (Score:2)
Re:Isn't it obvious? (Score:4, Funny)
Of course!
The idea is that without knowing which carriers are reliable, the terrorists will by chance pick an unreliable carrier. Then, when they're making the final call to initiate the attack, the call might be dropped, hopefully at a point that makes it sound like the attack is cancelled (like in those television commercials).
Come on, that's about as effective as most of our anti-terrorism initiatives, isn't it?
Parent
Re:Isn't it obvious? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
The first law of politics (Score:4, Insightful)
It would have been handy .... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:It would have been handy .... (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
national security terrorists.... (Score:3, Insightful)
even if it 'were' terrorists, how else will they know which companies service to use for their remote triggers?
lastly. when WHATEVER entity commissioned the collection of data, started with a request for funds to collect the data.. the request must have detailed SOME benefit to justify (stop laughing, even though it's government, it's true) anyone have an idea of what the original justification was?
Well, if they aren't going to release it... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Well, if they aren't going to release it... (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
These aren't the data you're looking for (Score:5, Informative)
Whom to Trust? (Score:3, Insightful)
My solution is not to trust any of them. I had a contract with Cingular. Largest Network, Fewest dropped calls, blah blah. I don't buy it. Why should I trust Verizon not that it's claiming to have the largest network? If I get a prepaid phone, It'll be Cingular because most of the rest of my family is on Cingular, but I'm under no illusions that it will work more than 85% of the time away from large towns or cities.
Part of the problem... (Score:3, Informative)
For example, I have a phone with T-Mobile. T-Mobile has a pretty small network; however, you can roam on a lot of other networks, particularly Cellular One in my area, at no additional charge over your normal plan. So the effective network is bigger than their actual co
Not happy (Score:5, Insightful)
This is information that I am paying for and could weigh heavily in my decision of which service to subscribe to. It is ridiculous that the government does not support a consumer-driven economy.
Terrorist to Terrorist calls are free! (Score:2, Funny)
Grammar nazi alert (Score:5, Informative)
The data collection on cell services began in 2004, but were simultaneously pulled from public view.
or
FOIA requests to obtain the data has been denied,
And I certainly wouldn't use the questionable idiom "Just the same."
Come on, mods. If you're going to edit my submission beyond recognition and destroy its grammatical integrity while you're at it, at least don't attribute the submission to me.
Re:Grammar nazi alert (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Direct quote?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Hmm, I wonder if we'll start seeing stories with this byline:
Alan Smithee writes...
Here's a scenario... (Score:2, Insightful)
Rip out the land lines, shoot down the communication satellites, blow up the unreliable cell phone carriers, thank the reliable cell phone carrier for doing a job well done, and Google stock shoots straight up as they own all of the undamaged dark fiber. Did I miss anything?
couldn't imagine? (Score:4, Funny)
And that is the threat! We must be prepared for threats we can't even imagine! The terrorists are cunning and we have to remove any information that could be used in any conceivable way by terrorists, even if we can't think of how they may use them!
I can't believe how careless cities are by providing traffic flow numbers and population densities. That kind of reckless pre-911 behavior will get us all killed!
Re: (Score:2)
Re:couldn't imagine? ... poor imagination (Score:3, Interesting)
How about if the report highlights single points of failure that are a bit dicey already and could be targeted to wipe out the network causing untold damage to businesses.
It didn't exactly take much imagination to come up with that.
All it needs is a large explosion somewhere (not necessarily with any loss of life) added to a communication blackout and you've got pandemonium. Yeah I've heard of la
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"OMG teh Al Kayeeda blew up the mobile tower, I can't call Mom and tell her to pick me up from soccer practice, let's start pandemonium!!!!1"
"pfft, don't panic, that tower drops 7% of calls anyway, n00bs"
Yet another... (Score:5, Insightful)
"We've been collecting information on cellphone services, and have produced a ranking of reliability. But, unfortunately, if we let Joe Sixpack have access to this information, the terrorists will win! So of course you realize that we're just keeping your best interests at heart, right? You wouldn't want the terrorists to blow up little Johnny's elementary school, now would you?"
Caveat emptor applies (Score:2, Interesting)
This blatant over generalization is contradicted by
FTA: Complaints about cell phone service are near the top of every list of consumer gripes. The Illinois attorney general's office, for example, last year ranked cell phone complaints as the fourth-most-common complainComplaints about cell phone service are near the top of every list of consumer gripes. The Illinois attorney gene
Maybe, but emptors need information (Score:3, Interesting)
Not necessarily. What if I just moved into the area, and I don't have that many local friends? What if my friends are stupid, and I'd rather trust some sort of objective report? What if my friends are generally poor and don't have cell phones? What if my friends all work at the same place and their phones all come from a single provider,
Records likely NOT detailed (Score:3, Insightful)
RTFA, and you will see that only really large outages are noted. This does not cover MUCH more common issues like:
* Poor RF optimization, leading to dropped calls and poor coverage
* Span outages to cell sites, forcing all calls on that site to drop and new attempts to be blocked
* Audio issues
AFAIK, while the feds may compile the data, I know of no efforts by any govt agency to independently collect this sort of data, IIRC it's all self-reported.
Now, if they lowered the thresholds (not gonna happen), then you would see more things of interest.
I foresee insider trading.... (Score:2)
Homeland security requests the outages! (Score:3, Insightful)
The real issue that is being hidden here is the number of times paranoid homeland security dickheads takeout the cell networks in response to perceived local threats. This may be done with or without the carriers co-operation. However, the carriers know when it is happening.
Why won't people take terrorism seriously? (Score:4, Funny)
When will people learn that terrorists may be using our roads, electrical grid, water supply, and grocery stores to benefit themselves? I hear some of them may even be using the telecommunications infrastructure to communicate with each other!
Once we deprive the terrorists of access to these resources, we can live safe and free. Limiting access to these things will be difficult as a practical matter, our best option is probably to blow all these things up.
We should probably burn down the schools and universities too -- there's no telling what a terrorist might do with knowledge they could gain there....
Freedom of Information Act... (Score:2)
National Security Excuses (Score:5, Insightful)
I note that "national security" is the excuse that Bush gives to protect his warrantless NSA spying on Americans, which covers the same telcos these reliability data could expose as unreliable with immunity, though they can use the data themselves for anything they want, including business competition.
Is there anyone left who believes Bush and his "national security" excuses are anything but fascism: government by and for, but not of, corporations? Anyone who believes anyone coming after Bush will be any more accountable, now that Bush has proven how easy it is for even a fool to abuse us this way, while we're actually under attack?
Why do they hate America?
Terrorist communication (Score:3, Funny)
Market balance (Score:3, Insightful)
As someone who creates these reports... (Score:5, Informative)
Outage event reports full of acts of God (and acts of vandals) do not provide any data on the actual "reliability" of cell phone carriers as judged by consumers. Consumer reliability is seen as: "How often do my calls drop - how many areas of town have no service - how often do my call attempts say 'try again' or 'network busy'". Knowing that 20,000 users lost long distance service in BFE when an idiot with a backhoe dug up a fiber does not help with those questions -- oversubscribed cell phone towers are not reported as outage events. In short, the FCC does not know who the most "reliable" carriers are -- only which ones sustain the most damage to their facilities.
As for security matters: If anyone wanted to create havoc, they'd take one glance at the report and burn down the sites responsible for the largest outages listed. "National infrastructure" is described in painstaking detail. It wouldn't take a criminal mastermind - only a couple of drunk high school kids.