Something is wrong with modern electronic devices

Currently if Alice wants to text Bob, then Alice will take out her cellular phone, type in the message she wants to send to Bob and then press send. What happens next is that her cellular phone will broadcast the message with electromagnetic waves.

While this is happening, Alice's Company is listening for messages with its giant antennas. It hears one, it's a message that Alice wants to send to Bob. However earlier today a Dark suited man told Alice's Company that Bob is a dissident, so Company sends a copy of the message to Dark as required by law. Dark reviews the message and tells the Company that they're permitted to rely the message to its intended recipient. Finally the phone company broadcasts the message with electromagnetic waves using their giant antenna.

Bob's cell phone is listening for messages. It hears one, it's from Alice. It displays said message.

- - - - -

What's wrong with this picture? Well lets say Alice and Bob are currently sitting in the same class. Does Alice's cell phone really need to waste electricity sending a wireless signal that can be heard as far away as the nearest cell phone tower. Why isn't Bob's cell phone able to read Alice's message the first time it's broadcast, by Alice?

Secondly the current set up doesn't make use of public key cryptography, at least not in the way it was designed to be used. Alice should be able to encrypt her message to Bob using Bob's public key, ensuring that it's impossible for anyone but Bob to read it. As things stand though, this is not the case. The Dark suited man has the power to read the message and can even stop it from being relayed to Bob if he wishes.

Now under such a system, companies owning giant antennas in geographically convenient places still have their use. Just because messages can be couriered directly or ferried over a mesh network, doesn't mean that it might not be expedient at times to pay a company who owns a giant antenna to help your message get to point B.

- - - - -

So why isn't there such a system in place? All electronic devices these days have the ability to broadcast data, but transmitting information from one computer directly to another requires a substantial amount of setup. And that's not to mention setting up a mesh network.

Now in terms of software engineering, creating a mesh network that people can play Starcraft over is tricky. However when it comes to sending a text message over a mesh network it's really just a matter of:
1. Alice's computer broadcasts a message for Bob.
2. Any computer that receives that message or a piece of that message can rebroadcast it if it so desires.
3. Bob may or may not receive the message.

People are connecting with each other through facebook, through their cellphone carriers and through their ISPs when they could just be connecting with each other directly. We have the technology to do this, so why isn't it happening?

I'm not really seeing how this is a "conspiracy".....

re Skippy1138:
At the moment, things are set up in a way that gives the powers that be total surveillance and control over our electronic lives. Do you think things ended up that way by accident?

EDIT: Let me make that almost total. At the moment I can:
Send an encrypted package destined for Alice to my ISP, who will send it to sketchy underground website, who will send it to Alice's ISP who will send it to Alice.
Or I can set up things so that:
Alice requests a encrypted package from me. I send the package to my ISP who sends it to Alice.

After AT&T et all get the tiered internet they desire neither of these things will be possible.

[edit on 31-8-2010 by scwizard]

[edit on 31-8-2010 by scwizard]

Originally posted by Skippy1138
I'm not really seeing how this is a "conspiracy".....

You don't see how this is a conspiracy?

It's just that it's a waste of energy, everything you text can be seen, and costs ten times as much in green.

S&F Op

Money is the answer.

Phone to phone=NO MONEY

Phone to cell relay network to phone=BIG MONEY

That relay network is where all the money is made. Same goes for the INTERNET.
Computer to computer= NO MONEY

Computer to ISP network to Computer=BIG MONEY

And with no middle man you do not only lose money but the chance to snoop into the data or eavesdrop on the calls


It really is an old trick or scam if you will. You create the need for a service that does not exist and then create the service for the need you created in the first place. Does that make sense?

I have often wondered if the anti-virus software companies are not writing at less some of the viruses them selfs just to make a market for there product but that is a topic for another time.

[edit on 8/31/2010 by fixer1967]

It's happening, orrather, we allow it to happen for the sake of "convenience", simple as that.
We've just gotten accustomed to it without ever questioning it.
Truly not not the best or safest means of communicating but it is what it is, and it's the preferred method of communication (PMC) for many.

