NYC shuts off cellphone service in tunnels
By Peter Rojas 
posted Jul 11th 2005 3:38PM
posted Jul 11th 2005 3:38PM
Cellphone coverage is notoriously spotty in subways and in tunnels (for obvious reasons), but NYC has pulled the plug on four places underground where the wireless carriers had extended their coverage: the Holland, Lincoln, Midtown, and Battery tunnels. Why? After last week's bombings in London the the MTA and Port Authority are worried about terrorists using cellphones to remotely detonate bombs in the tunnels and for the immediate future are blocking cellular networks in all four tunnels.
UPDATE: Looks like this was only temporary. Service should be back to normal this afternoon. [Thanks, StuBee]
Because it's so much more difficult to use an alarm clock.. Lame.
Easier solution would be to remove any security from the white house. After that the public can have a peaceful life. Isn't it funny to see that always the bad guys are the best protected ones ? They have plenty of reasons :D
They should shut them down anywhere near buses too.
Then you must be an idiot, Skype Fan.
"blocking cellular networks in all four tunnels"
Isnt that illegal? I can understand making the providers turn off their signals that reach to the tunnels....but to 'block' them...I'm sure thats illegal...If not someone show me some laws that say its not...I want to block cellphone use in the vally I live in lol.
Hey- i was just in the midtown tunnel on my cell phone about 10 minutes before this article was posted- wen will it go into effect?
This is one of those security measures that just doesn't make sense. Any determined bomber(s) would be able to rig the explosive with another device. Blocking the service causes more problems than it solves. Now everyday users that could get spotty service before can't get any and in the event of an incident, no one in the tunnel will be able to contact anyone...help there are 40 people trapped down here - dig faster...
Holy crap, the terrorists didn't even use cellphone signals to detonate the bombs... Apparently they could just have easily used alarms.
Damn conservative scaremongers will jump all over this.
Are cell phones also useful in emergency situations? Seems like a negligible benefit. Are there emergency phones located in the tunnels that can be used to report accidents, etc.?
what if u need to call 911.....
Final details aren't in on the London bombs, but the word is that they were all using traditional timers.
The Madrid bombs used cell phones, but the cell phones actually just had their internal alarm clocks set to detonate. They weren't detonated remotely by calling the cellphone.
So shutting down the cell signals in the tunnels does nothing. They must be mad about the NY Times report that said that of the $600 million allocated to pay for security upgrades to the MTA's system, only $30 million was spent, and most of that only on consultants.
Are there emergency phones in those tunnels? If not, it will be awfully hard to dial 911 from down there if there's any sort of accident in which someone requires immediate medical attention. (I've never driven through those tunnels, though, so I don't know.)
This is dangerously false security. How long have the American security chiefs been using "American Dad" as a source of ideas?
"More people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks" - Bruce Schneier
http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail119.html
What many fail to realise is that this is the point of terrorism. Spreading fear, and disrupting a way of life. Why do you think that there haven't been 9/11 magnitude follw up attacks in the US? They aren't needed is why. The government keeps the fear going without any more attacks - now the terrorists just have to carry out a minor (and i use that term relatively, it was an atrocity) attack every now and then to keep it going...
#4
There is no such thing as ILLEGAL when its the government performing the action.
The government decides what is legal and what is illegal. This little problem for instance is a clearcut excercise of national security power. There isn't a single congressman who can change the decisions of FEMA or the executive branch during wartime.
I've never been in the Holland, Lincoln, Midtown, or Battery tunnels. Do they have pedestrian access? If not, then how would the bombs be planted? I can't imagine a car stopping to place a package on the side of the road. If the bomb was to be detonated in a moving vehicle, then the suicide driver could detonate it himself. I guess they could use a moving vehicle with a clueless driver. That's the only scenario I can think of that would use remote detonation. Even then, a cell phone signal in a tunnel seems like an unreliable way to trigger anything.
