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Driver caught using cell phone jamming device

alexkus 12y ago
One of the last things I'd want is lots of drivers near me to be even more distracted saying "Hello? Hello?" into their phone and repeatedly looking at it to see if they're still connected or still have a signal. Also, good luck if you're in an accident as no-one nearby can call the emergency services.
- mhurron 12y ago
  I would add someone going around blocking emergency radios to that last things list. http://tbo.com/news/business/fcc-seffner-man-was-using-cell-phone-jammer-20140429/ http://tbo.com/news/business/fcc-seffner-man-was-using-cell-... "When Hillsborough County Sheriffs deputies stopped the SUV, their own two-way radios were jammed."
  - mikestew 12y ago
    By default I assume law enforcement is exaggerating for effect, but lot of emergency radios are on 800Mhz, AT&T (as one example) uses 850Mhz, so it wouldn't be hard to imagine a radio transmitter that cuts a wide swath (e. g., jammer) and interferes with other radios.
    - InclinedPlane 12y ago
      Do you not understand how jammers work? They are not narrow-band devices.
      - rcxdude 12y ago
        This depends on the jammer. They range from jam-almost-everything, to jamming only specific wavelengths (configurable or not), to jamming only specific protocols (which is more technically a DOS attack, but still functions like jamming). Assuming the driver was using a wavebubble, it's likely that it would jam police radios as well (depending on configuration).
      - mikestew 12y ago
        I understand how they work just fine. Which part of my statement implies a narrow-band device? Perhaps I was unclear, but I think that I worded it such that a wide-band device was implied ("wide swath"). Regardless, jammers can be narrow-band or wide-band depending on the goal. The device in the article sounds to be wide-band, but that doesn't define the entire category.
xacaxulu 12y ago
I got to play with these in Afghanistan. They were installed in our SUVs but they were so huge and unwieldy. I'd be interested in seeing what setup he had. Unless the traffic was very dense and slow, I'd imagine him just forcing calls to be dropped as he passed by which doesn't really seem helpful. Restaurants/theaters/anywhere-there-be-tweens, yeah bring it on in those locales!
- toomuchtodo 12y ago
  They're (cellular frequency jammers) down to the size of a cigarette pack, and can run off 12V aux power in your car. Range isn't terribly great (~100ft). Examples: http://www.phonejammer.com/home.php?cat=249 http://www.phonejammer.com/home.php?cat=249 Mods: I posted the link (which was the first google result for "cell phone jammer") just to show what the size and cost was. If it needs to be removed, please feel free to remove my comment in its entirety.
  - dublinben 12y ago
    A friend has one of these compact models from China, and it works just as you'd expect. It will completely kill any and all cell phone connections (or WiFi, or Bluetooth) within a large room. Apparently it can run for several hours on battery, or the length of a long movie.
  - Wistar 12y ago
    I darn well KNOW that a crappy hotel I stayed at in San Diego a few years ago was using a jammer.
- rdl 12y ago
  You can do network-specific jamming really easily (P25, the dominant digital trunked police radios, can be locked out by reprogramming a toy pager to tie up the trunks, for about $20 and in the milliwatts...). JIEDDO was generally trying to jam more than just cellphones, and wanted high assurance, and while they were in motion (so, you needed range).
  - 12y ago
incision 12y ago
Certainly a terrible idea on every level, but I can't help but sympathize with the intent. Too much of the public simply aren't responsible about driving and there doesn't seem to be any good way to identify and prevent or penalize them for it.
- cleaver 12y ago
  As a motorcyclist, I can sympathize... I become acutely aware of distracted drivers when I'm in traffic on two wheels. Like you say, it's a terrible idea for a lot of reasons, but I always admire a good hack.
- Nogwater 12y ago
  Since hands-free phone usage is just as distracting[1], it would be very challenging for a police offer know if someone is using a cell phone while driving. Probably we just need a cultural shift to make people reluctant to use a phone (or even talk to their passenger) while driving. My guess is that we'll get self-driving cars first. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_and_driving_safety#Handsfree_device http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_and_driving_safet... Edit: https://www.aaafoundation.org/sites/default/files/MeasuringCognitiveDistractionFS.pdf https://www.aaafoundation.org/sites/default/files/MeasuringC... Don't talk to passengers folks! (like that's going to happen)
  - sukuriant 12y ago
    I need to read those studies closely; but, I imagine there's a difference between gabbing about nothing and doing serious mental work when it comes to the amount of focus taken away by talking. Singing with the radio probably has similar focus requirements to gabbing. I have not done any tests on this; and we're not going to stop singing on the radio. Fiddling with a phone is probably the most dangerous of phone related activities while driving, though. Looking and reading off the screen (texts), pushing capacitive spots on the screen to interact with it (changing songs), and so on. Police most likely want eyes on the road, as even passive attention to the road is better than eyes completely off it. [edit: replaced "be singing" with "stop singing" since that's what I meant to say]
leephillips 12y ago
My impression that the biggest domestic market for these is hotel operators, who secret them around the premises to force their customers to be gouged by the hotel phone. EDIT: reference: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/07/business/07jamming.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/07/business/07jamming.html?_r... There is disagreement about whether this actually happens in the US; seems to be more evidence for it in the UK.
- pinko 12y ago
  Any evidence or reference? I can't believe this is true, since such persistent, immobile jammers would be trivial to locate (and presumably would be -- cell providers track down problems as the OP's article attests), and hotels would have so much to lose from being caught, and so little to gain by doing it.
- monksy 12y ago
  Given the competition for hotels in the states... I don't buy that for a minute.
- lostlogin 12y ago
  I know of a dentist who has one to stop patients using their phones. As someone who works in a hospital, I can see his point. People answer their phones in the middle of procedures. Some even make calls during them.
  - massysett 12y ago
    Did he ever consider asking his patients to stop?
    - lostlogin 12y ago
      I don't know, but we have several signs and yet I have still needed to ask patients to stop. It probably happens once or twice a month. Not quite as frequent is those who try to video their procedure. While I get irritated, I'd get more bothered by not being able to make or receive calls myself if a jammer was installed. A good compromise is to have patients seated near an MRI Faraday cage - it works just as well and doesn't break laws.
msoad 12y ago
I don't know if you noticed this but in my area most of retail stores have terrible cellphone reception. I'm assuming they put cell jammers in their store too
- colinbartlett 12y ago
  That's a pretty unsubstantiated assumption. Could it simply be that cell signals have trouble penetrating the store walls?
- mahart 12y ago
  There are building materials that naturally block/reflect/absorb mobile frequencies which is perfectly legal. That is different from transmitting a signal to jam which is highly illegal.
  - dingaling 12y ago
    One other trick is to advertise as a cell and accept connections, then just black-hole them. Full signal strength but no calls. Edit: may be illegal in your jurisdiction if you require a license to transmit on cell frequencies.
