A Legal Analysis For Why BART's Mobile Phone Shutdown Was Illegal

from the free-speech-isn't-free dept

There's been a lot of coverage over BART's bizarre decision to shut down mobile phone service in one of its stations to hinder some potential protestors. With the FCC investigating, we've heard a number of folks say that there's no First Amendment violation here because there's "no right to mobile phone service." And while it's true that there's no right to mobile phone service, the law is pretty clear that there is a right to not have the government try to stifle a particular form of speech by shutting down infrastructure, solely targeted at that form of speech.

That is, the key issue isn't whether BART needed to keep its mobile phone service up all the time. If it goes down for maintenance, that's fine. But it can't turn it off if the decision is to try to block a particular type of speech. And that's exactly what BART clearly admitted to doing. Of course, it's not just the First Amendment at issue. There's also telecom law, and it appears BART violated that too.

Telecom lawyer/consumer rights advocate Harold Feld has a long and detailed explanation for why the shut down both violates telecom law and is also just a bad idea in general. It's pretty detailed, pointing out the specific citations in telecom law that were violated and a series of relevant caselaw decisions. There's a lot in there, but here's a key citation that reads like it could apply almost directly to the BART situation:

In Pike v. Southern Bell Tel. &Telegraph Co., 81 So.2d 254 (Ala. 1955), Mr. Connor, in his capacity as Commissioner of Public Safety for the City of Birmingham, ordered Southern Bell to remove the telephone of one Louis Pike, described by Mr. Connor as “a negro” of “questionable character” alleged by Mr. Connor to be a “well-known lottery operator in the city” and to be using his phone for unspecified “illegal purposes.” Reviewing cases from other jurisdictions (including People v. Brophy), the Alabama Supreme Court found that the right of every citizen to use a phone was guaranteed by federal law and could not be deprived without due process.  As the Court observed:

The present tendency and drift towards the Police State gives all free Americans pause.  The unconstitutional and extra-judicial enlargement of coercive governmental power is a frightening and cancerous growth on our body politic.  Once we assumed axiomatic that a citizen was presumed innocent until proved guilty.  The tendency of governments to shift the burden of proof to citizens to prove their innocence is indefensible and intolerable.

We are not able to glean from the bare conclusions set up in the letter of the Commissioner, whether it is claimed that the “illegal” use of the telephone was by the appellant, her husband, or a total stranger.  From aught that was alleged in the plea, except for the conclusion of the Commissioner, no “illegal” use of any type was made of this telephone by any one.

The notice alleged to have been received by the Telephone Company was couched in the terms of a direct order from the Commissioner of Public Safety.  What is the source of Mr. Connor’s authority to issue such an order?  We know of none.  And we hold that none exists.

If we took a contrary view, it would naturally flow and follow that the telephone company would be justified in acting on the notice of any over-zealous law enforcement official who, without evidence, and on mere suspicion, is impressed with the bad character or occupation of a particular telephone subscriber. The letter from Commissioner Connor set up in the plea is no defense.  It is the Telephone Company’s burden to show that the use being made of the telephone did, in fact, justify its removal.

These depredations of a subscriber’s legal right to telephone service constitute a denial of due process guaranteed by the Constitution of 1901, art. 1, § 6.  The gratuitous and arbitrary action of a police official is no justification for an abridgment of this right.  To hold that the Telephone Company is justified in discontinuing service by “order” of a police official would require judicial recognition of a police power which does not exist.  The bald assertion of an executive officer, be he the Attorney General of the United States or a constable of some remote beat, cannot be accepted as a substitute for proof in the judicial process.  No presumption arises as to the sufficiency of evidence based on a law enforcement officer’s conclusions.

Similarly, the BART's possession of “intelligence” that individuals may use their mobile phones to coordinate illegal activity does not confer “police power that does not exist.” BART must still go to the California agency with actual jurisdiction, the CPUC, and obtain a legal order authorizing the shut down of cellular service.

Filed Under: bart, free speech, harold feld, mobile phones, protests, wireless

Could Google's Motorola Buy To Fend Off Microsoft... Actually Drive More Business To Microsoft?

from the the-perverted-economics-of-patents dept

It's pretty clearly established at this point that Google bought Motorola Mobility in large part because of the patents. The number being tossed out is that 50% of the price was for the patents. A big part of the reason for those patents was to fend off Microsoft, who has been quite aggressive in claiming patents over things in Android. In fact, multiple sources have reported that thanks to patents and licensing, Microsoft actually makes more money from Android than from Windows Phone. Talk about perverted patent economics.

