The end of POTS?

[CanadianGuy]

BellMTS still has plenty of POTS here in Manitoba, Canada. They're on a big push to get FTTH out to a lot more areas, but I'm still seeing news articles of customers being without working landlines for weeks.

Before I quit contracting for them,  I was in a couple remote COs whose ancient GTD-5 EAX switches appeared to be recently upgraded to something modern. I was surprised since the new stuff probably won't be needed for very long, relatively speaking, especially compared to how the old stuff. I wonder if they've started upgrading their "newer" Nortel DMS stuff yet 😏

[dsk]

147 years of common telephone networks on regular copper lines are ended today here in Norway  
Still it works in my home with an electromechanical switch...
I do not know if you may open this link from outside Norway, but here is the last call:
https://www.nrk.no/osloogviken/ruth-_89_-ble-oppringt-telenor-sjefen-_-den-siste-telefonsamtalen-pa-kobbernettet-i-norge-1.16226206

[MMikeJBenN27]

Bad news all the way around.  I think they want to do away with regular phone service so that they can more easily hack into people's phone calls.  Wireless is actually radio transmissions, and radio transmissions are easily intercepted, even from remote locations.  I am keeping my regular telephone service until they take it away from me.  If they don't, I will not get rid of it. 

Home phones forever!

Mike

[Stormcrash]

It's fine if you don't like cell phones but please stop repeating these lies/misunderstandings about how they work. Cell signals are encrypted and not "more easily hacked" or intercepted. And other than the link from phone to tower they use the same back end network as a landline

[poplar1]

DSK: So will Ruth still have a working phone? And what kind of central office switches were still in service until today? Anything old?

[TelePlay]

Cell signals are encrypted and not "more easily hacked" or intercepted. And other than the link from phone to tower they use the same back end network as a landline

I agree.

Cell phones (the original analog phones) no longer exist. Those were basically analog walkie-talkie devices that could be tuned into with an appropriate 800 mHz analog receiver.

PCS phones are digital and use the same compression/decompression technology as CDs to convert sound waves into 1s and 0S. On top of that, the digital sound bits are coded to the phone sending and receiving the digital stream with a unique code assigned to each phone known to only the MTSO (Mobile Telephone Switching Office) which uses the control frequencies of a digital call to allow the call to proceed. Illegitimate phone IDs are rejected, attempted calls ended.

"Cell" today refers to the network of towers in any area that provide blanket coverage, each tower is a cell on a network of towers each providing digital PCS communications.

The analog Motorola Flip Phones, and the multiple number of equivalent analog phones back in the day, are no more.

How this all works is explained well in the link below including this paragraph pertaining to phone security coding:

"All cell phones have special codes associated with them. These codes are used to identify the phone, the phone's owner and the service provider.

Let's say you have a cell phone, you turn it on and someone tries to call you. Here is what happens to the call:

When you first power up the phone, it listens for an SID on the control channel. The control channel is a special frequency that the phone and base station use to talk to one another about things like call set-up and channel changing. If the phone cannot find any control channels to listen to, it knows it is out of range and displays a "no service" message.

When it receives the SID, the phone compares it to the SID programmed into the phone. If the SIDs match, the phone knows that the cell it is communicating with is part of its home system.

Along with the SID, the phone also transmits a registration request, and the MTSO keeps track of your phone's location in a database -- this way, the MTSO knows which cell you are in when it wants to ring your phone.

The MTSO gets the call, and it tries to find you. It looks in its database to see which cell you are in.

The MTSO picks a frequency pair that your phone will use in that cell to take the call.

The MTSO communicates with your phone over the control channel to tell it which frequencies to use, and once your phone and the tower switch on those frequencies, the call is connected. You are talking by two-way radio to a friend!
As you move toward the edge of your cell, your cell's base station notes that your signal strength is diminishing.

Meanwhile, the base station in the cell you are moving toward (which is listening and measuring signal strength on all frequencies, not just its own one-seventh) sees your phone's signal strength increasing. The two base stations coordinate with each other through the MTSO, and at some point, your phone gets a signal on a control channel telling it to change frequencies. This hand off switches your phone to the new cell."

https://www.mat.ucsb.edu/~g.legrady/academic/courses/03w200a/projects/wireless/cell_technology.htm

There is virtually no way to "listen in" on over the air transmissions and, AFAIK, the receiving tower to sending tower connection (be it copper, FO or microwave) moves the encoded digital train of compressed and account coded phonetic bits (CD encoding technology digital bits) is what is sent over the air to and from a tower.

Listening in on a PCS to PCS conversation is not possible without knowing the phone codes of a call. However, if calling a landline, the call could be "tapped" after the digital signal is decompressed, made analog by a DAC, somewhere upstream of the analog "old" phone.

But I could be wrong as to who has access to what, where and how so always carefully choose what you say on any phone.

[dsk]

DSK: So will Ruth still have a working phone? And what kind of central office switches were still in service until today? Anything old?

We just saw a little square box, (Ill guess it was a mobile to landline adapter) and a new handsfree telephone set.

[countryman]

The more realistic issue is not that voice communications might be overheard - that one is as old as telephony itself and according to the legend inspired Mr. Strowger to his inventions.
Overhearing random phone calls by the communist East German "security" must have been one of the most boring jobs in the world. I have scorched my sauerkraut yesterday - is that a code word for a coup? Jeez.
The more realistic issue is data privacy. I suppose in the countries where the majority of the forum members live, pretty decent rules have been set up on this subject. "They" won't come to your house when you said the wrong word or used the wrong app. Legal authorities may tap into the communication of criminals though, and that doesn't seem to be a bad idea.

