Feds Have a High-Speed Backdoor Into Wireless Carrier 229
An anonymous reader writes "An unnamed U.S. wireless carrier maintains an unfiltered, unmonitored DS-3 line from its internal network to a facility in Quantico, Virginia, according to Babak Pasdar, a computer security consultant who did work for the company in 2003. Customer voice calls, billing records, location information and data traffic are all allegedly exposed. A similar claim was leveled against Verizon Wireless in a 2006 lawsuit."
Wow! (Score:5, Funny)
Ghorbaneh Shoma (Score:4, Funny)
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CALEA (Score:5, Informative)
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Interesting)
NEWS FLASH: EVERY wireline and wireless carrier has facility like this between their central offices and Quantico, Virginia. I can tell you for an absolute fact that a medium-sized cable company operating in the Rocky Mountain region has similar facilities between their main office and the FBI Academy, because I helped install it.
Welcome to the world post-CALEA.
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:CALEA (Score:4, Funny)
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You can call me crazy, but first do the
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Every single design for a new piece of telecom equipment includes provisions for lawful intercept. That provision working is more important than any other piece of the system. It can ship even if it is rebooting every 24 hours, but it won't ship if lawful intercept isn't working 100%.
Mod Parent Down As Simply Wrong (Score:3, Informative)
No they don't. We don't. None of our peer ILECs or CLECs do. The only case in which this would ever be the norm is if you are an RBOC, very large CLEC or very large wireless carrier and regularly field CALEA requests from the same law enforcement agency. Read that again just to make sure what I'd said registered. Even then it would have be be in excess of 23 simultaneous calls to justify m
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Informative)
Still horsepucky, but it IS part of CALEA as the above posters are mentioning.
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Interesting)
Use the Goog. It's your friend.
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously? You're going with that argument?
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Prove it.
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
You think all those people in Chinese prisons who were arrested for speaking out against the government 'did evil shit'?
Not that we live in China, but thinking that this can't turn against you...
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Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
You should seriously spend some time learning about the principles this country was founded on, because the concept of monitoring interpersonal communications of American citizens would have been an appalling affront to the people who founded it and gave their blood and lives for it. Frankly I find it shameful that so many Americans are willing (if not overjoyed) to hand over their Constitutional rights.
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not trying to be a dooms-day preacher, saying that we're going to start killing our own citizens for exercising their freedom of speech, but the fact of the matter is, as seen in your circular logic (someone correct me if that's not what it is) in the quote above, that by the time it is a problem, you're not going to be able to fix it by voting.
I feel like I understand your argument; I'm not doing anything wrong in my house, so why do I care if the government puts cameras up and watches everything I do? Honestly, I don't care one bit. Until someone decides to pass a law that makes copying a CD illegal, or being gay (just an example... I'm not) illegal, or decides they don't want to count my vote in the next election because I'm a Democrat (again, just an example), or decides that I should be put in jail where my anti-government ideas can't influence other people. And by then, voting isn't going to do me much good.
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I just wonder what we'll hit first: Jericho or Idiocracy.
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That's an unlikely scenario anyway. Given the typical behaviour of the US, you're far more likely to start killing your own citizens because it's cheaper than figuring out whether they've done anything. That's more or less what's happening in Gitmo to non-citizens already; it is a small step to start doing it to your own citizens as well (while claiming that "of course"
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out -
because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out -
because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out -
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me - and there was no one left to speak for me.
Small steps like these make a totalitarian state make.
Do you think our Founders were stupid to abolish domestic spying?
It is people like you who form the remaining 22% support base for Bush & Co.
Perhaps if you are shown on your DVD player all (i mean ALL) that you have said, done and possibly non-being-able-to-do, i guess you will understand...Or probably you would shrug it off when Eva Longoria comes about in Desperate Housewives.
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Please don't try to pin this on Bush, et.al. Clinton pushed this just as much.
In fact, I see no difference between Obama, Clinton, McCain, Huckabby, or Edwards. Every one of them have the same answer to every social...more power for the Federal government. One says that he is going to raise revenue to fund the program by cutting taxes, the other claims she will only tax the 'rich', but they all want new programs on top of old
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, while a court order is still legally required, it is no longer technically required. The FBI need only press a button to start wiretapping. Not only is there no one outside of the organization verifying that the FBI has a legitimate need to know, there is no one keeping records of the wiretaps other than the FBI itself. Our American system has been subverted in the name of safety.