Couldn't they rig the bombs to go off once they no longer had a signal then? I think we should stop making batteries too. And clocks, no more clocks should be allowed to be sold...
Franklin said it best...
"Those who would trade a freedom for security deserve neither freedom or security."
Silly Silly Silly
The actions of, um, none affecting the lives of everybody, to give the illusion of safety from a so called threat.
Didn't the train driver in london borrow someone's cell phone to call in the first bombing because the radio was down?
Why can't they use the same argument for preventing bombs being detonated in movie theaters?...
Reading boingboing.com...looks like the authorities figured out this was really not such a great idea after all.
http://www.ny1.com/ny1/content/index.jsp?stid=1&aid=52050
Yes, they should overturn this ASAP. From a eye-witness account of someone on one of the London tube trains that got blown up:
"We then had to wait while the driver called for assistance and tried to inform his controller or whatever that there’d been an incident – I think he had to borrow somebody’s mobile phone to do so"
http://www.thetriforce.com/newblog/
If there's a major incident in the tunnels, chances are the communications infrastructure is going to get damaged. In such cases having mobile reception would be invaluable.
heh, i can just imagine where this will lead.
"hey, whats this suspicious package with a timekeeping device attached, i better call teh police on my cell phone.... BOOM"
a week later in the news
"government bans all timekeeping devices from public transport, with the pleasant knock on effect of no-one know just how late all the trains are running therefore unable to complain about it."
"So shutting down the cell signals in the tunnels does nothing."
Bullshit. The fact of the matter is there have been more than two terrorist attacks in the world in the past 5 years and some of them *were* detonated remotely by cell phone (go look it up).
I see no reason why people need to be able to use their cell phones in these tunnels, when they didn't for the many decades before they were even available. Deal with it.
NYC has been the victim of *several* terrorist attacks (not just 9/11), and there have been several more major plots busted up over the past 15 years - including at least two targeting bridges and tunnels specifically, one of which was in the final stages of planning (i.e. the explosives were already bought, and were found by the cops in a Brooklyn apartment). So I hope nobody out there thinks nothing should be done to prevent an attack on these tunnels.
And if you're operating from the premise that something *should* be done (as anybody in their right mind would be), then I don't see how you can object to something that is such a minor inconvenience, and that does nothing but set things back to the way they were before these cell repeaters were installed 4-5 years ago. Your life is not worth being without cell phone service for five minutes? Sheesh.
Nobody is saying this is some sort of magic bullet. There is no magic bullet to prevent attacks. But you know, pre-9/11 if you had said you shouldn't allow box cutters on airplanes, everybody would have laughed and called you an idiot. But such a small, simple rule, enforced properly, would have saved thousands of lives and billions of dollars.
You can't know which rule, or combination of rules and laws, is going to prevent the next attack. But you can take some common sense precautions. I am as much in favor of maintaining our civil liberties in the face of terror as anybody; I'm no neo-con, and I vote democratic. But I'm sorry, talking on your cell phone in a tunnel is not a "civil liberty". In fact, it's basically illegal as it is for completely unrelated reasons, unless you're hands-free, which hardly anybody is (especially people coming from NJ, who seem to not realize they actually need to follow New York's laws when they get here).
So, I have no problem with this, and as someone who uses these tunnels pretty frequently, I'm happy to see any initiative to make them safer. There are not many things scarier in this world than being stuck in the Lincoln Tunnel next to an unmarked semi truck, for a whole mess of reasons. This at least eliminates one of them.
It doesn't make the tunnels safer, it just makes people who don't have any capacity for logic "feel" safer.
Bah, and now you say it's temporary. It should be permanent.
I may as well respond to this, though:
"If there's a major incident in the tunnels, chances are the communications infrastructure is going to get damaged. In such cases having mobile reception would be invaluable."
Except that cell phones in major incidents *don't work*. I had a cell phone on 9/11. How do you think my wife and I managed to call our parents to tell them we were okay? We walked to a diner and used a freakin' payphone.
