BART Pulls a Mubarak in San Francisco

[MrScorpio]

Commentary by Eva Galperin

This week, EFF has seen censorship stories move closer and closer to home — first Iran, then the UK, and now San Francisco, an early locus of the modern free speech movement. Operators of the Bay Area Rapid Transit system (BART) shut down cell phone service to four stations in downtown San Francisco yesterday in response to a planned protest. Last week, protesters disrupted BART service in response to the fatal shooting of Charles Blair Hill by BART police on July 3rd. Thursday’s protest failed to materialize, possibly because the disruption of cell phone service made organization and coordination difficult.

Early reports indicated that BART cut off cell phone service by approaching carriers directly and asking them to turn service off. Later statements by James Allison, deputy chief communications officer for BART, assert “BART staff or contractors shut down power to the nodes and alerted the cell carriers” after the fact. AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, and T-Mobile have not yet made comment as to whether or not they were complicit in the shutdown.

Obviously, we'd like to know exactly what the carriers said to BART, but many other unanswered questions remain as well. Was pulling the plug on people's phones a quick, on-the-spot decision, or part of a protest-response plan vetted by BART's lawyers? Who decided that blocking all cellphone calls at these BART stations was the right response to news that there might be a protest? Were the carriers ever in the loop about this plan or action? Who decided that the news of this planned protest justified the shutdown? How do we know this isn't going to happen again?

http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/08/bart-pulls-mubarak-san-francisco

[FirstLight]

1. bad juju

yes...it's getting closer and our rights have been gone for a very long time...
:scared:

[Cherchez la Femme]

2. Because a BART protest is much more important than a personal emergency

:eyes:

[AngkorWot]

3. Don't you think that's just a bit of an exaggeration?

Maybe just a little?

[boppers]

4. Which part?

BART ganking all internet access in certain areas?
Or that shutting off all access, to an entire nation, is not the same as shutting it off in specific structures?

[jberryhill]

5. Sounds like a safety issue

I'm not familiar with the BART system, but am I correct in understanding that the protest was going to include subway platforms?

I'd think the engineers responsible for safety would have more say in what equipment is disconnected and why, than the lawyers.

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. Shocked I tell you, SHOCKED

Reality is none should be surprised by this. And it will become more and more obvious. I expect Twitter to be heavily monitored as well as FB and any and all other social media.

We are becoming the dystopia we all read about in our youth.