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The article talks about the son messaging his mother, and then says "by the time his mother realized that Airbnb would not give her his address and that she had

by manarth 11y ago

The article talks about the son messaging his mother, and then says "by the time his mother realized that Airbnb would not give her his address and that she had to get it from him, he said, his host had cut off Internet access". At a guess, I'd say the son didn't have roaming, and had connected to the host's wifi to send messages. The article also said "Mr. Lopez did not realize his phone would allow him to call and said he would have been scared to speak out loud into the phone in any event". The son could even have been using an ipad/ipod to send messages, so it wasn't unreasonable to think a phone call might not have been possible at all.

blfr 11y ago
You should be able to call 112 even without a SIM card, not to mention roaming.
- mschuster91 11y ago
  In Germany, not any more since 2009 due to massive amounts of abuse (http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Kein-Notruf-ohne-SIM-Karte-195838.html http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Kein-Notruf-ohne-SIM-...). Heh, if I were to commit a bank or casino robbery, I'd just have ten or twenty guys reporting fake hostage, rape and murder cases at the same time so that the police is spread too thin to come for aid.
- manarth 11y ago
  You used to be able to make emergency calls in the UK without a valid SIM card, but it's been required since 2009 [1][2] (apparently to cut down on untraceable hoax calls). There is a technical difference though, between 'Roaming' and using another network in the same country. I have roaming enabled on my Vodafone account, but I can't connect to O2's UK network when Vodafone is out of range, because the other UK networks are on a list of not-permitted networks. The technical solution is called LSS - "Limited Service State" (sometimes referred to as "Emergency Roaming", and that's what allows us to 'camp' on another network to make an emergency call, but it's a different technical implementation to roaming. Here's a thought though…if someone visits the UK from abroad, and hasn't activated roaming, is their SIM card considered 'valid' enough for the sake of LSS/Emergency Roaming? [1] http://community.giffgaff.com/t5/Using-giffgaff/Emergency-Roaming-in-the-UK/ta-p/5421642 http://community.giffgaff.com/t5/Using-giffgaff/Emergency-Ro... (GiffGaff is a UK mobile operator, but the requirement stands for all UK operators). [2] http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2009/next-steps-to-ensure-availability-take-up-and-effective-use-of-communications-services/ http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2009/next-steps-to-ensure-ava... (Ofcom is the UK regulator for communications industries).

by manarth 11y ago

blfr 11y ago

You should be able to call 112 even without a SIM card, not to mention roaming.

mschuster91 11y ago
In Germany, not any more since 2009 due to massive amounts of abuse (http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Kein-Notruf-ohne-SIM-Karte-195838.html http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Kein-Notruf-ohne-SIM-...). Heh, if I were to commit a bank or casino robbery, I'd just have ten or twenty guys reporting fake hostage, rape and murder cases at the same time so that the police is spread too thin to come for aid.
manarth 11y ago
You used to be able to make emergency calls in the UK without a valid SIM card, but it's been required since 2009 [1][2] (apparently to cut down on untraceable hoax calls). There is a technical difference though, between 'Roaming' and using another network in the same country. I have roaming enabled on my Vodafone account, but I can't connect to O2's UK network when Vodafone is out of range, because the other UK networks are on a list of not-permitted networks. The technical solution is called LSS - "Limited Service State" (sometimes referred to as "Emergency Roaming", and that's what allows us to 'camp' on another network to make an emergency call, but it's a different technical implementation to roaming. Here's a thought though…if someone visits the UK from abroad, and hasn't activated roaming, is their SIM card considered 'valid' enough for the sake of LSS/Emergency Roaming? [1] http://community.giffgaff.com/t5/Using-giffgaff/Emergency-Roaming-in-the-UK/ta-p/5421642 http://community.giffgaff.com/t5/Using-giffgaff/Emergency-Ro... (GiffGaff is a UK mobile operator, but the requirement stands for all UK operators). [2] http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2009/next-steps-to-ensure-availability-take-up-and-effective-use-of-communications-services/ http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2009/next-steps-to-ensure-ava... (Ofcom is the UK regulator for communications industries).