- thisone 12y ago
  I think it might be the fact that it's a rather large concrete box with very few areas that signal can pass through.
cheeseprocedure 12y ago
Does anyone here work for a wireless service provider? It would be interesting to hear how major sources of interference are identified and dealt with.
- TallGuyShort 12y ago
  Causing interference is generally covered by regulation, and the FCC enforces it. See some examples for violation of amateur radio misuse: http://transition.fcc.gov/eb/AmateurActions/Welcome.html http://transition.fcc.gov/eb/AmateurActions/Welcome.html edit: I don't work for a wireless service provider, but I'm into amateur radio.
  - mikestew 12y ago
    And to follow up on what TallGuyShort says, they most likely triangulate just as for amateur radio when looking for transmissions that violate regulations. Or, come to think of it, if you know the transmitter goes down I-4 everyday, just sit by the side of the road with a receiver and watch signal strength. I-4 can be pretty crowded, but it shouldn't be hard to narrow it down as the signal gets stronger then starts to tail off.
    - gkop 12y ago
      I learned from another HN comment that the correct word for this is trilaterate, not triangulate.
      - TallGuyShort 12y ago
        No it isn't - in this case triangulation is the correct technique. Trilateration is when you measure distances. For instance, locating the epicenter of an earthquake is done by comparing the time at which various waves arrive, and making calculations based on the known speeds of those waves. Doing that with the speed of light at terrestrial distances is very tough and will be prone to inaccuracies and large errors. Instead, you measure the angles at which the signal is strongest, and that is triangulation.
grecy 12y ago
Does anyone know if it would be legal to use something like this if it was sufficiently clear with big signs? I'm thinking movie theaters or coffee shops that have huge signs "Your cell phone will not work in there. If you don't agree, don't come in", etc.
- kelnos 12y ago
  Certainly not without FCC approval, which I'd doubt would be easy to get. The big issue (as described in the article) as that the chance of interfering with a legitimate emergency communications system is fairly high.
  - dublinben 12y ago
    The FCC does not even allow cell phone jammers at prisons. The Secret Service protecting the President is probably one of the few authorized users of cell phone jammers anywhere in the country.
    - zo1 12y ago
      Guess the "pigs"# are indeed more equal than the rest of us. #And no, I don't mean pigs as in the derogatory term for the police.
      - hsod 12y ago
        Are you arguing that it's wrong for the President's security team to be given special privileges under the law?
        zo1 12y ago
        No, I'm saying we're not all equal if such "special privileges" are granted to some special few individuals for one reason or another. Overall, it was a reference to the Animal Farm book. But if you want to know if I think it's wrong for us to have inequality in the form of non-universal applications of morality or "law", then I'll answer with Yes.
staunch 12y ago
Any solution that tries to pry people from their amazing magic boxes is going to fail. They're too damn good and only getting better. We just need self-driving cars and VR(/AR).
- fixermark 12y ago
  There's also a lot of room for improvement on the UI-side of things. Ideally, drivers shouldn't need to touch their phones to access the data or service they want; everything I want to do in the car ought to be voice-accessible.
monksy 12y ago
The real surprise here is that MetroPCS noticed the lack of service. As someone who has used Cricket [they bundle Sprint and MetroPCS together] ... they couldn't care less about spotty reception within their given coverage map.
nkozyra 12y ago
I've dreamed of doing this for a decade, even found some sources in the U.K. to purchase a few and looked up schematics for building wideband jammers. Ultimately it was the very serious approach the FCC takes that stopped me from really exploring it, even for fun. Everthing I'd read indicated that you'd be caught and fast, so I'm sort of surprised it took two years, even if it was on a highway. But lord I still might push it whenever I'm at the grocery store and someone's doing a remote, live shopping list with their wife down every aisle.
- skygazer 12y ago
  Why is a husband and wife talking to each other in a grocery store so vexing? Is it only if one is remote, or have you also looked into the ramifications of muzzling fellow shoppers? Is it that you prefer to hear both sides of stranger's conversations? I ask in a flippant way, just to highlight the incongruence, but I'm sincerely curious.
  - sukuriant 12y ago
    I think the image here in this person's mind is of someone bumbling around an isle, not looking where they're going (2 people tend to look around more and be more cogniscent of their environment, especially when the sounds they're listening to are coming from the environment (human voice, 3 feet away) and not a small box a few inches away)... and then occasionally yelling, "WHAT?!!?" into the phone when they can't hear.
  - lmm 12y ago
    > Is it that you prefer to hear both sides of stranger's conversations? Yes. Hearing just one half is irritating, I think because I can't help expending brainpower on filling in the other side. A speakerphone conversation is much less annoying.
- rohansingh 12y ago
  Really? Let's just hope nothing happens that requires someone to call 911 around you, finding themselves unable to and having emergency services be delayed.
michh 12y ago
My guess would be driving around with a relatively short-range jammer actually increases the odds of being hit by a distracted driver. Rather than people driving near you being distracted by conversations on their phones, they're going to be even more distracted because their call just got dropped, prompting them to look at the display waiting for the bars to come back so they can re-dial.
- harrystone 12y ago
  I agree. Most people aren't smart enough to put down their phone even to save their own life. The guy has good intentions but some people just can't be saved.
  - iLoch 12y ago
    Ahh, so the effectiveness of this devices is actually a matter of perspective...
  - Fuxy 12y ago
    Not to mention it's plain stupid. What if there's actually a legitimate need to use a cell phone like a big car accident. Or all the data connectivity some devices need for navigation. If you want to jam signals jam it on your farm/house but keep it out of public range.
- qwerty101010 12y ago
  But... if they became standard, no one would ever be able to use their phones near roads. Which would cause people to stop trying in the first place.
  - PhasmaFelis 12y ago
    Rather a lot of people actually live near roads.
    - Justsignedup 12y ago
      like literally all of new york
primitivesuave 12y ago
My mom's SUV was totaled by a woman who was on her iPad while driving. I really don't think we'll be fixing the idiots-on-the-road epidemic anytime soon.
- jablan 12y ago
  The solution is not only logical, but also an answer to lots of other problems: ditch the car-centric culture and move these people out from their cars to buses, trains, trams, bicycles and other forms of sustainable transport. It's not that hard, takes some time getting used to, but will do good to all of us.
  - sukuriant 12y ago
    First step: better buses, oh and stop removing routes from the bus system. (I'm looking at you Seattle and your recent voting results)
    - unsignedint 12y ago
      And perhaps transit mode off the road needs to be seriously invested, too. (Trains, etc.) Even as current state, buses are far from usable, unless perhaps you are living in the heart of the city...
  - zo1 12y ago
