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> In the raid, authorities seized 1200 SIM boxes, with the devices containing 40,000 active SIM cards Realistically, wouldn't that look suspicious to a cell to
by sva_ 1y ago
> In the raid, authorities seized 1200 SIM boxes, with the devices containing 40,000 active SIM cards
Realistically, wouldn't that look suspicious to a cell tower if 40k sims log in from one location?
- doublerabbit 1y agoConsidering how enriched we are with mobile devices you'd probably already have hundred of thousands logging in from one location.
- lillecarl 1y agoNo, the denser the area the more radio towers there are making precision better.
- Nextgrid 1y agoIf they mostly received inbound traffic, the carrier actually gets paid for it, so may not have any incentive to stop this. Carriers generally only care when SIM farms place outgoing traffic (it allows them to use cheap/free consumer plans instead of expensive SMS providers).
- rmbyrro 1y agoCan they know the SIM location precisely? I believe they can only triangulate multiple towers to determine a radius. If they could pinpoint a specific, narrow location, it'd be easier to spot unusual concentration.
- Lapsa 1y agothey can know your inner monologue, thoughts precisely
- lillecarl 1y agoIt's not impossible that they have directional antennas pointed at different towers nearby-ish, if you do directional antennas the triangulation thing kinda fails. Just speculation though, it's more likely they just paid the right people off.
- jpalawaga 1y agoDepends. They found one of these in New York but it’s very easy for 10s of thousands onto gather in a relatively small area. For example, New Year’s Eve, sports/concert at msg, regular foot traffic at Times Square, etc. so I think barring even antennas shenanigans, disguising it could be not impossible. (I also understand they rarely use all active SIMs at the same time but instead rotate through in order to avoid arousing suspicion)
- immibis 1y ago> but instead rotate through in order to avoid arousing suspicion Also to use fewer resources! Compared to the SIM cards, the radio/modems are expensive. It's cheaper to reuse one radio/modem cycling through different SIM cards for just long enough to receive pending SMSes. But not too many, or you increase latency. It's probably more suspicious to have the same modems cycling through SIM cards than to have all of them always connected.
- mrtksn 1y agoI bet it looks better in their books to have 40K paying customers more than not having those, so they just ignore it as long as not causing more problems than they are worth it. My guess is that the telcos were making half a million euros a month from these.