Comment Re:No, Technology isn't magic. (Score 1) 561
This is absolutely wrong on the Third point.
Cell phone triangulation works not by signal strength and police running on foot. Triangulation (a wrong term to use here) works by using the differences of time the signal hits the cell phone towers (TDOA, or time difference of arrival) and calculating intersections of the hyperbolaes generated. Several cell towers are required to cooperate for this though.
For technical reasons (bandwidth on many parts of the systems used), this cannot be done on every call, and is usually only done for 911 calls. In fact, there is an FCC requirement that this be done for all wireless 911 calls, and in the future there may be fines if this fails to happen.
This is all automated for 911, however, and adding someone's phone number to be tracked is going to require a lot more than just escalating above customer service.
Cell phone triangulation works not by signal strength and police running on foot. Triangulation (a wrong term to use here) works by using the differences of time the signal hits the cell phone towers (TDOA, or time difference of arrival) and calculating intersections of the hyperbolaes generated. Several cell towers are required to cooperate for this though.
For technical reasons (bandwidth on many parts of the systems used), this cannot be done on every call, and is usually only done for 911 calls. In fact, there is an FCC requirement that this be done for all wireless 911 calls, and in the future there may be fines if this fails to happen.
This is all automated for 911, however, and adding someone's phone number to be tracked is going to require a lot more than just escalating above customer service.