    Here's another non-obvious solution to the problem: Start making sure that insurance companies have no payouts if the driver's phone was on X amount of time before the accident. That way they pay for their own damage, and the damage done to everyone around them. Regardless if they were "at fault" using conventional reasoning. How about another one: Require all vehicles to install cell phone tethers that have the driver's registered sim card in it. Disable it during the drive. Mandate it's installation, and penalize people that break it, even more so if they were in an accident. Almost ALL problems have a technical/legislative solution for them. The only real problem is that no one has either the resolve, balls, lawyers, political backing, or money to implement/require those technical/legislative solutions. So all we get are half-asses solutions with selective (and sometimes biased) enforcement by the police/courts.
neil_s 12y ago
On a related note, anyone know why cinemas don't have some form of shielding/Faraday caging to prevent people from making calls? You could shield just the movie halls themselves, so people can still make emergency calls from the lobbies.
- elwell 12y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7676514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7676514
- vacri 12y ago
  Faraday caging is an extra expense, especially when it comes to retrofitting.
maresca 12y ago
My opinion is probably in the minority on this issue, but I think cell phones should be disabled by default near vehicles(Except for emergency services). As a stick-driver and motorcyclist, I see way too many distracted drivers. People will miss lights, swerve, and worse because of their cell phones. The one thing that will help reverse this trend will be self-driving cars.
- sukuriant 12y ago
  Do you like listening to Pandora or Spotify in your car? That would be disabled, too. Same band. I understand the desire, and it makes a lot of sense; but ... it's just not going to happen :/
  - maresca 12y ago
    I actually don't, but that's mainly to make my battery last. I get what you're saying though.
- hueving 12y ago
  This completely ignores everyone considerate enough to car pool. One of the major advantages is being able to read emails, check news, etc. If you can't do anything on your phone, it kind of wrecks one of the major perks.
  - maresca 12y ago
    A very valid point. I wonder what people did before all of these wonderful gadgets. Enjoy the scenery?
    - TeMPOraL 12y ago
      Read books, papers, do some noting/writing work if the ride is smooth. That's actually another good argument for self-driving cars. The used-to-be-driver doesn't have to waste his/her time anymore during commute.
    - 12y ago
bdg 12y ago
Great way to prevent people you drive around from calling 911...
TheCapn 12y ago
"Agents from the FCC used direction finding techniques to find that strong wideband emissions were coming out of a blue Toyota Highlander SUV driven by Humphreys." This I find interesting and am curious what devices they had to obtain in order to accomplish this. I used to work for a telco that, to this day, continues to have this very issue with _someone_ in a remote rural location. By the time the NOC can inform local law enforcement the jammer has left the area, seemingly impossible to track.
- DanBC 12y ago
  Aren't the FCC helping?
- Periodic 12y ago
  I think this person gave themselves away by being extremely regular about their behavior. If he was causing disruption on the commute every day for two years then they had plenty of time to work through the bureaucracy of getting the equipment out there and tracking it down.
- eephd 12y ago
  It was a strong radiator (perhaps broadband) and that makes it easy to geo-locate. You can use distributed mobile sensors and TDOA to pinpoint the location.
- ChuckMcM 12y ago
  Tracking radio signals with two spectrum analyzers, two Yagi type directional antennas is pretty trivial. If you know the probable location set up two (or more for a faster fix) people with gps units and their hand held antennas. Tell them the frequency and they can read back their headings (you know their position from GPS). After about 3 minutes of this you have the transmitter location to a precision of less than 12" if it isn't moving.
- jacquesm 12y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direction_finding http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direction_finding
- 12y ago
harrystone 12y ago
I appreciate this guy's intent but he doesn't need to do this. Texting while driving is the leading cause of death for teens. The problem is fixing itself.
- TeMPOraL 12y ago
  If only they killed/permanently injured just themselves, not innocent people...
jlgaddis 12y ago
About 20 years ago, an electrical engineer friend of mine had built himself a small (~10 GHz, IIRC?) transmitter about the size of a garage door opener. It had a single red button on it that, when pressed, emitted a signal in one of the frequency bands that radar detectors picked up. As a teenager, it was amusing to watch another car go zipping past us on the highway and then see their brake lights come on right after Nathan would hit the button.
wsh 12y ago
There are a few more details in the FCC's official “Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture,” which was released yesterday: On June 14, 2013, agents from the Tampa Office tested the seized cell phone jammer and confirmed that it was capable of jamming cellular and PCS communications in at least three frequency bands: 821-968 MHz, 1800-2006 MHz, and 2091-2180 MHz. — http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2014/db0429/FCC-14-55A1.pdf http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2014...
zacinbusiness 12y ago
I can understand the desire. But at the same time, I use Spotify while I'm driving and it would be really annoying to me that a crazy spacebat with a jammer blocked my tunes. But as is pointed out already, I feel certain this would actually increase distracted driving.
evanb 12y ago
Does anyone know if it is illegal for the military to operate these within the United States? I'm not sure they're in use, but I did notice that an unreasonably high percentage of my phone calls were (perhaps coincidentally) dropped when I was on I-395 near the Pentagon.
bradchoate 12y ago
"A Florida man..." -- should be disclosed in the article title (kinda how the link domain is shown).
pjc50 12y ago
Note from Europe: fairly soon all cars will be required to include a mobile system with GPS that will automatically call the emergency services if the car is involved in an accident. This system is called "eCall". http://www.heero-pilot.eu/ressource/static/files/2013_12_09_ecall-implementation-for-psaps.pdf http://www.heero-pilot.eu/ressource/static/files/2013_12_09_... It's not just humans that need to make emergency phone calls without being jammed.
galuggus 12y ago
I wonder if he was jamming or doing something else There has recently been a crackdown in China on people driving around with a device that can hack and spam cellphones. I think the way it works is by spoofing a basestation. It's range is short and it has to be kept on the move to avoid detection so the scammers drive it around busy areas all day. I'll try to find more info if anyone is interested.
chrisBob 12y ago
If you don't like people driving and talking on their cell phones while driving near you then there is on easy solution. It is hard to find many good tech jobs near the radio observatory though, so this option might not be good for the HN crowd. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_National_Radio_Quiet_Zone http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_National_Radio_Qu...
TheRealWatson 12y ago
If only the police was that determined to also find and punish the irresponsible drivers.
deleted 12y ago
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deleted 12y ago
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One of the last things I'd want is lots of drivers near me to be even more distracted saying "Hello? Hello?" into their phone and repeatedly looking at it to see if they're still connected or still have a signal. Also, good luck if you're in an accident as no-one nearby can call the emergency services.

