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US Carriers Said To Have Rejected Kill Switch Technology Last Year
alphadogg writes "U.S. cellphone carriers were offered a technology last year that supporters say would dramatically cut incidents of smartphone theft, but the carriers turned it down, according to sources with knowledge of the proposal. The so-called 'kill-switch' software allows consumers to remotely wipe and render their phones useless if stolen. Law enforcement and politicians believe the incentive for stealing a smartphone or tablet would be greatly reduced if the technology became standard, because the devices could quickly be rendered useless. A proposal by Samsung to the five largest U.S. carriers would have made the LoJack software, developed by Canada's Absolute Software, a standard component on many of its Android phones in the U.S. The proposal followed pressure from the offices of the San Francisco District Attorney and the New York Attorney General for the industry to do more to prevent phone theft."
... until someone hacks into a carriers network, and deactivates and wipes EVERY PHONE on the carriers registry.
Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?
If I'm a carrier, why would I NOT want to sell service to whomever stole your phone?
Since the carriers have no culpability in the theft of your device, the legal fiduciary obligation to the shareholders trumps any perceived moral obligation to you.
Right here:
And this, ultimately, is the problem with those who keep repeating that we should just trust the government. It implies we should also disengage our brains.
Dog is my co-pilot.
You can still part out a phone and make at least a hundred bucks off it. I'm sure they would continue to be stolen just for that amount of money alone.
Better known as 318230.
Each stolen phone that they make the victim pay to replace or make them eat the remaining contract with no phone. that gets hooked back up to their network should gain them a fine and jail time for participating in the laundering of stolen goods.
That's exactly what's going on -- they are dragging ass because they profit, knowingly and deliberately, from participating in this cycle. Some interstate criminal conspiracy charges on executives would also be welcome.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I don't get why I would want my ISP to have a say in whether or not (or how!) I disable my personal computer. But I also don't get why I'd want my government to have a role in that discussion either.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
This is the government wanting more intrusive access into your phone. This doesn't have a damn thing to do with theft. Android already has a "where the ****" is my phone, as well as wiping features exposed through Google's device manager service. If you want another party to have access to such functionality you can make that party administrator of your phone such as is often done when connecting your phone to your company's Exchange server.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
Apple already ships remote kill software with iPhones. Why can't Samsung just do the same with Android phones it sells?
I do see value in being able to tell a carrier that a phone it stolen and they should not allow its use on a network. But remote kill, I don't see as being something that should go through a cellular provider.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I'd say no too if I had to pay all those royalty fees because only one tech was allowed by law.
Just do what Europe has been doing for decades. A shared and standard registry of IMEI and other serial number components of stolen/lost devices.
None of this remote wiping or other stuff. If someone wants that they can buy their own software/mobile solution for it.
Just require the phone to state on its screen: IMEI banned due to reported lost/stolen device. That cuts the resell theft down right there.
Not 100% but a noticeable difference.
Can't you just imagine this tool when it comes to mass protests? Especially when things turn violent as they have in plenty of countries over the year. The primary way news is getting out is cell phone cameras and videos.
Wouldn't any freedom loving government just die to have access to a kill switch?
I can already imagine how many times someone will lose their phone, then remotely break it only to find it later and hassle customer service to fix it.
Putting that aside, I just can't see this kind of security being useful or reducing actual thefts very much. I can't imagine there won't be a way to disable, remove, or otherwise bypass this remote wipe in some way.
Why would anybody favor such an expensive and ineffective option (with so many shortcomings) when the carriers could just be required to keep a database of unique identifiers (don't quote me--I think they're called IMEI numbers) of phones reported stolen and simply blacklist those phones from their networks.
Then, a person can report their phone stolen and the carriers make it useless because none of them are allowed to service it while it is in the "stolen" database.
No "kill-switch" required.
Who did what now?
While I agree with others worried that a kill switch could be abused (by carriers / government / MPAA / RIAA / etc), I'm now wondering if it would be a handy way to counter (un)lawful search and seizure of a device by various authorities? Say you're transiting through the US and a TSA agent decides they want to confiscate (and presumably search) your smartphone. If the kill switch is easy to activate (maybe a number you call and enter a code, or via your laptop or friend's smartphone), you could wipe your device before they get the contents.
A recursive sig
Can impart wisdom and truth
Call proc signature()
the immediate response on /. is always "But what about the hackers!" as if there's a group of malicious hackers just waiting for the technology to appear so they could exploit it
That would be because there IS a group of malicious people looking to exploit technology, some of them merely because they can. The topic gets brought up because it usually is insufficiently considered in the beginning. If something can be exploited you can be pretty sure that sooner or later it will be exploited.
. Most systems get hacked because there's some profit to be made out of it or someone is trying to put a message out there.
You think there is no profit to be made in wiping people's cell phones? Ever hear of blackmail? How about terrorism? Think there is no profit to be made in selling technology to mass kill cell phones to terrorist groups who might want to cause problems? There is profit to be made in exploits if you really think about it hard enough.
The ability to disable cell phones is already there and used in most of the rest of the world. All the carriers have to do is to ban the IMEI number of the phone when it is reported stolen and the phone can't be activated on the network. Yes, the phone isn't wiped, but it removes the primary cause of phone theft, which is selling them (since people will not be able to activate and use the stolen phone). This is used to great success almost everywhere except for the US where the carriers refuse to do it. We don't need something new, we just need the carriers to do the same thing carriers all over the world are already doing.
My guess is that carriers don't want to halt phone theft since it is a money boon for them. If someone's phone gets stolen, then they have to buy a new one from the carrier at full price, and the carriers make more money that way. If they start banning IMEI numbers and phone theft goes down, they don't get than extra money in their pocket. All the government has to do is mandate that the carriers not allow stolen phone's IMEI numbers on their network and everything takes care of itself.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
These carriers have seen that it reduces theft in the rest of the world. And I mean reduce, not 'completely stop it'.
So these companies know it will work and reduce the demand for phones. So why would they be against it? Oh right, money.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
You don't live in that kind of a society right up until the moment when you do live in that kind of a society, at which point it is rather too late to do anything to prevent it. Trust someone who lived behind the iron curtain - you don't WANT to know what society will be like if we keep heading in that direction. However small those steps are, they are not reversible.