Second problem - what the FBI can use, criminals can abuse. And I'm not talking about criminal behaviour by the FBI itself, I mean unauthorized users with the smarts to co-opt the backdoors that the FBI uses. See this paper from the January/February 2008 issue of IEEE Security and Privacy. [crypto.com]
Third problem - what's your definition of "evil shit?" Does it include breaking up with your boyfriend, the federal agent? [informationweek.com]
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I somewhat agree, except for the last part... what are you suggesting? That the FBI should not be allowed access to information that is otherwise private? Yeah, he misused it, obviously. And I hope he got in trouble for it, I didn't read enough to find that out (looks like he did, since he was indicted). But that doesn't mean the FBI shouldn't have access.
Corruption is going to be there, but it seems having the FBI and some of its corruption is a lot better than having no FBI and having everyone else's
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That may be true. But that doesn't mean the Courts will allow them to use that evidence in a prosecution.
Data taken via wiretap might provide conclusive evidence that a crime was committed. But if that wiretap wasn't legal--- a determination made solely by the Court--- then a jury will never know the data even existed. And if that data is the sole evidence that a crime was committed, then there is no evidence.
THAT's the checks-and-balances part o
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Insightful)
Do you think this administration gives a flying fuck whether or not evidence is admissible in court?
Once the government started holding people indefinitely without trial, the whole concept of admissibility went right out the fucking window. Prisoners in Gitmo don't even have the right to know what the evidence against them is at all, much less whether or not it's admissible in a court of law. (Hell, they don't even have access to lawyers to tell them whether or not the evidence is admissible.)
Concern for this sort of infrastructure and its potential for abuse isn't tinfoil-hat paranoia, the abuse can and has happened. (If you haven't been paying attention, google 'warrant less wiretapping' for further information.)
The checks-and-balances part of the Constitution has been slaughtered in the name of 'protecting our citizens from the terrsts' and 'national security'. While the latter is nothing new, the former is a recent development.
Trusting this government (or any likely future one) with this kind of potential for abuse is kind of like putting a junkie in a room with a kilo of heroin and his 'works', and telling him only to shoot up if the withdrawal symptoms become impossible to bear. It doesn't matter IF they abuse the system, the problem is that they ARE the system, and will do whatever they feel is necessary to protect the system, and therefore themselves (and the multinational corporations that pull their strings.) Even when they DO get called on something that's obviously an abuse of the system (if not black-letter-law illegal) they stamp their feet, throw a tantrum, and refuse to do ANYTHING until the multinationals get immunity for their self-serving rape of their customers' privacy rights.
I've said it before, I'll say it again: If you can convince a judge that I'm obviously engaged in illegal activity, wiretap away. Until then, get the fuck off my phone lines. While I understand the need for expedience in an emergency situation, there is no reason for these lines to be active at all until there's a signed warrant. If you think that's too much bureaucracy or an unnecessary burden on law enforcement, go find another country, because this one requires it by Constitutional order. The only way we can avoid a police state (well, a more obvious one) is to not allow this sort of shit to go unquestioned.
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"If one would give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest man, I would find something in them to have him hanged." -Cardinal Richelieu [wikipedia.org]
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Re:CALEA (Score:5, Informative)
While a DS-3 might not be out of the question to the FBI, depending on the volume of traffic, I have yet to see an "unmonitored" line. Everything I've seen (and set up -- I do this for a living) is an IPSec tunnel from the carrier to the LEA with BER encoded ASN.1 for data and packetized native (to the carrier) encoded voice. And the line works one way only. Carrier --> LEA. The only packets flowing back are stateful connection packets.
In short, I think this story is B.S.
Yes, the FBI probably has a big line with no firewall. That is because the firewall(s) is/are on the carrier end. The carriers do extensive logging as well, so it doesn't surprise me that the FBI-end of the circuit isn't heavily logged. They log their REQUESTS and the carrier logs the connections.
Re:CALEA (Score:5, Informative)
It may appear to be unfiltered to the person making the connection. However, if it is anything like the T1 I hooked up where I worked, only the calls with active warrants are passed down the T1. That being said, the T1 hooks directly into the switch just like any other T1, and is configured to be a CALEA port in the switch itself. A wire-frame guy who isn't doing the programming/translations wouldn't know any better, so I think that's where this "idea" comes from.