mhurron 12y ago
I would add someone going around blocking emergency radios to that last things list. http://tbo.com/news/business/fcc-seffner-man-was-using-cell-phone-jammer-20140429/ http://tbo.com/news/business/fcc-seffner-man-was-using-cell-... "When Hillsborough County Sheriffs deputies stopped the SUV, their own two-way radios were jammed."
- mikestew 12y ago
  By default I assume law enforcement is exaggerating for effect, but lot of emergency radios are on 800Mhz, AT&T (as one example) uses 850Mhz, so it wouldn't be hard to imagine a radio transmitter that cuts a wide swath (e. g., jammer) and interferes with other radios.
  - InclinedPlane 12y ago
    Do you not understand how jammers work? They are not narrow-band devices.
    - rcxdude 12y ago
      This depends on the jammer. They range from jam-almost-everything, to jamming only specific wavelengths (configurable or not), to jamming only specific protocols (which is more technically a DOS attack, but still functions like jamming). Assuming the driver was using a wavebubble, it's likely that it would jam police radios as well (depending on configuration).
    - mikestew 12y ago
      I understand how they work just fine. Which part of my statement implies a narrow-band device? Perhaps I was unclear, but I think that I worded it such that a wide-band device was implied ("wide swath"). Regardless, jammers can be narrow-band or wide-band depending on the goal. The device in the article sounds to be wide-band, but that doesn't define the entire category.

