Slashdot Mirror
Apple Disables Egyptian iPhones' GPS
floydman writes "Apparently the Egyptian government is paranoid about its community using GPS devices, to the degree that it demanded Apple remove any GPS functionality from its iPhone 3G.
They claim that 'GPS functionality should be limited to military purposes.' Egyptian blogger Ahmed Gabr brought this issue up in another article, and talks about how this does not make sense, since Google maps and the like can be used. I also happen to know for a fact that most of the modern cars in Egypt have built-in GPS systems."
Other than, say the ability to drop a UAV bomb on government buildings or open markets from hundreds of kilometers away ?
Other than that GPS would pose no real danger, no.
And yes and iphone 3G would be a usable (though probably not ideal) controller for such a UAV or rocket. It certainly has got the processing power and the necessary outputs.
You could perhaps make it send a nice MMS of a few surprised faces seconds before impact.
GPS + terrorists = disaster. The only thing stopping these things is their ease-of-use somewhat lacking and the price, obviously. It's also unreasonable to expect to be able to down a UAV before it reaches it's target. Maybe the american "star wars" program could do it. Maybe (to be honest I doubt it). Most countries do not have the capability of even detecting the thing in-flight (and with the bomb light enough, flying close to buildings the us does not have that capability either).
Add to that, what are you going to do if it's flying low over a populated city ? Bomb it, making at least 50 victims on the ground due to the size of the explosion ... and you get to take credit for the steel plates sticking into their chest, it was your rocket blast that killed, not the terrorist's.
An iphone 3g (or any gps device, but iphone 3g is sturdy, cheap and available) controlling a low flying bomb would be a terrorist's dream weapon. There's just no good way to dispose of them. And there's no way of disposing of 50 or 100 of them simultaneously.
"True, but let's imagine you have a car, a tank full of gas..." What car goes only 100 miles on a tankful of gas?