Re:CALEA (Score:4, Interesting)
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Many switches open a data channel between the switch and Quantico. Telcos are required to deliver not only the voice, but details about the call including supervision status, digits dialed and collected, and even if the tapped phone goes on and off hook.
Typically, this "call detail" information is delivered via TCP/IP from the switch in question. My understanding is you cannot have any stateful packet inspection between your switch and the FBI, because of the potential for thi
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have direct access to the switch itself. Switch being the Nortel DMS,
Lucent 5ESS, Eriksons, and whatnot. All that is required is RAS or VPN
access to the backbone network and they have the keys to the kingdom
at that point.
Several flavors of devices sit on the network which convert a telnet
session into an async connection directly tied to the switch. It's just
like sitting at the main console. . .
( Cisco comm servers, Datakit and Applied In
Re:CALEA (Score:4, Insightful)
" Because the data center was a clearing house for all Verizon Wireless calls, the transmission line provided the Quantico recipient direct access to all content and all information concerning the origin and termination of telephone calls placed on the Verizon Wireless network as well as the actual content of calls.
The transmission line was unprotected by any firewall and would have enabled the recipient on the Quantico end to have unfettered access to Verizon Wireless customer records, data and information. Any customer databases, records and information could be downloaded from this center."
Since the tech was at the telco & not at Quantico, he was referring to security on the telco side. There was no firewall on the telco side.
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1. None of the other carriers have a "central clearinghouse for all wireless calls". There is just too much traffic to pump it all back to one location, much less start forking stuff off down a single DS-3. The carriers break the country into regions -- about a dozen or so -- where all calls for the region go through a regional hub.
2. Call processing, accounting and custo
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Exactly how is our entire election system privatized? Are you referring to the volunteers and government workers at the polling stations? According to you they work for Coca-Cola... or Halliburton? The county employees counting the votes? They must be working for Ford I guess.
If you're referring to the voting machines then yes. Those are privately manufactured and sold to the local governments. And aside from the Deibold machines, they're not
So, what are we doing about it? (Score:2)
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Talk is Cheap (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Talk is Cheap (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is that, with this administration, any claims of domestic spying are hardly "extraordinary". It's more like "business as usual" - to be assumed unless there's evidence to the contrary.
Re:Talk is Cheap (Score:4, Funny)
Go to your Verizon Wireless-serviced cell phone, call a friend in a foreign country, and have a normal conversation, but make sure to throw in a few key "red flag" words and phrases here and there. Examples of "red flags" are:
"Bomb"
"Subways"
"Code Green"
"Statue of Liberty"
"Monuments"
"Airplanes"
"Buildings"
"I hate George Bush and think the Justice Department is a corrupt pile of shit"
Say goodbye to your friend once a few or all of these phrases have been sprinkled into your conversation. Then sit back in your favorite Barca lounger, take out your stopwatch, measure how many minutes it takes for one or more black SUVs to park across from your driveway.
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terrorist
Same-sex marriages
Nader for president
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Since we don't know what wireless carrier Mr. Pasdar is referring to, we don't know that my experience with my carrier is actually evidence for his claim. I could have a different carrier.
And since your test doesn't actually eliminate all possible technologies but the one Mr. Pasdar describes, the results would be utterly inconclusive even if I happened to be using the same carrier to which Mr. Pasdar refers.
Finally, i
Guess who! (Score:4, Funny)
"Can you hear me now?"
"Yes we can, perfectly clear."
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In an unrelated story.... (Score:3, Funny)
Full story at eleven....
Cool (Score:3, Funny)
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The NSA and FBI are both hiring in the Tech areas (Score:5, Funny)
And the loyal opposition, the Democrats, will... (Score:5, Insightful)
Do you want to know why Bushco thinks it's above the law? Because until you fucking cowards grow a goddamn spine and stand up to their evil, corrosive attitude towards the rule of law THEY ARE.
Why is it that in 8 years, I have never, EVER heard of a major Democrat standing up and saying outright, without analogy, subtlety or tact, that thanks to Bush the terrorists have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams? That thanks to him, 19 insane religious fanatics have gone from "attacked three buildings and got their organization crushed like a bug for it's trouble" to "shook the rule of law, the foundation of the most powerful country in the world, to it's base?" That thanks to him and the Republican fear machine, bin Laden has changed and hurt American society in ways he never could have dreamed of? That thanks to him, the terrorists have won in every way that matters?