xacaxulu 12y ago

I got to play with these in Afghanistan. They were installed in our SUVs but they were so huge and unwieldy. I'd be interested in seeing what setup he had. Unless the traffic was very dense and slow, I'd imagine him just forcing calls to be dropped as he passed by which doesn't really seem helpful. Restaurants/theaters/anywhere-there-be-tweens, yeah bring it on in those locales!

toomuchtodo 12y ago
They're (cellular frequency jammers) down to the size of a cigarette pack, and can run off 12V aux power in your car. Range isn't terribly great (~100ft). Examples: http://www.phonejammer.com/home.php?cat=249 http://www.phonejammer.com/home.php?cat=249 Mods: I posted the link (which was the first google result for "cell phone jammer") just to show what the size and cost was. If it needs to be removed, please feel free to remove my comment in its entirety.
- dublinben 12y ago
  A friend has one of these compact models from China, and it works just as you'd expect. It will completely kill any and all cell phone connections (or WiFi, or Bluetooth) within a large room. Apparently it can run for several hours on battery, or the length of a long movie.
- Wistar 12y ago
  I darn well KNOW that a crappy hotel I stayed at in San Diego a few years ago was using a jammer.
rdl 12y ago
You can do network-specific jamming really easily (P25, the dominant digital trunked police radios, can be locked out by reprogramming a toy pager to tie up the trunks, for about $20 and in the milliwatts...). JIEDDO was generally trying to jam more than just cellphones, and wanted high assurance, and while they were in motion (so, you needed range).
- 12y ago

incision 12y ago

Certainly a terrible idea on every level, but I can't help but sympathize with the intent. Too much of the public simply aren't responsible about driving and there doesn't seem to be any good way to identify and prevent or penalize them for it.

cleaver 12y ago
As a motorcyclist, I can sympathize... I become acutely aware of distracted drivers when I'm in traffic on two wheels. Like you say, it's a terrible idea for a lot of reasons, but I always admire a good hack.
Nogwater 12y ago
Since hands-free phone usage is just as distracting[1], it would be very challenging for a police offer know if someone is using a cell phone while driving. Probably we just need a cultural shift to make people reluctant to use a phone (or even talk to their passenger) while driving. My guess is that we'll get self-driving cars first. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_and_driving_safety#Handsfree_device http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_and_driving_safet... Edit: https://www.aaafoundation.org/sites/default/files/MeasuringCognitiveDistractionFS.pdf https://www.aaafoundation.org/sites/default/files/MeasuringC... Don't talk to passengers folks! (like that's going to happen)
- sukuriant 12y ago
  I need to read those studies closely; but, I imagine there's a difference between gabbing about nothing and doing serious mental work when it comes to the amount of focus taken away by talking. Singing with the radio probably has similar focus requirements to gabbing. I have not done any tests on this; and we're not going to stop singing on the radio. Fiddling with a phone is probably the most dangerous of phone related activities while driving, though. Looking and reading off the screen (texts), pushing capacitive spots on the screen to interact with it (changing songs), and so on. Police most likely want eyes on the road, as even passive attention to the road is better than eyes completely off it. [edit: replaced "be singing" with "stop singing" since that's what I meant to say]

leephillips 12y ago

My impression that the biggest domestic market for these is hotel operators, who secret them around the premises to force their customers to be gouged by the hotel phone. EDIT: reference: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/07/business/07jamming.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/07/business/07jamming.html?_r... There is disagreement about whether this actually happens in the US; seems to be more evidence for it in the UK.

