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MIT Says Gunman Hoax Call Mentioned Swartz Case

Posted by Soulskill on from the not-the-way-to-protest dept.

An anonymous reader writes "MIT has posted a letter to campus newspaper The Tech providing a timeline of last weekend's 'gunman' hoax. On Saturday morning, Cambridge, MA police were contacted via Internet relay by a tipster who claimed that a someone wearing armor and carrying a 'really big gun' was in Building 7 at MIT (the Massachusetts Ave. entrance to the Infinite Corridor) and was heading towards the office of MIT President Rafael Reif. The call continued for 18 minutes, with the caller eventually claiming that the gunman was seeking to avenge the suicide of Aaron Swartz, who was being prosecuting for alleged illegal downloads of millions of journal articles using MIT's computer network. The caller also identified the gunman as an MIT staff member, who has since been questioned by police and cleared. MIT has been criticized for waiting 1.5 hours before sending a campus-wide alert after the call was received."

9 of 41 comments (clear)

  1. Good grief... by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 5, Insightful

    MIT has been criticized for waiting 1.5 hours before sending a campus-wide alert

    No, they are being criticized for not buying into the same paranoia that spawned the TSA, the same paranoia that has transformed police departments into paramilitary gangs, the same paranoia that is moving us as a society closer and closer to being a Police State - if we are not already there. They are being criticized for understanding that it was almost certainly a troll, and terrorizing and traumatizing their student and staff was not warranted based on the information they had.

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    1. Re:Good grief... by Dexter+Herbivore · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I sort of agree with you, but to play devil's advocate... what if they were wrong?

    2. Re:Good grief... by BKX · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That was my reaction to a botched bomb-threat reaction when I was in eight grade. One of my friends called in the threat to the middle school from the middle school payphone at 7:45 AM. I heard the call, and he definitely said the bomb was in the middle school in a bathroom by the gym. At 8:30 AM, the high school (the two schools share a single campus) was evacuated into the middle school gym. At 9:00 AM, my friend was arrested. The evacuation was completely unnecessary, as they knew he called it by 8:00 anyway. He called his mom right afterward and said that she needed to pick him because a bomb threat had been called in. She called the school to find out if it was true, and they asked, "Wait, how did you know that again?" Anyway, in addition to the evacuation being unnecessary, it was the stupidest thing I'd ever heard. Why would you evacuate an unaffected school's population into the area containing the bomb, and why would you wait an hour and a half?

    3. Re:Good grief... by hedwards · · Score: 2

      I take it you've forgotten about VT Tech massacre where the school chose to delay warning the student body about the murderer on the loose. Instead of just 2 people being murdered, the eventual death toll was into the 30s.

    4. Re:Good grief... by BKX · · Score: 3, Interesting

      You missed what I was saying happened. The middle school had the "bomb". The High School was evacuated. The High School's students were put into the middle school, where the "bomb" was. That's the nonsense.

    5. Re:Good grief... by Rogerborg · · Score: 2

      what if they were wrong?

      What if we went back in time and assassinated Hitler?

      What if goblins?

      What if we didn't live in unreasoning, trembling fear every moment of every day, but used our brains to analyse threats rationally?

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    6. Re:Good grief... by cffrost · · Score: 2

      My school evac'd to the football field bleachers. I realized then the idiocy of that since all it meant was a potential bomber need setup the bomb under the bleachers before calling in the bomb threat.

      Indoor placement yields greater bang for the buck, as it retards shock wave dissipation and maximizes peak overpressure. A more effective scenario would be to place it in the auditorium before an assembly and forgo the phone call altogether.

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  2. Shit's haunted by Z34107 · · Score: 5, Funny

    A gunman, seeking vengeance for Aaron Swartz, unseen by anyone other than the caller, and magically disappears into thin air when police arrive?

    That's not a hoax. Aaron confirmed for haunting MIT.

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  3. Re:They've actually had practice with weird calls by ledow · · Score: 2

    In my country, the dispatcher doesn't get a choice.

    In fact, last night I watched "999", a program that follows the emergency services. They got 18 calls from the same guy, and they went through the same routine every time sending out all the services, and it was always a hoax. Eventually, at the end of the conversations on the phone, the dispatcher would say "Yeah, it's that hoaxer, again" (or words to that effect). Hell, most of the time he called them to the same street for the same things.

    But still they dispatched the amount of fire, ambulance and police that would be necessary to handle the reported incident before they'd even properly started the conversation on the phone (literally, as soon as they asked what was happening).

    Yes, it's an enormous waste of time and money, but it's not up to the dispatcher to decide if the call is genuine or not. If help is requested, they are obliged to send it. Even if help isn't requested, but they think it's necessary, they are obliged to send it.

    For every 100 4-year-olds who pick up the phone and dial the emergency services to "talk to the man", there's one who's done it while shit-scared (maybe of the fact that they've been left in the house alone because their daddy has collapsed in the back garden and they don't know it) - and they can't express what's worrying them, or what the problem is, or even talk to a stranger, but they know to dial the emergency services because something is wrong.

    With adults, you get mental illness, you get shock, confusion, drunkenness, drugs, fume intoxication, and yes - still hoax calls. Some people will give you an address they haven't lived at for 20 years because they are panicking. But you don't get a choice. You dispatch as soon as you have enough information to do so - a drunk on the way home from the pub might well have been the only one around to see something happen and ask for help, even if he wouldn't be able to tie his own shoelaces. Anything else will cost genuine, innocent lives in need of help even if dealing with the hoaxer might do the same.

    Dispatchers aren't there to analyse the voice, except to calm you down to get the information that needs to transfer between caller and dispatcher to do just that. They are there to send help. Even those idiots who "cry wolf" still have to have help sent to them on their 100th hoax call because this MIGHT be a real one that kills them and others.

    The use of text-to-speech is not new, hell that's how a lot IRA bomb threats to the UK services were made back in the 80's. And the threats given were often obscure, weird, complete nutters phoning it in, and after a while similar hoaxers did the same stuff. You don't get to decide "who gets help", you send it.

    Yes, it's a pain, and we should lock up the hoaxers if caught, but that's not the dispatcher's job to be judge, jury and executioner (literally). The guy on TV last night eventually got caught, got a prison sentence and couldn't even explain why he'd done it (not drunk, not drugged, not insane, etc.).

    Text services for the deaf have been around for decades, as have dispatchers who know a hoax call when they hear one. But you still don't take the chance.