Opposition? You've been deceived... (Score:3, Insightful)
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Nonsense (Score:4, Insightful)
But I guess if the only thing that matters to you is "government power", then yes, you might think they're the same, because you're ignoring all the substantial differences.
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Re:Nonsense (Score:4, Insightful)
In fact, one might argue that the main reason the US government has been so bad at making positive change is that there are so many people here who believe, as a matter of principle, that government can't do anything well - and when those people are elected, they use their power to prove themselves right.
Government is really just an alternate way to get things done. Private industry and the free market are excellent at getting things done efficiently, but the other side of that coin is, they don't even try to get anything done that isn't going to be profitable. If you want something done, period, whether or not it's profitable, that's where government is useful. For example, look at phone and electrical service in rural areas: it didn't exist before the government stepped in, because it wasn't profitable to build phone infrastructure where there were only a few potential customers, but We The People decided that infrastructure was important enough that it should be built anyway.
On the other hand, I'd rather have a government that does good things, like make medical care and education available to people who can't afford to pay for it, than one that's stagnant and unable to do anything.
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They both want to rob one constituency or another in order to buy votes (and hence, power) from another.
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They are all socialist in the end. The only exception I know of is Ron Paul. We simply must elect him.
All the sig links and comment spam in the world won't make that happen, though: you need votes to get elected, and that means you need to convince the voters that your platform is what they want. Unfortunately for Ron Paul, what they want isn't radical libertarianism. Most voters in the US are just fine with government-operated schools and highways, Social Security, and those other "socialist" programs he opposes so strongly.
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.
Ron Paul is running for President of The United States. He opposes massive FEDERAL government. Why is it so hard for so many people to understand that his principles are rooted in the U.S. Constitution which grants very limited powers to the Federal government and most of the power to the states? The Department of Education didn't even exist un
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Re:And the loyal opposition, the Democrats, will.. (Score:5, Insightful)
The Democrats are no better than Bush? Then why is it Bush, and the party which routinely condemns "tax-and-spend liberals" and trumpets itself as the bringer of small government and fiscal responsibility, the one which has in 8 years saddled us and our children with more debt than every other president combined, and doubled the size of the federal budget whose cancerous growth he and the Republicans so vehemently denounce?
Neither party is at all better than the other? Since when have the Democrats proclaimed themselves to be the sole beacon of light, Moral Decency, and the Traditional American Family in the smothering night of evil secularism, only for one Democrat after another to turn out to be those gays or adulterers whom they so ardently and stridently insist are going to be the downfall of America?
What Democratic or Republican president before Bush has taken that fabled shining city upon a hill, and desecrated it such that his supporter's defense in a debate is no longer "Because we are better than they are," but "We aren't the worst human rights violator on Earth?"
No, the Democrats have a very long way to go before they are as bad as Bush has been, for both his party and the nation.
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To every complex question, there is an answer that is simple, concise, and wrong - paraphrase of H.L. Mencken.
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Re:And the loyal opposition, the Democrats, will.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Because thanks to him, the Democrats have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Literally. As in, they were criticizing the prescription drug boondoggle as going to far. When is that supposed to kick in, anyway?
And they got their education bill: "No Child Left Behind" was co-written by sen
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None of the laws in place that force carriers to play ball with the FBI were passed without the support of the Democrats. And I think it's quite reasonable. Whether or not you believe they always do so legitimately, the FBI needs the capability installing wiretaps as part of its mission. If they do so too often, the remedy is legislative, not technical.
And demonizing Bush is wrong and counterproductive. He isn't "evil", and he's not stupid. The guy is focused on preventing the next 9/11. Legitimate a
You are kidding. (Score:2, Interesting)
So if a bunch of sleazoids in Virginia want to listen to your daughter talk dirty to her boyfriend, there's no way to know and even if you did, nothing you can do about it.
And yet the remedy is legislative? Really? Yeah, if we pass a law to forbid casual spying on domestic citizens
So right! (Score:2)
Why are people surprised by this? (Score:5, Insightful)
who's in trouble (Score:2, Interesting)
You know I don't ever care anymore (Score:2)
It doesn't add up (Score:5, Interesting)
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That wouldn't require anything more than an additional data stream just like a thr
So it's a DS3 (Score:2)
Do the math (Score:4, Informative)
45000Kbps / 5.6Kbps = 8037 simultaneous calls supported on a DS3, assuming 0% overhead, protocol, encryption, and that all calls are half-rate.