pinko 12y ago
Any evidence or reference? I can't believe this is true, since such persistent, immobile jammers would be trivial to locate (and presumably would be -- cell providers track down problems as the OP's article attests), and hotels would have so much to lose from being caught, and so little to gain by doing it.
monksy 12y ago
Given the competition for hotels in the states... I don't buy that for a minute.
lostlogin 12y ago
I know of a dentist who has one to stop patients using their phones. As someone who works in a hospital, I can see his point. People answer their phones in the middle of procedures. Some even make calls during them.
- massysett 12y ago
  Did he ever consider asking his patients to stop?
  - lostlogin 12y ago
    I don't know, but we have several signs and yet I have still needed to ask patients to stop. It probably happens once or twice a month. Not quite as frequent is those who try to video their procedure. While I get irritated, I'd get more bothered by not being able to make or receive calls myself if a jammer was installed. A good compromise is to have patients seated near an MRI Faraday cage - it works just as well and doesn't break laws.

msoad 12y ago

I don't know if you noticed this but in my area most of retail stores have terrible cellphone reception. I'm assuming they put cell jammers in their store too

colinbartlett 12y ago
That's a pretty unsubstantiated assumption. Could it simply be that cell signals have trouble penetrating the store walls?
mahart 12y ago
There are building materials that naturally block/reflect/absorb mobile frequencies which is perfectly legal. That is different from transmitting a signal to jam which is highly illegal.
- dingaling 12y ago
  One other trick is to advertise as a cell and accept connections, then just black-hole them. Full signal strength but no calls. Edit: may be illegal in your jurisdiction if you require a license to transmit on cell frequencies.
thisone 12y ago
I think it might be the fact that it's a rather large concrete box with very few areas that signal can pass through.

cheeseprocedure 12y ago

Does anyone here work for a wireless service provider? It would be interesting to hear how major sources of interference are identified and dealt with.

TallGuyShort 12y ago
Causing interference is generally covered by regulation, and the FCC enforces it. See some examples for violation of amateur radio misuse: http://transition.fcc.gov/eb/AmateurActions/Welcome.html http://transition.fcc.gov/eb/AmateurActions/Welcome.html edit: I don't work for a wireless service provider, but I'm into amateur radio.
- mikestew 12y ago
  And to follow up on what TallGuyShort says, they most likely triangulate just as for amateur radio when looking for transmissions that violate regulations. Or, come to think of it, if you know the transmitter goes down I-4 everyday, just sit by the side of the road with a receiver and watch signal strength. I-4 can be pretty crowded, but it shouldn't be hard to narrow it down as the signal gets stronger then starts to tail off.
  - gkop 12y ago
    I learned from another HN comment that the correct word for this is trilaterate, not triangulate.
    - TallGuyShort 12y ago
      No it isn't - in this case triangulation is the correct technique. Trilateration is when you measure distances. For instance, locating the epicenter of an earthquake is done by comparing the time at which various waves arrive, and making calculations based on the known speeds of those waves. Doing that with the speed of light at terrestrial distances is very tough and will be prone to inaccuracies and large errors. Instead, you measure the angles at which the signal is strongest, and that is triangulation.

grecy 12y ago

Does anyone know if it would be legal to use something like this if it was sufficiently clear with big signs? I'm thinking movie theaters or coffee shops that have huge signs "Your cell phone will not work in there. If you don't agree, don't come in", etc.

kelnos 12y ago
Certainly not without FCC approval, which I'd doubt would be easy to get. The big issue (as described in the article) as that the chance of interfering with a legitimate emergency communications system is fairly high.
- dublinben 12y ago
  The FCC does not even allow cell phone jammers at prisons. The Secret Service protecting the President is probably one of the few authorized users of cell phone jammers anywhere in the country.
  - zo1 12y ago
    Guess the "pigs"# are indeed more equal than the rest of us. #And no, I don't mean pigs as in the derogatory term for the police.
    - hsod 12y ago
      Are you arguing that it's wrong for the President's security team to be given special privileges under the law?
      - zo1 12y ago
        No, I'm saying we're not all equal if such "special privileges" are granted to some special few individuals for one reason or another. Overall, it was a reference to the Animal Farm book. But if you want to know if I think it's wrong for us to have inequality in the form of non-universal applications of morality or "law", then I'll answer with Yes.

staunch 12y ago

Any solution that tries to pry people from their amazing magic boxes is going to fail. They're too damn good and only getting better. We just need self-driving cars and VR(/AR).

fixermark 12y ago
There's also a lot of room for improvement on the UI-side of things. Ideally, drivers shouldn't need to touch their phones to access the data or service they want; everything I want to do in the car ought to be voice-accessible.

