Would-Be Suicide Bomber Killed by Unexpected SMS From Mobile Carrier

Source: Wired

The would-be suicide bomber was planning to detonate a suicide belt bomb near Red Square, a plan that was foiled when her wireless carrier sent her an SMS while she was still at a safe house, setting off the bomb and killing her. The message reportedly wished her a Happy New Years, according to the report, which sourced the info from security forces in Russia. Cell phones are often used as makeshift detonators by terrorist and insurgent groups.

I found this article this morning. I thought that you folks might find it interesting that a terrorist was taken down prematurely by a random wireless carrier text message. Spam: 1, Terrorist: 0.

Yes, I just heard about this on the Glen Beck radio show this morning.

He will be talking about it soon.

Its a good thing that spam came through and saved lives from that nut job..

no 72 virgins for her...errr..ummm or whatever woman get.

LOL? Happy New years? It's January 28.

Very interesting; however, one would hope that these cell-phone detonators only worked one way. If it detonated on an incoming SMS, whoever put it together wasn't very bright.

reply to post by RUFFREADY

Saved lives? Really? Perhaps the security checkpoint might have caught this before it detonated and saved all the lives.

reply to post by Xiizhan


this is so damn funny thank you for that

Originally posted by mr10k
LOL? Happy New years? It's January 28.

Very interesting observation. And they found the phone in operational order or what here? lol

Karma.
Got to love it.

I can imagine God sitting on his throne, in Heaven. With a blackberry in his hand, asking St. Peter, "how do you get the smiley face on the screen?"

Why would a suicide bomber need a cell phone rather than a manual detonator? If cell phones are regularly used as detonators, then I think the military just found a way to prevent attacks....send out a SMS spam to all cell numbers every few minutes.

Originally posted by Aggie Man
Why would a suicide bomber need a cell phone rather than a manual detonator? If cell phones are regularly used as detonators, then I think the military just found a way to prevent attacks....send out a SMS spam to all cell numbers every few minutes.

Would-be bombers tend to "chicken-out" at the last minute. The controller usually has a cell phone and calls the detonator number from a safe distance.

This is why you never buy from ACME.

reply to post by Aggie Man


Well on 24, there was always an override method that was triggerable from afar so that if the suicide bomber wavered or backed down they'd have some "help" in fulfilling their mission.

(I see beezzer already covered this while I was typing! Sorry!) But whoever put this one together still wasn't that smart if they didn't anticipate the SMS thing...if that's even true.

reply to post by mr10k

LOL? Happy New years? It's January 28.

Well, according to the article on Wired, this happened on New Years Eve.

prematurely exploded a would-be suicide bomber’s vest bomb in Russia New Year’s Eve,

It is still rather amusing nonetheless.

Edit- Link (same as OP)www.wired.com...

is this ATS? why are we so quick to believe all of a sudden despite the glaring inconsistencies in the OP's source? so if you were one of those involved in the investigation, how would you know about the cellphone having recieved an sms that triggered the explosion? is the cellphone still intact?

next, ask yourself. why are they telling us this?

Its a great story, but I have to wonder how they actually knew that a SMS message triggered this? Sounds like pure speculation or totally made up.

I remember the story. The cell phones company could track messages sent and delivered.
The phone itself was taken out. Remember, this is Russia we're talking about. They may have a differrent policy on privacy rights.

so, if i'm in Russia and i smash my phone after receiving an sms message from my provider, they'll be able to confirm that my phone has been smashed after receiving their message? coz that's basically what happens when you explode an ied using a cellphone as detonator.

Originally posted by toreishi

so, if i'm in Russia and i smash my phone after receiving an sms message from my provider, they'll be able to confirm that my phone has been smashed after receiving their message? coz that's basically what happens when you explode an ied using a cellphone as detonator.

If it has GPS, then maybe. Though the SIMS card could have survived, and from that, they could have traced the phone, it's messages, its content.

How did they know it was set off by a text?

The KGB sent it. Are you guys forgetting that cell phones can be listened to even when turned off ?

'OK were all set...we leave in 5 minutes..."HAPPY NEW YEAR"'

and the SIM card might have been smashed as well, it could go either way. you're all free to believe what you want and i'll be the first to admit that i can be wrong on this but seeing as the article doesn't mention the SIM card specifically then i'm more of a mind to believe that the objective of the said article is to give second thoughts to anyone thinking about using a cellphone as a detonator to an IED.

or it could just be a case of sloppy journalism and stuff lost in translation.