Of course, the big question that many raised when Google did this deal was whether it would actually push some handset makers away from Android, out of a fear of competing with their own supplier. While big Android players like HTC quickly downplayed that risk, insisting that they were committed to Android, at least some are speaking out about being less willing to bet on Android, and how it might even drive them to look more closely at Microsoft's Windows Phone operating system.

Let's unpack this for a second, because it begins to show just how ridiculous this overall situation is:

• Microsoft, thanks to patents, makes more money from Android phones.
• In order to fend off patent threats, Google buys Motorola to get its patents.
• In doing so, handset makers scared of competing with Google, start looking at Microsoft as a partner.
• The end result: Microsoft may get more handset partners, but less money, since Android is a pure licensing profit center.

So, the Google buy may result in fewer Android devices and more Windows phones... but less money for Microsoft. Whatever happened to the simple system where companies just compete in the market place and the best one wins?

Filed Under: android, patents, windows phone
Companies: google, microsoft, motorola

No, Having Open WiFi Does Not Make You 'Negligent' And Liable For $10,000

from the no-freaking-way dept

That Anonymous Coward was the first of a few of you to send over the news that one of the "John Does" sued by Corbin Fisher/Liberty Media has settled. Corbin Fisher is a porn company that has followed the footsteps of others down the mass infringement lawsuits path that many of us note feels a lot more like a shakedown process than a reasonable use of copyright law. Even more troubling, in our view, is that one of the theories presented by the company is that anyone who has an open WiFi network, and uses that as an explanation for what happened, is guilty of negligence. Given the vast number of good reasons to leave a WiFi network open, we found this quite troubling.

And so we're extremely worried about this particular settlement, which you can see embedded below. The full payout by the Doe is $10,401, but the breakdown is as follows:

• $200 for innocent infringement
• $200 for contributory infringement
• $1 to pay off the conspiracy charge... while not admitting to any conspiracy (another theory presented is that in using BitTorrent, you enter into a "conspiracy" -- a claim we won't debate this time around, but may revisit another time)
• $10,000 for the negligence of having an open router

While we have issues with a lot of this, it's that last part that is super troubling. While this is not a legal ruling, just the fact that it's in a settlement will allow Corbin Fisher and others to wave the document around, warning others that if they want to claim that their WiFi was open -- a potentially legitimate defense -- they now risk a massive fine for so-called "negligence." This is insulting, dangerous and ridiculous. There are all sorts of legitimate reasons to leave your WiFi network open and almost none of them amount to "negligence," by any stretch of the imagination.

As I've mentioned in the past, I'm also surprised by the fact that the lawyer representing Corbin Fisher/Liberty Media in this case is Marc Randazza, who has done some fantastic work in the past and present to defend free speech rights -- including taking on a variety of defendants against copyright troll Righthaven, despite its efforts bearing some striking similarities to what Corbin Fisher is doing here. In fact, Randazza has been at the forefront of many of the recent victories against Righthaven, and the various attempts to force Righthaven to pay up for its abuse of the court system to shake people down.

I like and respect Randazza and have sent a few interesting cases his way when people I know have needed legal help concerning attacks on their free speech rights. He's also helped us at times when we've been threatened with bogus lawsuits. But I still have trouble understanding his position on these Corbin Fisher cases, which strike me as being the same, or in some cases, worse than some of these other efforts. Given that, I emailed Marc, telling him I was going to write a post about this settlement and the fact that I think it's a horrible and dangerous result, that will be used to harass people who have open WiFi networks for perfectly legitimate reasons, and asking if he had any comment. He wrote back a lengthy response, which he also sent to TorrentFreak, who posted it as an article.

This is one time where I think Randazza is 100% wrong, and is actually doing significant harm to causes he claims to support. Thankfully, the folks at the EFF (who list Randazza as a lawyer to talk to if you're hit up for money by copyright trolls) have stepped up to debunk the legal basis of Randazza's argument, which is effectively based on a famous case on negligence involving tugboat radios. The EFF points out that such negligence claims for a service provider are clearly barred by Section 230:

Perhaps hoping to avoid this limitation, the essay suggests that operators can be held liable under a general tort theory of negligence (meaning, it's not a copyright claim, just a general injury claim). But that approach immediately crashes against another legal wall. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act offers broad immunity from tort claims (including negligence) to providers of “interactive computer services” for claims arising from the activities of their users. The statute’s broad definition of interactive computer service includes “specifically a service or system that provides access to the Internet.” (emphasis added).