monksy 12y ago

The real surprise here is that MetroPCS noticed the lack of service. As someone who has used Cricket [they bundle Sprint and MetroPCS together] ... they couldn't care less about spotty reception within their given coverage map.

nkozyra 12y ago

I've dreamed of doing this for a decade, even found some sources in the U.K. to purchase a few and looked up schematics for building wideband jammers. Ultimately it was the very serious approach the FCC takes that stopped me from really exploring it, even for fun. Everthing I'd read indicated that you'd be caught and fast, so I'm sort of surprised it took two years, even if it was on a highway. But lord I still might push it whenever I'm at the grocery store and someone's doing a remote, live shopping list with their wife down every aisle.

skygazer 12y ago
Why is a husband and wife talking to each other in a grocery store so vexing? Is it only if one is remote, or have you also looked into the ramifications of muzzling fellow shoppers? Is it that you prefer to hear both sides of stranger's conversations? I ask in a flippant way, just to highlight the incongruence, but I'm sincerely curious.
- sukuriant 12y ago
  I think the image here in this person's mind is of someone bumbling around an isle, not looking where they're going (2 people tend to look around more and be more cogniscent of their environment, especially when the sounds they're listening to are coming from the environment (human voice, 3 feet away) and not a small box a few inches away)... and then occasionally yelling, "WHAT?!!?" into the phone when they can't hear.
- lmm 12y ago
  > Is it that you prefer to hear both sides of stranger's conversations? Yes. Hearing just one half is irritating, I think because I can't help expending brainpower on filling in the other side. A speakerphone conversation is much less annoying.
rohansingh 12y ago
Really? Let's just hope nothing happens that requires someone to call 911 around you, finding themselves unable to and having emergency services be delayed.

michh 12y ago

My guess would be driving around with a relatively short-range jammer actually increases the odds of being hit by a distracted driver. Rather than people driving near you being distracted by conversations on their phones, they're going to be even more distracted because their call just got dropped, prompting them to look at the display waiting for the bars to come back so they can re-dial.

harrystone 12y ago
I agree. Most people aren't smart enough to put down their phone even to save their own life. The guy has good intentions but some people just can't be saved.
- iLoch 12y ago
  Ahh, so the effectiveness of this devices is actually a matter of perspective...
- Fuxy 12y ago
  Not to mention it's plain stupid. What if there's actually a legitimate need to use a cell phone like a big car accident. Or all the data connectivity some devices need for navigation. If you want to jam signals jam it on your farm/house but keep it out of public range.
qwerty101010 12y ago
But... if they became standard, no one would ever be able to use their phones near roads. Which would cause people to stop trying in the first place.
- PhasmaFelis 12y ago
  Rather a lot of people actually live near roads.
  - Justsignedup 12y ago
    like literally all of new york

primitivesuave 12y ago

My mom's SUV was totaled by a woman who was on her iPad while driving. I really don't think we'll be fixing the idiots-on-the-road epidemic anytime soon.

jablan 12y ago
The solution is not only logical, but also an answer to lots of other problems: ditch the car-centric culture and move these people out from their cars to buses, trains, trams, bicycles and other forms of sustainable transport. It's not that hard, takes some time getting used to, but will do good to all of us.
- sukuriant 12y ago
  First step: better buses, oh and stop removing routes from the bus system. (I'm looking at you Seattle and your recent voting results)
  - unsignedint 12y ago
    And perhaps transit mode off the road needs to be seriously invested, too. (Trains, etc.) Even as current state, buses are far from usable, unless perhaps you are living in the heart of the city...
- zo1 12y ago
  Here's another non-obvious solution to the problem: Start making sure that insurance companies have no payouts if the driver's phone was on X amount of time before the accident. That way they pay for their own damage, and the damage done to everyone around them. Regardless if they were "at fault" using conventional reasoning. How about another one: Require all vehicles to install cell phone tethers that have the driver's registered sim card in it. Disable it during the drive. Mandate it's installation, and penalize people that break it, even more so if they were in an accident. Almost ALL problems have a technical/legislative solution for them. The only real problem is that no one has either the resolve, balls, lawyers, political backing, or money to implement/require those technical/legislative solutions. So all we get are half-asses solutions with selective (and sometimes biased) enforcement by the police/courts.

neil_s 12y ago

On a related note, anyone know why cinemas don't have some form of shielding/Faraday caging to prevent people from making calls? You could shield just the movie halls themselves, so people can still make emergency calls from the lobbies.

elwell 12y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7676514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7676514
vacri 12y ago
Faraday caging is an extra expense, especially when it comes to retrofitting.

maresca 12y ago

My opinion is probably in the minority on this issue, but I think cell phones should be disabled by default near vehicles(Except for emergency services). As a stick-driver and motorcyclist, I see way too many distracted drivers. People will miss lights, swerve, and worse because of their cell phones. The one thing that will help reverse this trend will be self-driving cars.