Same thing during the blackout two years ago. The first thing to go in any emergency is cell phone service. From what I've read, this was as true in London after the bombings as it is in NYC. In every emergency there's ever been in NYC, the only reliable method of communication is a land line.
in response to jeff:
so you think a publicly announced law stopping a relatively new method of detonation (and unreliable at best) is going to make the slightest little bit of difference?
hell i can think up plenty of more reliable methods of readio detonation in the time it took to write this response, for example detonation on loss of signal from a personal transmitor.
its simply not in the slightest little bit effective, do you think they are going to make a bomb, set it all up. leave it, send the detonation command and _THEN_ realise there is no signal?
if you want the tunnels to be secure then be prepared to go to work with no bags or packages of any sort, as thats the only measure that would be effective, no bags of food, takeaways, etc.
for example do you realise what a coke can full of c4 would do? is the answer to ban all non-transperant drink containers from undergrounds?
Jeff, I think this is a case in which you have to look at the benefits and risks of the technology. Cell phones are used thousands of times a day in these tunnels, sometimes to call 911 (what I'll call a "very positive" use), sometimes to advance a business or social need ("positive"), sometimes just to kill time recreationally ("neutral"), sometimes to the distraction of drivers ("negative"), and sometimes -- just hypothetically at this point -- to detonate bombs ("very negative"). I would guess that the vast majority of these cases fall into the "very positive," "positive" or "neutral" brackets, so you'd have to give all those up in order to avoid the "negative" and "very negative" brackets. Frankly, it makes more sense to ban cell phones in order to promote safer driving, which many cities are now doing. But this whole discussion is about detonating bombs, and it seems (at least to me) to be unreasonable to stop thousands of positive and neutral things from happening every day, just on the off chance that something very negative might happen in the future... especially when the very negative thing can be accomplished in many other ways that don't involve cell phones.
Box cutters were already prohibited on airplanes prior to 9/11, and that's because no one could think of a compelling benefit to allowing them, versus the risk of allowing them. I've flown quite a bit, and I can tell you that I've never seen anyone try to pass the time on a flight by cutting open boxes. I've also driven quite a bit, and I can tell you that many drivers use cell phones for legitimate reasons.
In the United States, sometimes guns are used to save lives ("very positive"), sometimes they're used to advance a business need like protecting property ("positive"), sometimes they're used to pass the time recreationally ("neutral"), sometimes they're used to threaten people ("negative"), and sometimes they're used to hurt or kill people ("very negative"). Now compare guns to cell phones. In the case of guns, the overwhelming majority of times they're used are "neutral," "negative," or "very negative." Even though guns are rarely used by civilians in the United States to save lives, and cell phones are used thousands of times a day towards that end, guns tend to be treated as a necessity and cell phones as a luxury.
It's all about benefit versus risk. In the United States, it would make far more sense -- and we'd be much safer -- if we banned guns than if we banned cell phones, but even banning guns won't keep people from hurting each other.
This is a safety measure that is unnecessary, but it still is to the publics interest. If you need to call 911, then wait for the next stop, since it will be very close. I think that most people can go without the cell phone for a few minutes if it insures public safety
Not that I think the gov't is 100% brilliant all the time, but it strikes me as unusual that they would do this - and continue to do it in several places even after stopping it in others - unless there were a specific threat. As a general precaution it does seem pointless, but if there is a specific threat it seems reasonable. And maybe "they" aren't telling anyone about a specific threat because of the panic and detriment to NYC commerce that would result.
As a terrorist I feel that I could easily work around such precautions. And by the way what subways are they talking about? They've never had cell service underground. I don't need a cellphone to blow things up. All you need is a well placed backpack and an egg timer. Or some stooge who's willing to die for Allah.
"Hello? Can you hear me? Bad!"