BTW, did you know that all ATM's actually run on a Windows CE platform?
Scary, ain't it?

Well, I already have this all figured out. I do it all the time and it's even free. I just did it right now as I was typing this.

So two kids are sitting in class and want to communicate directly? Here is how you do it, my BIG secret. One of them TURNS to the other one, LOOKS at them and actually...yes, *gasp* TALKS to them!!!!

I know this is a hard concept for many to grasp and understand, but don't worry, you get the hang of it quickly! (and it even works if the power goes out!!)

reply to post by westcoast


Haha that's funny. You make a good point, not necessarily exactly what the OP was going for but we do rely on technology a little too much. Of course, if it was safer in the way the OP described, it probably wouldn't be as worrisome that we are so reliant.

Everything is controlled by the network(service provider). You must first go through the network to get services. To get them to accept your actions(texts, calls, whatever) you must get permission by paying them money.

It is just a business deal that is bad for us but totally fine for them to make sure that their services aren't being used by anyone not paying for permission.

Same principle as tesla wanting to provide free acess to electricity to the public and getting shut down. If it cants be tolled or billed it won't get off the ground. I thought this was common knowledge? It's economics, why do you wars are waged and people slaughtered?

Originally posted by scwizard
What's wrong with this picture? Well lets say Alice and Bob are currently sitting in the same class. Does Alice's cell phone really need to waste electricity sending a wireless signal that can be heard as far away as the nearest cell phone tower. Why isn't Bob's cell phone able to read Alice's message the first time it's broadcast, by Alice?

Because a cell phone is not a walky talky. Walky talky operates on the principle that everyone is able to hear what you say on a specific channel, they do this because if they authorized one private channel for every Bob-Alice communication in the world then they'd run out of channels (frequencies) pretty quick.

Now, cell phones operate on the same principle (limited number of channels and a signal everyone can catch), but the fundamental difference is that you want to make it private. Sure Alice can encrypt the signal, but if the signal is encrypted, how will Bob ever know Alice is calling? In fact, how do you decrypt the signal?

Lets say you solve the first problem by broadcasting Bob's phone number and then encrypting the rest of the message. Again, what's the encryption key? Bob needs to know that key no matter what in order to read Alice's message. Obviously Alica can't broadcast it else everyone will know it.

Solution: Someone in betwee that they both trust(cell phone tower) must hold all keys. Alice sends a signal that only the tower can decrypt, the tower then figures that the message should be delivered to Bob and sends a signal that only Bob's cellphone can decrypt. (Alice's cell phone could do this directly if her cell phone held a database of the keys to all cellphones in the world, but obviously if your personal key is stored inside every cell phone, it'd be pretty easy for a hacker to read it).

Worried about the tower sharing your info with a shadow? Use a blackberry, encrypt the message before the cell phone uses it's own encrypton, and when the tower decrypts the signal it gets it will only be able to share your encrypted file. Bob would still need to know the key, but if what Alice is sending is very sensitive info, then I'd bet she'd have no trouble giving Bob the key by non electronic means.

Also, it's not your antenna transmitting a huge signal, it's a huge sensor (the phone tower) picking up your signal.

[edit on 31-8-2010 by daniel_g]

reply to post by daniel_g


Thank you for answering these questions, it saved me some time. You are correct, it's hard to manage encryption keys with a network such as that used for mobile phones. And you can actually send data straight to another phone close to you, it's called blue-tooth.

reply to post by scwizard


You want to know what I think? I think all this technology is a complete bloody nuisence and I can't think for the life of me why I got sucked in to it like everyone else. I still recall the days we had no technology and my milk was delivered to my door in glass bottles; they were the best years of my life!!!

That's exactly what happens.
Alice can talk to the tower "A". Bob can talk to the tower "A".
Alice sends a message to Bob and the message goes over tower "A" from Alice to Bob.

Oh, wait, are we talking GSM / TDMA or UMTS / HSPDA / CDMA and/or IP / Packet Routing?

