O2's UK Network Crash Hits Offender Monitoring System

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O2's UK Network Crash Hits Offender Monitoring System

Posted by timothy on Friday July 13, 2012 @08:40PM from the feel-free-to-move-about-the-cabin dept.

judgecorp writes "Mobile operator O2's network crashed on Wednesday and Thursday of this week. In the aftermath it has emerged how other services rely on mobile networks. Law enforcement agencies were unable to track some convicted criminals wearing electronic tags, and the crash also disabled parts of London's network of 'Boris Bikes' — public hire bikes."

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It was a horrible day... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-13 20:48 · Score: 5, Funny

...I actually had to meet my friends face to face and use full sentences
Sounds like an Ocean's 19 Olympics heist trial run by PolygamousRanchKid+ · 2012-07-13 20:58 · Score: 3, Funny

Convicted Criminals on Boris Bikes . . . unable to be tracked!
We'll see their true intent during the Olympics, when the Crown Jewels or something like that are five-fingered.

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Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Re:Good on them by Chrisq · 2012-07-13 21:07 · Score: 4, Funny

We also had a crash in France recently (Orange was down for a whole day), and it made little to no difference on anyone's life -- except control freaks who had to know where you were all the time
i bet that's what the monitored criminals were saying!
Re:Good on them by nospam007 · 2012-07-13 21:36 · Score: 4, Funny

"Anyway, if you're relying on a single consumer mobile network for anything life-critical, you're an idiot."
Indeed, solar flares usually inflict damage only on corrupt carriers.
Wait 'til the electricity goes down, most people are so idiotic that they use only one provider there too.
Finally, news of some proper consequences by Higgs+Bosun · 2012-07-13 22:03 · Score: 5, Insightful

Now we're finally hearing of the important consequences of O2's network being down. I couldn't help but be irritated at how this was being reported in the news. Hysterical accounts of how Joe. Q. Public couldn't use their mobile. One news paper even found it news worthy to report that someone on twitter said they missed a phone call from their daughter! Wow, that really sounds like a living nightmare. Of course, there is also the inevitable talk of compensation... SPOILER: most people use their phones for inconsequential, inane yacking. For most people mobiles are a convenient toy they can live without. I hope it was just the news stirring things up and that we haven't all been reduced to being whiny cry babies. My mobile was affected (GiffGaff) but somehow I managed to deal with it and get on with life.
My sympathy is entirely with the engineers who would have certainly been under immense pressure to get this fixed ASAP, and to also provide a totally useless "ETA to resolution". Urgh, I've been there :(
1. Re:Finally, news of some proper consequences by Richard_at_work · 2012-07-13 22:31 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  The demand for compensation is amusing, as most people don't pay more than £30 a month for service - so a 3 day outage corresponds to £3 of service fees, and yet I've seen people demanding O2 pay them £50 or more for their inconvenience. Today's compensation culture is laughable and more than a little disgusting.
Why not roaming? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-07-13 22:18 · Score: 3, Interesting

Why were these 'critical' systems not set to automatically roam to another network if their 'home' network becomes unavailable?
1. Re:Why not roaming? by Igloodude · 2012-07-13 23:17 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Because the roaming network passes the authentication request to the home network HLR - so if the home network HLR is down, the roaming network doesn't know if the SIM can be allowed on its network.
  
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