from the call-for-help-go-unconnected dept.
Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984
911 emergency services go down across the US after CenturyLink outage
911 emergency services in several states across the U.S. remain down after a massive outage at a CenturyLink data center.
The outage began after 12pm ET on Thursday, according to CenturyLink’s status page, and continues to cause disruption across 911 call centers. Some states have seen their services restored. CenturyLink has not said what caused the outage beyond an issue with a “network element,” but said in its latest update — around 11am ET on Friday — that the company said that it was “seeing good progress, but our service restoration work is not complete.”
In a tweet, the telecoms giant said it was “working tirelessly” to get its affected systems back up and running.
CenturyLink, one of the largest telecommunications providers in the U.S., provides internet and phone backbone services to major cell carriers, including AT&T and Verizon. Data center or fiber issues can have a knock-on effect to other companies, cutting out service and causing cell site blackouts.
In this case, the outage affected only cellular calls to 911, and not landline calls.
Several states sent emergency alerts to residents’ cell phones warning of the outage.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:04AM
So did the country turn into a "The Purge" mentality instantly?
(Score: -1, Troll) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:12AM (1 child)
Mossad is attacking America and American interests as punishment against Trump for pulling the troops out from the Middle-East (and not just that, but meeting with a U.S.S. Liberty Survivor and pushing Israel to get its act in gear for a two-state solution).
We can expect to see more cyberattacks on SCADA and other infrastructure, the disappearance and/or destruction of civilian airliners at home and abroad, and Lavon Affair [wikipedia.org] style attacks on overseas tourists, such as this recent one [cnn.com] and the flight 9268. [wikipedia.org]
Mossad (with the help of sympathetic nonprofits) is also behind the staging and support of the Latin American caravans attempting to invade America.
(Score: 2) by seeprime on Saturday December 29 2018, @06:38AM
Wouldn't China make a better and more believable choice of attacker? Mossad, not so much.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:15AM (10 children)
Ummm... A few days ago the concept of doing away with cash was discussed here.
Any speculation of how a similar outage would impact society?
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:28AM (7 children)
Most people with crypto also have some gold/silver/etc that has a long history of being used as money. The (majority of) people who do whatever the government tells them will be in a pickle though, so there should be some plan for helping them.
(Score: 3, Touché) by sjames on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:22AM (6 children)
The local grocery store is unlikely to take gold or silver during an outage. I doubt they even know where to get a suitable scale.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:41AM (5 children)
Its mostly in the form of coins of known weight... and most grocery stores have a scale to weight vegetables and meat and such.
(Score: 2) by danaris on Saturday December 29 2018, @02:45PM
As I understand it, such scales would be unlikely to have the precision required for the weighing of the amounts of gold necessary to pay for reasonable-sized grocery trips.
And that's assuming that standard weights of coins had even been set. That seems like the kind of thing that would take months at least, and the establishment of some more local governmental system to oversee them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:05PM (2 children)
Most grocery stores sell digital scales of reasonable (+/- .01 gram) accuracy, and have business-grade scales for counting cash in the office that are even more accurate. Not sure what you level of accuracy is needed to weigh precious metals fairly, but I'm willing to bet they have it.
(Score: 2) by Kalas on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:28PM
Where the fuck do you live that you can just grab a scale accurate to 10mg at Walmart or whatnot?
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday December 29 2018, @10:29PM
Cash is not counted with a scale. They use something like this [amazon.com].
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday December 29 2018, @10:25PM
At best, those scales weigh to the nearest 1/8 oz. Based on today's price, that's plus or minus $160. Even if you shop for a month's worth of groceries, that's too much variance.
Who is going to standardize the weight and purity of the coins? In p[articular, who is going to do it during a two week (or so) communications outage?
Stick to folding green. It's already standardized and cheerfully accepted by every retailer.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:38AM (1 child)
Congratulations. You've just understood why killing cash is a bad idea. Just like Estonia going all digital for state records. All it takes is an outage to disrupt society, and it doesn't take much to come about: a good strong solar flare, a nuke going off in the upper atmosphere, the US not maintaining the power grid properly...
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Wednesday January 02 2019, @03:19AM
If any of those things happen, not being able to use "cash" or the digital equivalent is going to be the least of your problems. Chances are, paper cash is going to lose its value very quickly in those scenarios anyway.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Saturday December 29 2018, @03:34AM
- Counties in Oregon.
In my actual experience, the Clark County "User Error" did the right thing, because I have the 971 Oregon Area code with a local Portland exchange, despite that I actually live in Vancouver.
I shall write a letter to CRESA to request they alert Oregon's Multnomah, Clackamas and Washington Counties during future such events.
Far more common is for a Portland resident to have a 971 or 503 number but then to actually work in Vancouver.
(The alert scared the living crap out of my lady.)
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @04:53AM
That was the final straw. They have also been spamming me with NWS Flood Alerts that don't amount to a hill of beans. Then there was the "just testing" presidential alert. The USA is turning into Half Life 2.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @07:20AM (2 children)
"help 9/11 you're our only ho [click]"
[tap, tap, tap]
"9/11?"
"your call is important to us. please deposit $0.10 to continue your call."
"what?"
[click. hum. dead air.]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday December 29 2018, @07:57AM
That will go over some younger people's heads. They've never seen or used one of those devices. And $0.10 should $1.00. Better have some Susan B. Anthony's in your pockets.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday December 29 2018, @09:28AM
Your dad may not have had 911 at all. We first heard of it while I was in high school. It seemed to be a thing in California, popularized by a television show. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3buQlW0Ums&list=PLDRGkcb4IW3-DYjnbVaNOjshzpuHnzoq_ [youtube.com] Enjoy a corny 70's TV show. Oddly, I don't see mention of 911 in the first little bit of the first episode I'm looking at. Maybe it was in a later season yet.
Oh yeah, a little ways in, I heard a dispatcher supposedly answering the phone over the radio, clearly said "911". Back then, it was just Hollyweird shit.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Sunday December 30 2018, @04:52AM
Just since last evening, from time to time I can't ping such 1.1.1.1. Disconnecting and reconnecting the wifi always fixes it.
My T-Mobile data was dropping dead from time to time late this afternoon but after five or ten minutes it would work just fine again.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]