sukuriant 12y ago
Do you like listening to Pandora or Spotify in your car? That would be disabled, too. Same band. I understand the desire, and it makes a lot of sense; but ... it's just not going to happen :/
- maresca 12y ago
  I actually don't, but that's mainly to make my battery last. I get what you're saying though.
hueving 12y ago
This completely ignores everyone considerate enough to car pool. One of the major advantages is being able to read emails, check news, etc. If you can't do anything on your phone, it kind of wrecks one of the major perks.
- maresca 12y ago
  A very valid point. I wonder what people did before all of these wonderful gadgets. Enjoy the scenery?
  - TeMPOraL 12y ago
    Read books, papers, do some noting/writing work if the ride is smooth. That's actually another good argument for self-driving cars. The used-to-be-driver doesn't have to waste his/her time anymore during commute.
  - 12y ago

bdg 12y ago

Great way to prevent people you drive around from calling 911...

TheCapn 12y ago

"Agents from the FCC used direction finding techniques to find that strong wideband emissions were coming out of a blue Toyota Highlander SUV driven by Humphreys." This I find interesting and am curious what devices they had to obtain in order to accomplish this. I used to work for a telco that, to this day, continues to have this very issue with _someone_ in a remote rural location. By the time the NOC can inform local law enforcement the jammer has left the area, seemingly impossible to track.

DanBC 12y ago
Aren't the FCC helping?
Periodic 12y ago
I think this person gave themselves away by being extremely regular about their behavior. If he was causing disruption on the commute every day for two years then they had plenty of time to work through the bureaucracy of getting the equipment out there and tracking it down.
eephd 12y ago
It was a strong radiator (perhaps broadband) and that makes it easy to geo-locate. You can use distributed mobile sensors and TDOA to pinpoint the location.
ChuckMcM 12y ago
Tracking radio signals with two spectrum analyzers, two Yagi type directional antennas is pretty trivial. If you know the probable location set up two (or more for a faster fix) people with gps units and their hand held antennas. Tell them the frequency and they can read back their headings (you know their position from GPS). After about 3 minutes of this you have the transmitter location to a precision of less than 12" if it isn't moving.
jacquesm 12y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direction_finding http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direction_finding
12y ago

harrystone 12y ago

I appreciate this guy's intent but he doesn't need to do this. Texting while driving is the leading cause of death for teens. The problem is fixing itself.

TeMPOraL 12y ago
If only they killed/permanently injured just themselves, not innocent people...

jlgaddis 12y ago

About 20 years ago, an electrical engineer friend of mine had built himself a small (~10 GHz, IIRC?) transmitter about the size of a garage door opener. It had a single red button on it that, when pressed, emitted a signal in one of the frequency bands that radar detectors picked up. As a teenager, it was amusing to watch another car go zipping past us on the highway and then see their brake lights come on right after Nathan would hit the button.

wsh 12y ago

There are a few more details in the FCC's official “Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture,” which was released yesterday: On June 14, 2013, agents from the Tampa Office tested the seized cell phone jammer and confirmed that it was capable of jamming cellular and PCS communications in at least three frequency bands: 821-968 MHz, 1800-2006 MHz, and 2091-2180 MHz. — http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2014/db0429/FCC-14-55A1.pdf http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2014...

zacinbusiness 12y ago

I can understand the desire. But at the same time, I use Spotify while I'm driving and it would be really annoying to me that a crazy spacebat with a jammer blocked my tunes. But as is pointed out already, I feel certain this would actually increase distracted driving.

evanb 12y ago

Does anyone know if it is illegal for the military to operate these within the United States? I'm not sure they're in use, but I did notice that an unreasonably high percentage of my phone calls were (perhaps coincidentally) dropped when I was on I-395 near the Pentagon.

bradchoate 12y ago

"A Florida man..." -- should be disclosed in the article title (kinda how the link domain is shown).

pjc50 12y ago

Note from Europe: fairly soon all cars will be required to include a mobile system with GPS that will automatically call the emergency services if the car is involved in an accident. This system is called "eCall". http://www.heero-pilot.eu/ressource/static/files/2013_12_09_ecall-implementation-for-psaps.pdf http://www.heero-pilot.eu/ressource/static/files/2013_12_09_... It's not just humans that need to make emergency phone calls without being jammed.

galuggus 12y ago

I wonder if he was jamming or doing something else There has recently been a crackdown in China on people driving around with a device that can hack and spam cellphones. I think the way it works is by spoofing a basestation. It's range is short and it has to be kept on the move to avoid detection so the scammers drive it around busy areas all day. I'll try to find more info if anyone is interested.

chrisBob 12y ago

If you don't like people driving and talking on their cell phones while driving near you then there is on easy solution. It is hard to find many good tech jobs near the radio observatory though, so this option might not be good for the HN crowd. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_National_Radio_Quiet_Zone http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_National_Radio_Qu...

TheRealWatson 12y ago

If only the police was that determined to also find and punish the irresponsible drivers.

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