[edit on 9/1/2010 by abecedarian]

Q:Why mobile want to connect to tower in the first place ?
A:Because of "destination unknown", Alice want to contact Bob. Which Bob and where ?. The tower need to know which and where is Bob so it can relay it. It got Bob info with it (as biz and billing secret of course). If Bob with different carrier, then tower need to pay some bucks for that info.

Q:Why Alice mobile dont know Bob mobile location ?
A:Because of "distance unknown", if Bob in front of Alice, why not Alice just use IR/Bluetooth/Cable/Just yell ?
Now since Alice mobile didnt know Bob location and distance, it need to use a relay or a call center for help. Hence a relay is needed. Guess what ? Turns out Bob is on the other side of the world, Alice mobile dont know, the carrier also dont know, but they still can find Bob for Alice.

Q:How can we protect the info from eavesdrop/infotap ?
A:There are few way,
1.PGP contain 2 key, public and private, read it up.
2.ROT13 (or just replace the 13 with any number) or any other weak algo
3.Secret encryption only known to Alice and Bob

Q:Why Alice mobile cannot detect Bob location ?
A:To known somebody location, you must broadcast (yell) continously and wait until that person will respond. If Alice mobile can broadcast power like the carrier tower, you might have headache within a minute.

Q:Why Alice mobile cannot detect Bob distance ?
A:Without the ability to broadcast continuously, Alice definitely have problem. Bluetooth and IR is a another adaptation of this, there are chat midlet if you want to chat freely in classroom, just look it up. For long distance and who knows where, text messages seems the only choice.

Comparison with internet:
Where am I ? "distance unknown"
What browser am I using ? "destination unknown"

Hence we got relays - switch, routers, hub, gateways, proxy etc... just to send a message from me to you which might be next door.

[edit on 1-9-2010 by RainCloud]

There is nothing wrong with technology, but there is something wrong with how its being used. Its not the idea its the person behind the idea.
If people werent so selfish we could be useing the world's technology to help eachother.

One love. peace

daniel_g: I addressed this, the solution is public key cryptography. You don't need a trusted company to hold all keys, because Alice can encrypt her message using Bob's public key, and then only Bob can decrypt the message. Also you can indicate that the message is for Alice by including Alice's public key with the message unencrypted, or some other identification.

RainCloud:
Yes, that's why I'm saying that people who own antennas can still make money, which is why fixer1967's point of view doesn't make any sense to me.

However if Alice and Bob are sitting next to each other, then when Alice shouts "I have a message for Bob" then the tower might hear her and Bob might hear her and there's no reason that Bob can't just receive the message directly.

Another side of what I'm talking about, is that we're not using software to send messages to other computers directly. If two people want to communicate through instant messaging, then they need to go through something silly like MSN. There's no reason for that to be the case, if Alice and Bob know each others public keys, then it's trivial for Alice to freely accept messages from Bob as long as she's online. You'd only need Alice, Bob, Alice's ISP and Bob's ISP.

EDIT: Such a thing isn't possible right now because we don't have the cooperation of ISPs. For such a thing to work, Alice would need to be able to tell her ISP "here is Bob's public key go find him." As things stand though, you need another party who knows both Alice's and Bob's IP address.

If things worked the way I wish they did, then IP addresses wouldn't be needed. They're kind of a silly concept in my opinion.

[edit on 1-9-2010 by scwizard]

Originally posted by scwizard
... if Alice and Bob know each others public keys, then it's trivial for Alice to freely accept messages from Bob as long as she's online. You'd only need Alice, Bob, Alice's ISP and Bob's ISP.

That's what happens in distributed / meshed IP / intelligent "Node B" networks.... and LTE takes that a lot further.

So that's the question I'm asking in this thread abecedarian, why don't we have these "distributed / meshed IP / intelligent "Node B" networks."

They're better faster stronger and the technology is there.

I would just like to say that teens should be talking to each other in the real world.

I think our teens have been damaged by mobile phones.