What I find even more troubling about Randazza's argument and especially this settlement is how it will be used (whether by Randazza or others) to falsely imply that having an open WiFi network -- which is perfectly legal -- is not a defense when sued. In fact, the really nefarious part of this is that not only does it imply you can't use that defense, it implies additional liability for mentioning this very legal use of WiFi as a part of your defense. Anything that effectively takes away a legal defense against a questionable legal claim, and implies that you may actually be hurting yourself just for bringing it up, is immensely troubling.

Randazza claims that negligence claims are really a way of saying "you should have seen this coming." But that's ridiculous. It implies that anyone leaving open WiFi must assume that people will use that open WiFi for illegal activity. That's a huge leap. There are security reasons as to why you might want to secure your own WiFi... but there are also alternative ways to secure your home surfing and home network, while still leaving an open WiFi network. Randazza's statements suggest that's not possible and that anyone opening up their home WiFi should know that it's likely to be used for illegal activity.

Like the EFF, I'm also troubled by the way that Randazza seems to ignore the basic concepts of properly applying liability. We have safe harbors in the DMCA and the CDA for a very specific reason: to have people properly apply liability to the actual actors, and not the third party service providers and intermediaries. We have a long tradition in US law, even outside of those explicit safe harbors, that liability should be applied to the actual actors, rather than 3rd party service providers. Randazza talks about how leaving your WiFi open leaves you open to having your house raided by police if someone uses your router to transmit child porn. But just because the police might raid your house improperly, that does not suddenly make it negligent to have an open router. Instead, it should raise questions about the investigation and the decision to raid the house.

In fact, we keep seeing that even when someone uses open WiFi to commit a crime, while law enforcement may investigate, they're still looking for the person who actually did the crime. The fact that Randazza ignores this and basically says that because you might get raided, it's negligence, is really troubling.

Furthermore, Randazza stretches liability to ridiculous levels with some guilt by association:

The kind of person who would steal your car is probably the kind of person who would commit other crimes (or just do something stupid). So if you leave your keys in your car, and someone takes it and drives it into someone’s fence, you’re at least partially responsible for the damage. If the car thief runs off, who should pay for the damage? The fence owner or you? It would seem that between those two parties, you would be more responsible than the fence owner. You wouldn’t say that the fence owner should have built a better fence, would you?

That’s what negligence is: It is the law saying “You really should have seen that coming.” When you do something careless, and that carelessness costs someone else money, you pay the ”carelessness tax” – Negligence.

And the kind of person who would steal wifi is more likely to steal something else, isn’t he? So if you invite wifi theft by leaving your home network open, you’re more likely than not also inviting more.

But that's incredibly misleading (beyond the false use of "stealing"). First of all, those who have open WiFi should not have "seen it coming," because there are lots of perfectly legitimate reasons to offer and use open WiFi. Nothing about doing so should make you liable for what people do on the network, and that's exactly what the law says. Leaving your network open is not "inviting theft." That's simply misleading.

Finally, there are tremendous benefits to the public for there to be more open WiFi available. Getting settlements like this and implying that having open WiFi is negligence and potentially costly, serves to hurt such connectivity and holds back perfectly legal and reasonable options for many people to connect to the internet. While Randazza believes there are ethical issues here, I tend to side with two different NYTimes ethicists, who both came down in favor of open WiFi being perfectly ethical. In many ways, it's beyond ethical, in that it's altruistic, providing the community around you with something useful. Efforts to suggest potential legal liability for such actions strikes me as really nasty and an affront to the belief that helping others connect to the internet is a good thing.

At the end of his response, Randazza notes that he respects the perspective of people who "don't like the negligence claim," and suggests that it's the law we're disagreeing with, rather than his application of it. But I disagree entirely. As the EFF noted, there is no case law that says an open WiFi is negligence, and Randazza's position here seems like a pretty big stretch of the law, especially in light of Section 230 safe harbors. Randazza told me over email that he completely understands and appreciates that folks like myself disagree with him on this, but I think he should revisit his overall approach here. He also mentions that he makes clear to his clients that he will not represent them if he believes it will harm the First Amendment, something (as mentioned earlier) he's famous for helping to protect. But I'd argue he fails on First Amendment grounds in bringing (and defending) these negligence claims.