VZW and ATTW have subscriber counts in the millions.
Whatever the legality or circumstance of this, a single DS3 is hardly wholesale snooping.
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With overhead- throughput on a DS3 is only about 43Mbps. All things considered- that's not a very large pipe (tube?) at all, especially considering the amount of traffic it would have to carry for wholesale surveillance. There are a lot of small to mid-sized companies that have OC3s, including mine. You can get one for only around $3k/month with the right carrier/contract. If anything- an OC-3 would be slightly more impressive, but considering the millions of customers and transac
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I've never seen an OC-24: the more common value in the US is an OC-48 (2.4Gbps). A good rule of thumb for getting the relative size of these pipes is that the number after the OC- represents roughly the number of DS3s which can be carried on the optical path. Of cours
It probably costs $1 billion a day. (Score:2)
DS-3 = high bandwidth? (Score:2, Insightful)
Going to Prison now? (Score:2)
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US law protects whistle blowers
What law? The one passed in 1970s? That was repealed by Bush last year.
Today no law protects Federal Whistleblowers.
If they squeak, the KGB, sorry FBI, descends on them like rocks.
Either that, or your husband is exposed as a spy, or your son is arrested for dealing in drugs.
Get real man!
We have a president who says we should thank companies for breaking the law!
And who treats the contitution as toilet paper to wipe cheney's a$$.
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What the hell are you talking about? (Score:2, Informative)
Would you mind explaining how a President can repeal a law? I think you could benefit from some education.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower#Whistleblower_Protection_Act_of_2007 [wikipedia.org]
As to this
"Today no law protects Federal Whistleblowers."
That's wrong too. Both the Whistleblower Protection Act and the No FEAR act protect federal whistleblowers.
No FEAR Act [wikipedia.org]
+4 informative for being totally wrong...
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he should be on his way to prison for breaking his end of the deal
Exactly! That is what the British said about Paul Revere...
Now wait a second! whose side am i on....is this the Empire or USA?
he signed on to a job that had requirements, and he broke those requirements
Wasn't the president asked to mumble something during the oath taking about keeping the constitution sacred and to obey it???
Oh yeah, right, such oaths mean nothing, since its the President.
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That means he never had a deal with the US Government not to disclose any de
network vcr's (Score:3, Informative)
Okay, so the DS3 is a Very Bad Thing for a tonne of reasons.
BUT ... The linked .doc says that
Note the focus on 'phone' and 'conversations'. Aside from demonstrating ignorance on the difference between 'mass' and masse', this statement *directly contradicts* the linked .pdf, which states that the exposed 'Data network' transports all mobile data service traffic and related business app traffic but *not* the raw traffic of the 'Cell network', which was not examined in the audit.
Anyone else read this similarly?
Which is it? This, plus the lack of detail around the location of the 'network vcrs', which presumably are traffic copy mechanisms, the location of which will determine exactly what data is exposed by this mechanism, gives me less of a warm-and-fuzzy feeling with respect to the allegation's supporting documentation.
I am in no way supporting the existence of this no-ACL, no-logging circuit into what is allegedly a major carrier's mobile support network. The devil is in the details in this dialogue, however, and there is no excuse for direct contradictions and lack of important detail.
Feds need to read the fine print (Score:3, Funny)
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get throttled by forged packets saying the party ended the phone call
If that happens, the following will happen:
In other news, the FBI busted a racket by Comcast executives that raked up billions for the syndicate by threatening to cutt of 911 access to customers mid-speech if they did not call a 1-900 number before.
Speaking to reporters, the regional FBI director of Quantico said: "We have received numerous complaints that comcast was delibrately cutting off 911 access to victims by forcing them to agree to route their calls through a 1-900-xxxxx number located in the east
Re:everyones an expert (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't think that out of that 1.2 MILLION of mostly geeks many of us don't work in the datacom industry?
And that out of those, many of us see the stupid games the government plays with the second biggest near monopoly/cartel on the planet?
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You have given hours of quality entertainment to the boys here at Langley.
Carry on patriot (and you probably should have that "red thing" looked at by a doctor).