Slashdot Mirror
Elderly Georgian Woman Cuts Armenian Internet
welcher writes "An elderly Georgian woman was scavenging for copper with a spade when she accidentally sliced through an underground cable and cut off internet services to nearly all of neighboring Armenia. The fibre-optic cable near Tiblisi, Georgia, supplies about 90% of Armenia's internet so the woman's unwitting sabotage had catastrophic consequences. Web users in the nation of 3.2 million people were left twiddling their thumbs for up to five hours. Large parts of Georgia and some areas of Azerbaijan were also affected. Dubbed 'the spade-hacker' by local media, the woman is being investigated on suspicion of damaging property. She faces up to three years in prison if charged and convicted."
assuming her goal wasn't to steal copper wire
"Scavenging for copper" is a euphemism for exactly this. The only copper you find 'just lying around' is copper being used for power or data transmission.
Why do they call them "scavengers" instead of what they really are - thieves.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I was under the impression that a self healing ring was a fairly common way of dealing with important fiber
Sorry, but you're making it too easy to even try..
which is totally what she said
I mean, it was an accident
So said Exxon after the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
If you cause harm due to ignoring the possible consequences of your action you should be punished according to the consequences of your act, not according to your intent. That's what the law defines as "criminal negligence".
"The only copper you find 'just lying around' is copper being used for power or data transmission.
Clearly you've never been in an office building or an industrial site. There's literally hundreds of km of unused and abandoned copper wires in buildings around the US. The basic practice of leasing a building with no network services, installing network services, and then when the lease is up reaching into the wall and cutting cables short so the next company can't benefit from your expense has caused all of this. In many places decommissioning is another way of saying get rid of the equipment and just cut the cable at both ends and leave it buried. We serviced an antenna mast a few weeks ago and pulled some 9 40m lengths of LMR-900 off the tower, all cables were traced from dead antennas to either loose connectors in the buildings or had been cut off in the building or on the tower. After the decommissioning we took the cable with us and someone sent it down to the recyclers. The metal in it was worth a fortune and no one could even tell us why it was there.
Yes it is. It's also understandable, justifiable, and a very poor reflection on the surrounding society, but it's still theft.
Actually it's not fheft it's copyright infrin....wait a second!
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+1
This is truly sad reality. I can remember standing in a McDonald's for morning breakfast back in ~2008, this store had a TV with CNN running and the news anchor made a comment that Russia had moved tanks into Georgia. The person taking my order quite literally asked how it was possible that Russia could get tanks into the USA