Trying to get around the proper application of liability and blaming third parties for actions they did not commit, while pushing to shut down a channel of communication, seems very much an attack on basic First Amendment principles. It's an attempt to use legal pressure to stop a form of speech. Yes, some of that speech may be infringement, but the vast majority of speech via open WiFi is not infringement or child porn as Randazza suggests. So, as a staunch First Amendment defender, I hope that he will reconsider his position in bringing such a negligence claim -- and, I hope that he will reject the further use of this highly questionable settlement.

Filed Under: copyright, marc randazza, negligence, open wifi, wifi

Once Again, Basic Detective Work Tracks Down Criminal Activity Done On Open WiFi

from the not-so-difficult dept

One of the things we hear over and over again about the evils of "open WiFi" is that it allows criminals do horrible things on a network with no way to track them down. We've always pointed out how ridiculous this is. Just because someone does something on a network, it doesn't mean they don't necessarily leave other clues that can be uncovered through basic detective work. And, time and time and time and time and time again, we see stories of basic detective work being used to catch criminals on open WiFi networks.

Here's yet another example. In a case involving a disgruntled former IT worker logging into his former employer's computer systems and pretty much deleting everything important (including "the company’s e-mail and BlackBerry servers, as well as its order-tracking system and financial-management software"). These sorts of things happen every so often, and the responsible party almost always gets caught.

In this case, Jason Cornish used an open WiFi network at a McDonalds to do his dirty work. But there was enough evidence to link the crime to Cornish (beyond basic motives). For example, investigators discovered that he had made a purchase of some food at that McDonalds about five minutes before the deletion began. Honestly, it looks like he wasn't particularly careful in a variety of things that he did -- but that's kind of the point. The fear about how open WiFi will be regularly abused and there will be "no way" to track down those responsible is a huge exaggeration. Perhaps there are some users who are careful enough not to leave a trail, but those sorts of people will figure out a way to do what they want with or without open WiFi. The fear of untraceable hackers on open WiFi is way overblown.

Filed Under: crime, detective work, open wifi, wifi

Does The FBI Really Use Surveillance Vans With WiFi SSIDs Saying 'FBI_SURVEILLANCE_VAN'?

from the not-sure-i-believe-it... dept

Danny was the first of a few of you to send in variations on the story of Tampa police arresting a teenager, Jared Cano, for allegedly plotting to blow up a local high school. The police were apparently tipped off by someone. However, what resulted in the submission is the note in the article about a posting on Cano's Facebook page from a few days ago, in which he claims that he saw an SSID for "FBI_SURVEILLANCE VAN": This is leading lots of people to ask just how stupid the FBI is for having such an SSID. The thing is... I doubt this is really true. There's no confirmation of it other than this kid saying it, and it doesn't sound like it was the FBI who investigated and arrested him in the first place. And while we've certainly seen the FBI do some crazy and clueless things at times over the years, I have a hard time believing that anyone there would ever be so clueless as to set up an open WiFi with that SSID.

Filed Under: fbi, jared cano, ssid, surveillance van

What Google Gets With Motorola Mobility

from the yet-another-IP-market-distortion dept

Having already covered the basics of the Google deal to buy Motorola Mobility, we asked Derek Kerton to weigh in with his thoughts on what the deal really means.

Some suggest that Google bought Motorola Mobility Inc (MMI) so that it can vertically integrate and produce flagship phone models that have the polish and seamlessness of the iPhone. But the real reason is a common theme here at Techdirt: Google needs to build its defenses against patent lawsuits in the smartphone industry.

On the very face of it, Google doesn't need a handset subsidiary to make a custom Google phone. They can easily commission a handset exactly how they want it from OEM brands like HTC and Samsung, and have already done just that with the Nexus models. They could easily design their own brand of phones and have it built by contract manufacturers like Foxconn (as Apple does). I've read elsewhere that Google now gets the benefit of better understanding of the challenges of integrating Android into handsets. That's also incorrect. Google has a history of sending teams of engineers to most of their handset and tablet partners to work side by side overcoming those challenges.

Perhaps Google just saw a good deal on Motorola. Its stock price has been dropping through the decade, and also the past year. The market value prior to today was just $7.3 Billion, compared to $20B for Nokia or $13B for RIM. Perhaps, like Nortel before it, the value of Motorola's Intellectual Property (IP) is being hidden by a poor operational record. A buyer like Gordon Gekko (of the 1987 film Wall Street) could have bought up MMI, divested the operational arm from the IP portfolio, and realized a gain by separating the parts (as Gekko famously did to an airline). Of course, that's a 'private equity' view on the purchase, but Google has indicated it will retain MMI for now. Still the sum of the parts might be worth more than the whole. Although not a startup, this seems similar to Masnick's post yesterday that the value of a startup's patents might exceed the value of the operation.