Back to the topic, great to hear that Ruth can still call her friends with familiar equipment and over a reliable system.

[TelePlay]

The more realistic issue is data privacy. I suppose in the countries where the majority of the forum members live, pretty decent rules have been set up on this subject. "They" won't come to your house when you said the wrong word or used the wrong app. Legal authorities may tap into the communication of criminals though, and that doesn't seem to be a bad idea.

Yes, I agree, but first, we now know that rules, even laws, are not adhered to.

Second, the MTSO control channels. Everything on these channels is recorded somewhere forever to include calling number, number called, location of both phones and other information related to apps and service provider network data.

In addition, "they" know the location of every phone at the moment and for months, if not years, historically. Digital phones "ping" towers every 6 seconds so the network knows which tower has control over the phone should someone call the mobile phone. And if location services is turned on, GPS data is sent on the control channels every 6 seconds. A recent example is "they" identified every phone that was within a mile of a crime scene during a 6 hour period on the day and hour of the crime and they interviewed each phone's owner/user. They will come to your house just for being somewhere. It's a much different world in this digital area.

The phone's control channel meta data is stored in a huge server farm forever for future analysis and/or data mining. It's not the conversation as you say, it's  the control data that is kept.

[MMikeJBenN27]

And that is just as bad.  I simply do not like being tracked, and I don't like "data" from me being stored.  That's why I am sticking to my home phone.  Yes, the Feds can still tap it, etc., but "civilians", can't for the most part, and corporations won't risk it.  I am not important enough for them to undertake something like that, and risk getting caught.

Mike

[dsk]

This is the equipment I could see, but I do not recognize the black box.

[countryman]

That's the way mobile systems work.
When Ruth never moves that square box, the provider will know the same things as before: Where she lives and when she used the phone.
Formerly, it was the norm that the provider printed your full name and address in a book every so often and distributed this data all over the world.

[Stormcrash]

Yes, I agree, but first, we now know that rules, even laws, are not adhered to.

Second, the MTSO control channels. Everything on these channels is recorded somewhere forever to include calling number, number called, location of both phones and other information related to apps and service provider network data.

In addition, "they" know the location of every phone at the moment and for months, if not years, historically. Digital phones "ping" towers every 6 seconds so the network knows which tower has control over the phone should someone call the mobile phone. And if location services is turned on, GPS data is sent on the control channels every 6 seconds. A recent example is "they" identified every phone that was within a mile of a crime scene during a 6 hour period on the day and hour of the crime and they interviewed each phone's owner/user. They will come to your house just for being somewhere. It's a much different world in this digital area.

The phone's control channel meta data is stored in a huge server farm forever for future analysis and/or data mining. It's not the conversation as you say, it's  the control data that is kept.

Which barring the addition of the tower location information is the same stuff phone companies have always kept records on, what calls are made between what numbers and for how long. Nothing changes in how that data is used either, it's for billing, network traffic engineering, and if the feds come knocking with a warrant they get the specific records and time period covered by the warrant, just like a copper line

And no way civilians can "tap" a cell call, not since the earliest analog days (even then they would only hear half the call anyways). You'd need to bust the encrypted control channel, identify what time/frequency division slices are allocated to the call you want and break the crypto and encoding on the actual digitized call, not going to happen in real time. Meanwhile to tap your landline they'd just have to follow the wires to the pole/box and put a recorder on your wires before it reaches a conentrator/swtich

[TelePlay]

Which barring the addition of the tower location information is the same stuff phone companies have always kept records on, what calls are made between what numbers and for how long. Nothing changes in how that data is used either, it's for billing, network traffic engineering, and if the feds come knocking with a warrant they get the specific records and time period covered by the warrant, just like a copper line.

In addition to tower data (vector and distance information for triangulation of the phone), a lot of digital information (including GPS geolocation recording of the phone) is saved for analysis in many ways years after the phone was used. The following is from the web site of a law firm specializing in metadata retrieval and analysis:


"Simply put, metadata is data about data. A phone's metadata describes key facts about an individual data file such as phone calls, photographs, texts, etc. With this data, you might reveal habits, activities and interests, or even uncover a lie. For example, metadata from a phone might show you:

Location and time a user accessed certain online accounts.

Phone call duration, call status (incoming, outgoing, or canceled), date and time, call type (voice or video).

Software application install and uninstall dates for, their use frequency, and even usage time.

Camera or device used to take a photo, whether was a downloaded photo or not, capture date, time, and GPS location, deletion status.

Device or browser used to send an email, its delivery time, or even show an email was spoofed.

Consider also the ways text message and call metadata can provider deeper context to key relationships.

For example

What time of day or night did they usually communicate? By text or phone call?

Were there group chats? Who else was involved?

How often did they talk or text?

Who usually initiated communication?

Was communication mutually reciprocated?"

And "they" have even better techs than a law firm.

[Stormcrash]

That site is describing metadata stored on the phone, not metadata sent to the carrier

Most of the metadata listed never leaves the phone and is just how oeperating systems work. Verizon certainly doesn't know when I take a picture on my cell phone, and your web traffic is nearly universally encrypted end to end (this site actually being an exception since it doesn't use https) which prevents man in the middle snooping of what you upload/download (tracker cookies in browsers are a whole different story though)

Half of that metadata listed is not something sent to the carrier but would apply to metadata extracted from a physical device in possession of the extractor. And that's why iOS for instance encrypts the device and can self lock on failed access attempts so even physical possession can't give that data without the type of effort only agencies like the FBI can muster

The only metadata in that list carriers would get is voice call/text origin/destination/time, possible aggregation of DNS records for websites, but not the content for any of those, not what you said/wrote/did on those connections