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Yeah there was no cellular service, and the WiFi was limited to certain providers. They've been talking about this for decades as far as I can remember. They
by mattlondon 3y ago
Yeah there was no cellular service, and the WiFi was limited to certain providers.
They've been talking about this for decades as far as I can remember. They always resisted it because they were worried someone would use it to set off a bomb (London has quite a lot of terrorism in it's semi-recent history). I guess now they realised that suicide bombers are probably more likely than a Nokia 3310 rigged up to a detonator.
- lxgr 3y agoOh, that explains why the Wi-Fi was weirdly not available to international tourists/required registration with mobile networks. I've been wondering about that every time I've been to London.
- Symbiote 3y agoIt's nothing to do with bombs, that's just a conspiracy theory. There's some explanation here — power, space, time and cost were all issues: https://www.londonreconnections.com/2023/deep-inside-bringing-mobile-phone-coverage-to-the-underground-theengineer/ https://www.londonreconnections.com/2023/deep-inside-bringin... The wifi is available if you have a British SIM from a major network, there are also locals who can't use it.
- Angostura 3y ago> Oh, that explains why the Wi-Fi was weirdly not available to international tourists/required registration with mobile networks. Not really. The wifi was funded by the cellular/broadband networks as a value-add for their customers. So I was a broadband Virgin customer and could use Virgin Wifi on the Tube
- andrelaszlo 3y agoI imagine there must be countless other ways to accomplish this. Seems like CYA?