The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system, a public transit system that serves the San Francisco Bay Area, admitted on Friday that it cut off cell phone service on several subway platforms in San Francisco during a planned protest on Thursday.
The subway operator said it was to guarantee passengers’ safety, but others don’t see it that way, with groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation calling it “a chilling strike against free speech.” The timing is also rather uncanny: The attempt to disrupt protesters by shutting down their ability to communicate by mobile phone comes right as the British government is discussing how to quell the modes of communication between rioters wreaking havoc in the UK.
BART shut off power nodes on the several platforms during busy commute times (between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Thursday) and told carriers that operate service in the area about it after the fact, CNET reports. The subway system defended its actions in a statement on Friday, saying that it knew that organizers of the protest — which regarded the fatal shooting of a man by BART police in July — would be using mobile devices to coordinate their actions and relay the whereabouts of BART police. BART said the action was “one of many tactics to ensure the safety of everyone on the platform.”
Cellular service was not disrupted outside of Embarcadero, Montgomery, Powell and Civic Center stations, according to BART. “In addition, numerous BART Police officers and other BART personnel with radios were present during the planned protest, and train intercoms and white courtesy telephones remained available for customers seeking assistance or reporting suspicious activity,” the subway system’s statement reads.
BART’s actions sound similar to tactics UK Prime Minister David Cameron has been talking about in the wake of widespread rioting in his country that have alarmed free-speech activists – shutting down access to Twitter, Facebook and other social media sites and even BlackBerry Messenger when used “for ill.” The Guardian quoted Cameron on Thursday as saying:
And when people are using social media for violence we need to stop them. So we are working with the police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality.
“I have also asked the police if they need any other new powers.
“Police were facing a new circumstance where rioters were using the BlackBerry Messenger service, a closed network, to organise riots,” he said. “We’ve got to examine that and work out how to get ahead of them.”
Of course this is not lost on many how eerily similar both the measures employed by SF BART on Thursday and the kind the UK government is discussing are to the decision to cut Internet and cell phone service in Egypt during demonstrations against the government in early January.
Image courtesy of Flickr user ol slambert
The UK Prime Minister comments are VERY different and can’t be compared to the BART situation. David Camerion suggests freezing accounts (using intelligence) of known organisers of riots or any attempting to organise crime using these mediums, which is already against Terms & Conditions of these companies, NOT a blanket shutdown of cellphone service. It is a complicated issue that could use continued debate.
I think definitely a fine line was crossed
Another attempt to hijack the very few freedoms that we have in the West, it’s just a matter of time before new laws are passed in all the “Freedom Loving” Western powers as we did it in the US after 9/11
How can we peacefully protest when they shoot to kill, and block access to help?
The man that was shot was armed and attacking officers…
The comparisons to Egypt are a huge stretch. I agree that the access to technology should not be easily removed, the situations in the UK and in SF are not the same as information suppression employed in Egypt. These are both cases of organizations protecting the lives and interests of many by inconveniencing a few. The protesters were never told they couldn’t assemble. BART just did what was necessary to ensure the safety of those others that would be there.
Would you all be cheering for civil rights triumphs if BART dis nothing and innocent people were injured or killed because of overcrowding on the platforms? How about if the planning of organized violence via twitter in the UK caused the deaths of innocent bystanders? This is not a black and white issue. There has to be a gray area.
google:- y a p p e r z a p p e r