There is also the less-mentioned factor that Google now also owns MMI's set-top-box division, which might give a shot in the arm to the fledgling Google TV business. Bundling Google TV into every STB would be great for Google, but I would expect that, since these boxes are all bought by cable operators, the cable companies would ultimately decide if Google TV actually remained in the box once it was installed on the customer premises. Since Google TV competes with their on demand services, it may end up as popular as the built-in laptop tethering feature is on Verizon's Android smartphones - i.e. Verizon takes it out.

My understanding is that Google intends to run Motorola as independently as possible. That is, no doubt, to head off what is known as 'channel conflict'. Channel conflict occurs when one member of a supply chain, say the Android OS supplier to many handset vendors, expands into another part of the chain, in this case the handset industry. Now they are both a supplier AND a competitor to companies like HTC, Samsung, LG, etc. Historically, the other vendors start to mistrust their OS supplier, and become more reluctant to use the OS as they search for other options.

We've seen this before with Nokia's handling of Symbian. Since 2001, Symbian was, ostensibly, an openly available smartphone OS that any handset manufacturer could use. Nokia got behind this idea full force, not wanting to cede the market to OS companies like Microsoft. They pushed the idea of other handset vendors joining them, in competition against Redmond. Some did adopt Symbian, including Ericsson, Motorola, Siemens, NTT DoCoMo. But Nokia struggled with the notion that Symbian was "too controlled by Nokia" since around 2003, so they spun it off into an open consortium in 2009. Too little too late. The other OEMs didn't ever really believe that Symbian was truly independent. The end result is that very few other handset vendors ever got fully behind Symbian, even during the time when it was the best smartphone OS in the world. So Nokia just ended up buying it back again in 2010, and finally killing it off recently.

With Android linked too closely to Motorola, companies like Samsung might be driven more to their own OS, called BADA, while others like LG could seek new alternatives (Windows, QNX...) Thus, Google now must re-interpret the same dance that Nokia did years ago: "No, don't worry, Android is still open. You will have as equal access as Motorola." This may succeed, but is a precarious position. The dance partners may have changed, but the music is still the same. Let's see if they come up with some new moves.

OEM confidence that Google will keep equal access to Android to all handset vendors is made even more precarious since the recent moves by Google to prefer some vendors of its formerly "open" Android OS. Google only released the latest tablet version of the OS (Honeycomb 3.0) to select partners, shutting out the open source community and other hardware vendors from the OS for now. The first to get exclusive access? Motorola, for the Xoom tablet. This is not the best way to ease OEM concerns around equal access, given that some may be 'more equal than others'.

It becomes clear that what Google truly needs from the acquisition is the patent portfolio of Motorola Mobility. The smartphone patent wars have been raging lately. It seems every handset vendor is getting sued by big competitors and by patent trolls alike on a daily basis. Android vendors, for example, pay nothing to Google for use of the OS... but they must pay about $5 per phone to Microsoft because MSFT had the smartphone patent leverage against Google. In another dire example of the risk of patent assault on Android device makers, the Samsung Galaxy 10.1 Tablet has been shut out of European and Asian markets by injunctions based on patent claims from Apple.

To fend off patent assaults, companies seek to build their own patent arsenals. That, for example, is why so many vultures hovered around the carcass of Nortel, and bid up its patent portfolio to 4x what the market expected. Google bid, but did not win at the Nortel auction. But with Motorola's 14,000+ patent portfolio in the mobile phone industry, Google can not only defend Android much better from the patent assault (by threatening counter-assault), but Google can thus reduce risk and uncertainty for its handset partners, thereby making Android more attractive.

Think about it. One of the biggest features of the Android OS for device makers was the license fee: free. Free, as Techdirt readers know, offers some very powerful mathematical and business implications. Suddenly, building an in-house OS for your car stereo or TV remote control may look less attractive than a more powerful, free, Android OS. Same goes for tablets, fridges, netbooks, or phones. But if MSFT and Apple (and countless others) can layer up license fees, the attractiveness of Android starts to diminish. The power of 'free' disappears, and instead, uncertainty and risk of lawsuit reign supreme.

So, the deal results in two opposing forces for the future of Google: IP cost and risk mitigation, and potential channel conflict. If Google can succeed at making the IP risk mitigation more important than the channel conflict for the OEM vendors of the world, thereby winning more handset and device partners, the Motorola purchase can be a success. If channel conflict is the more important part of the equation, Google loses big. I wonder if Google might someday sell off the handset maker, but keep the IP. Big news, either way. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out.

