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Transportation Department Proposes Allowing In-Flight Phone Calls (go.com)
Yesterday, France's Le Monde newspaper issued a report, citing documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, that says American and British spies have since 2005 been working on intercepting phone calls and data transfers made from aircraft. Assuming the report is accurate, national security agencies may soon have their hands full if a new proposal by the Department of Transportation becomes official, which would allow each airline to decide whether its passengers will be permitted to make in-flight phone calls using the aircraft's onboard Wi-Fi system. ABC News reports: The Department of Transportation's proposal leaves it up to airlines whether to allow the calls. But carriers would be required to inform passengers at the time they purchase a ticket if the calls are allowed. That would give passengers the opportunity to make other travel arrangements if they don't want to risk the possibility of sitting near passengers making phone calls. The Federal Communications Commission prohibits using mobile phones to make calls during flights, but not Wi-Fi calls. There is a minimum 60-day comment period and the proposal leaves the door open to an outright ban. The Wall Street Journal first reported on the proposal.
But carriers would be required to inform passengers at the time they purchase a ticket if the calls are allowed.
What's the big deal? Remember when planes had those obnoxious pay phones in every seat? No one had a choice then???
Listening to folks yell into their phones passing by or in a restaurant is bad enough, imagine sitting next to one for an eight hour flight. :|
With no way to escape it.
Would almost be worth opening the door and jumping to your death from 30,000 feet. . . .
As long as wifi jamming is also allowed.
Air travel is bad enough without noise pollution.
If you're dumb enough to pay for that shitty wifi on flights good luck making a voip call over it. You're lucky to get an email out.
Didn't we go through a bunch of no about this a couple years ago?
In a lipstick tube FTW. OR.... They will have to make cabin separators so they can put all the passengers who want to flap their gums on the cell phone all together and leave normal passengers together so we don't kill them.
Victory is ours, America! Soon the skies will be as great as our land!
flights to crash.
your data plan is better then the high cost wifi on the plane
"The Department of Transportation's proposal leaves it up to airlines whether to allow the calls. But carriers would be required to inform passengers at the time they purchase a ticket if the calls are allowed."
This means some airlines will allow phone calls in flight, and others will not. Just like airlines, which allowed smoking. I imagine the non phone call airlines will be more popular. I hope discrimination against babies will also be permitted.
Calling isn't any safer or less obnoxious now than it was 20 years ago.
I guess now NSA has convenient way to tap it?
Yeah, cell phone jammer will always be narrow banded and no signal will ever leak and jam the aircraft communications instead.
Why the NSA feels that a conversation from an air craft is any more worthy of "security" attention than one from somewhere else. Besides, it will pass through a ground station anyway, so why bother with special attention, cost, and required resources.
As much eavesdropping going on in the name of "security" does little for "terrorism" anyway. It's used far more commonly in drug and financial cases to replace actually doing their job. At best it's used to prove a case; at worst, it's used to see if there's a case to be made.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
....but because cell phones each would be hitting dosens of towers at once vs just a couple on the ground plus this strain wouild be moving rapidly across any given area, causing network problems. Thats why cell calls are banned in flight.
Why the NSA feels that a conversation from an air craft is any more worthy of "security" attention than one from somewhere else.
today's lesson: LOW HANGING FRUIT
As much eavesdropping going on in the name of "security" does little for "terrorism" anyway.
tomorrow's lesson: NO SHIT SHERLOCK
I've been next to a baby that was on full wailing for quite some time, despite the mother's best efforts and that was considerably worse than any idiot yapping on the phone. Didn't really want to make me throw myself or the baby off the plane, but I was quite happy I didn't have to deal with that every other hour of the day.
In flight the cabin air pressure is reduced as the plane goes up in altitude, to an equivalent altitude of about 9,000 feet when the airplane is at cruising altitude. This reduces stress on the airframe, by about 5-ish PSI on every inch of the cabin outer surface.
Adults have the ability to clear their eustachian by yawning, but babies generally don't. The extra air pressure causes their ears to ache for the entire flight.
That's why babies cry during an airplane flight. Mothers don't generally have to deal with it all the time.
(I wrote the firmware for one of the popular air cabin pressurization systems currently in use.)
1) You obviously have to pay extreme roaming prices. And it does not matter if it is a call over your own provider. They will see to it that you pay extra and a lot extra. As they are flying all other pricing regulations will be deemed void, regardless that other places are not allowed to do the same, because they are on the ground (e.g. no roaming cost or blocking in malls or conference centers)
2) If you want to book a seat where you can do calls, you need to book extra
3) If you want to book a seat where people are not calling, you need to pay extra
4) To pay for the systems to be installed, prices will increase to pay for it, regardless if you use it or not or if it is even needed or not.
5) You will be spammed 10 minutes after you get in the plane.
OK, 4 and 5 might be a bit over the tom but 1, 2 and 3 are things I could see happening.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Let's handle phone calls the same way, with a Calling and a No Calling section. The difference from the old days would be that calling in toilets would be specifically encouraged.
What about all those cell phone calls made from planes on 9/11?
This was the only place we had a respite from this menace.. Don't do it
It will give job security to the TSA for all the extra screening they will need to do.
Also, don't pay attention to the sudden jump in occurrences of mid-flight manslaughter.
I was on a bus once with Cletus the Slack-Jawed Yokel talking to his girlfriend for two hours, loud enough for everybody to hear. Although once I got past how incredibly rude and oblivious this guy was, it was actually pretty entertaining, in a soap-opera sort of way.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
They're ready and waiting, I'm sure. That is, the NSA has built enough infrastructure to handle eavesdropping on all the new in-flight callers and data users. Having built that infrastructure the NSA is now itching to use it and creep on thousands more citizens!
So maybe the DoT got their marching orders from the NSA? Or maybe as another Three Letter Agency, they came to some sort of understanding, agency to agency style. You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours, that sort of thing.