Israel has been dealing with terrorism for decades now. Anyone that has visited Israel in the last few years knows what security measures are in place. Before entering any mall or shopping center’s parking garage every vehicle is inspected, including the undercarriage and the trunk. Once inside, every bag is inspected before any person can walk into the mall. Bags and purses are also inspected at the entrance of every movie theater, high rise building, and bank. Uniformed police board buses at random intervals in major urban areas like Tel-Aviv and Jerusalem and check buses for suspicious packages. Helicopters patrol the border at night between Israel and the west bank equipped with FLIR and night vision. Roadblocks are common, especially along major arteries, leading into major cities, like Tel-Aviv and Jerusalem.
The IDF and the Israeli police have put massive resources into intelligence gathering and analysis. That includes a wide spread network of informants, under cover officers and electronic intelligence.
And, despite all these measures, suicide bombers still make it into Israel. So, the Israeli government has decided to start building a 25 foot concrete barrier along the entire 100+ mile border. THAT is supposed to make Israel more secure and sterile. There’s only one problem: One of the suicide bombers involved in a bus bombing a few years ago was actually a British national that had flown in to Israel on his British passport. So? How DO YOU stop terrorism and do we want to become a country like Israel, living in fear and panic?
Now, mind you, I have only scratched the surface here with what measures are in place. Putting any of these counter measures into effect in a country such as the U.S. would be disastrous. Manpower hours would have to be significantly increased, there will be budget cuts and reallocation of resources and the economy will slow down if not come to a grinding halt.
People willing to give up their freedoms for an artificial sense of security have no idea what they are talking about. It’s time we started looking at the big picture and the big picture is like this: The more scared we are, the more we’re going to sacrifice for a false sense of security. Eventually, we’re going to become a nation no different than those countries we’re trying to change now. We criticize regimes like the former Soviet Union, Korea and China for restricting people’s freedoms and restricting their use of telecommunications systems and the internet, but we’re failing to see that slowly and surely we’re inching towards that very same ideal.
The war on drugs hasn’t been as successful as politicians have promised. Why? Because unless we solve the problem at its very root we’re going to keep seeing the same issues resurface. Narcotics police officers know this all too well; they make arrests in a high drug activity area one week, but then a week later they come to realize that the problem has just moved a few blocks. It’s still there and not much has changed.
We need to take a hard look at what causes terrorism in the first place. Then, perhaps, we will understand what’s better for us as a nation.
As of 6PM today, there was still no signal. I was driving into Manhattan this evening, and my call got cut off. Every now and then, I feel a little anxiety when going through the tunnels, but that's been going on since I saw that crappy Stallone movie Daylight. Hasn't stopped me though. I actually thought cutting off cell service in the tunnel was a good idea, but upon reading everyone's posts, I guess there are the drawbacks. I'd hate to be without communication should something happen in the tunnel. And someone brought up the issue of whether there is a pedestrian walkway in the tunnels. The fact is that there is no public pedestrian walkway, just a narrow walkway for maintenance. I think I'll stop right there. I dont even want to get into how one might carry out an attack in the tunnel. gives me the heebie jeebies.
Jeff --
"some of them *were* detonated remotely by cell phone (go look it up)."
NO. Why don't you go look it up and come back with citations of the facts. YOU and YOUR KIND OF IDIOTS are the ones imposing on OUR rights to live freely, so the onus is on you to show your facts or STFU.
In the absence of a solid solution, an action like turning off cell phone signals in tunnels does have the effect of reassuring the general public that someone is on the case. Most people are not familiar with the technical or tactical methods available to terrorists, so this largely ineffective decision actually has the effect of protecting the local economy by convincing a lot of people it's safe to drive thru the tunnels. I believe that was the intention of the decision. That does not mean that they are not trying hard to figure out the best security policy. I'm sure quite a few people are losing sleep while they tackle this problem. But until the solution is found, steps must be taken to protect the economy. This decision would appear to be just that.
And what did people do in the tunnels BEFORE cell phones were invented?