Filed Under: deals, handsets, patents
Companies: google, motorola mobility

FCC Investigating Whether BART Cell Service Shut Off Was A Violation Of Federal Law

from the and/or-the-first-amendment dept

Late last week, after it came out that BART had decided to shut down mobile phone service in one station because of the threat of a protest (which never actually materialized) many people started questioning the legality of the move. Now comes the word that the FCC is investigating. It will be interesting to see what they have to say. I'm not sure if it actually did violate any specific FCC rules, though I would imagine that the FCC might worry about this kind of thing becoming more common. It seems to me that the First Amendment argument (which I would believe is outside the FCC's purview) is much stronger. Here, an entity acting on behalf of the government shut down a form of communication specifically directed at a form of protest speech in an attempt to block that speech. You can get away with things if they're "content neutral," but in a case where BART officials have flat out admitted that they were targeting speech they didn't like, it seems like there's a strong First Amendment claim, though I'm not sure who would actually bring such a lawsuit.

Filed Under: bart, free speech, mobile phones, protests, wireless

Google Spends $12.5 Billion To Buy Motorola Mobility... And Its Patents

from the keep-an-eye-on-the-patents dept

Lots of talk today about Google's surprise decision to buy Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion. The deal is leaving some people scratching their heads, because it seems like a business that Google had always stayed out of, preferring to provide the tools (Android) for others to go and do things. But I'm betting a big part of this deal is because of Motorola's patents. You have to think that a big chunk of mobile device and mobile OS-related patents are likely included in the deal, and it gives Google something else to use in response to the Nortel patents going elsewhere. Of course, it may cause some other problems, as Motorola Mobility competitors, who also work with Google, start wondering if they should keep using Google as a partner. It also makes you wonder what Google will really do with Motorola Mobility. It would be nice to see a Google-like approach from the hardware side, but I just don't see that as likely. My guess is that the hardware side will fizzle, but Google will still be happy it has the patents.

Filed Under: android, mobile, patents
Companies: google, motorola

AT&T Accidentally Reveals That It Doesn't Need T-Mobile At All

from the oops dept

One of the key talking points from AT&T in support of the T-Mobile merger is that it "needs" T-Mobile's spectrum in order to expand its planned 4G/LTE networks to cover 97% of the population. And, there's no doubt that having T-Mobile's spectrum will make it easier, but that's not the same as it being necessary. As Broadband Reports has been pointing out for a while, Verizon has less spectrum than AT&T but can cover the same 97% of the population with it. Apparently a lawyer for AT&T accidentally posted a document to the FCC's site that more or less admits that AT&T doesn't need T-Mobile's spectrum, and that it could invest $3.8 billion to catch up to Verizon in terms of LTE coverage. $3.8 billion is a fair bit of money, but it's a hell of a lot less than the $38 billion that it's spending for T-Mobile. Yes, AT&T also gets T-Mobile subscribers with that, but it certainly raises questions about AT&T's claims that it would be too "costly" to invest to get to 97% coverage with its existing spectrum. As BBR notes, the timing of the letter also suggests that AT&T knew it was planning to buy T-Mobile when it decided to claim that it would "not" build out its network, perhaps recognizing that this would help give it a talking point for why the merger should be allowed.

Filed Under: costs, merger, spectrum
Companies: at&t, t-mobile

BART Turns Off Mobile Phone Service At Station Because It Doesn't Want Protestors To Communicate

from the really-now? dept

With all the talk in the UK from politicians about shutting down mobile messaging services, it's worth pointing out that it apparently takes much less to shut down mobile service in the US at times. Jacob Appelbaum points out that BART -- the Bay Area Rapid Transit train system here in the California Bay Area -- apparently shut down all cell service at a station under the (false, as it turns out) belief that protesters were going to show up there:

As an added precaution, the agency shut off cellphone service on the station's platform. While Alkire said the tactic was an unusual measure, he said it was "a great tool to utilize for this specific purpose" given that the agency was expecting a potentially volatile situation.

That's really quite incredible, and I'm at a loss to see how that could be allowed. Because BART feared people protesting it literally shut down mobile phone service at its station? Since this particular station is underground, it has special equipment as regular cell towers don't reach the station. However, that shouldn't give BART officials the right to just turn off the service because they're unhappy that people might protest.

Filed Under: bart, free speech, mobile phones, protests, wireless
Companies: bart