Lots
But seeing what that lot will do unbribed ...
1167 publicly visible posts • joined 29 Mar 2012
Well, no. They COULD -- but when firefighters, medical personnel and LE can't reach each other inside over their trunked or LTE systems -- shielding,remember? -- safety is a very large victim. I suspect occupants and convention goers etc whose cellular service is cut off would be miffed, too, not good for business.
In any event, access to law-enforcement and public safety communications has become part of the US National Fire Code and many localities have made it part of their building codes as well. Given the multiplicity of frequencies used and fast changing technologies, a simple Faraday Cage is pretty much ruled out. See links below.
*links
http://www.npstc.org/inBuilding.jsp
http://www.rfsolutions.com/
One approach used by insurgents -- and terrorists -- is to copy what government does, turning people against their own governments even if those really are defending them. Considering how many exploits and scripts are already running around wild, it seems additional surveillance can create an excess of less (shall we say) benign intrusions. There's no good way the average person can say who's taking his picture, writing down his licence number, reading his email or scanning his HDD when government insists on doing all of those and says he can't make it known or do anything to stop it.
Microswat apparently wants to churn hardware sales, producing operating systems that -- if security fixes were treated the same as auto safety -- cannot run on existing and still productive hardware, refusing to repair deficiencies in their own products that result in what would be massive recalls in the auto business (who can't squirt repairs down a link).
I worked in Avionics in the Army from1964-1980, and some of the equipment I worked with in Vietnam could still be seen in Active Duty Air Force transports in 1990; one enterprising person in Massachusetts, noting that test standards called out a specific instrument, bought the name and rights to build a vacuum tube (valve, to you blokes) Grid Dip Meter first sold in 1949. (http://www.isquare.com/millen/eqpicts/90651.html), much more recently, I worked in the digital loop carrier equipment business, where we made and sold equipment to telco's who expected FIFTY years of service and support. Military electronics, in a 2006--2011 job, had a still going and gegantic (sp) employer, as parts became EOL and unavailable, redesigning equipment first fielded in in the 1970's.
It seems to me that if the concept of implied warranty has any meaning, it applies to legacy products rendered unsafe to use not by acts by the users, but because of manufacturer oversights and omissions, manufacturers who, though GLAD to sell a lot if it, didn't want to fix teir errors after years of even decades while those who'd bought them could and were still being harmed as the mistakes became evident.
It could be worse; an OS update might some day come without warning (they've stopped giving most of us warnings) and a six day count-down to wiping it. Are they selling us ransomware? Not yet, but... there's money in it.
"... the Obama administration report showed that federal government agencies spent $10 billion on information security. The biggest culprits, experts say, are human error and a patchwork of different systems. Billions of dollars in security can't stop an employee from clicking a malicious link."
http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/19/politics/government-hacks-and-security-breaches-skyrocket/
Note also, that it's easier to buy, bribe, blackmail (e.g.: honeypot) convince or turn an operator than electronically intercept his work. Nothing fancy about the Snowden etc capers.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_American_spies#Americans_who_spied_for_foreign_countries
then needs must one despair; for all the good they do, no one will read them, there.
On the FCC's BPL Rulemaking (PLC for English speakers) my comments were backed up with reference to good data and a certain amount of what I thought was persuasive logic. Wasted effort; the Commission having seen the dagger readied to plunge into its budget in Congress, had orders from a higher authority; money.
Also see https://www.natoa.org/policy-advocacy/Documents/Deception&DistrustHouseRptFCC.pdf
In 1963 some of my colleagues in green decided to make shooting blanks on manoeuvers more fun by tying the end of a cleaning rod into the flash suppressors of their M-14's with alumin[i]um wire from a box of C-rations. Full auto, for a while, then the wire broke and the cleaning rod tip got stuck into a tree somewhere. As far as I know, nobody was wounded or killed thereby -- but some got angry after a vehicle accident and apparently managed flesh wounds with pine needles down the bore. The exercise (look up Swift Strike 3) was suspended a day or so to let tempers cool.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1891&dat=19630713&id=s_IhAAAAIBAJ&sjid=YdUEAAAAIBAJ&pg=1200,1509914
Fun days,eh?