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1.  

   There was this case, too

   

   John Fenderson (profile), Aug 18th, 2003 @ 2:16am

   
   

   Couple Were Snared by Satellites

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2.  

   Case in Cleveland

   

   Beck, Aug 18th, 2003 @ 8:43am

   
   

   There was a case in Cleveland a couple of years ago where evidence presented at a murder trial showed that the defendant was moving towards the scene of the murder shortly before it happened. The defendant was making cell phone calls, and the records showed which towers he was hitting and could show that he was travelling towards the murder location. Unfortunately I can't find an online reference to the story.

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3.  

   Locating cell phones

   

   Doug, Aug 18th, 2003 @ 4:24pm

   
   

   Hmm, it seems that some people are under the misbelief that the best that the phone company can do to locate your cell phone is to determine which cell it is near.

   In order to support "Enhanced 911" services, the FCC requires American cell-phone providers to be able to be determine the location of the phone to within 100 meters for 67% of calls, and to within 300 meters for 95% of calls. If using a handset-assisted location technique (GPS, etc.), the distances are halved.

   According to Declan McCullagh, AT&T Wireless, Cingular Wireless and T-Mobile use the network-based (primarily triangulation) technique, while Verizon Wireless, Sprint PCS and Nextel Communications use handset-assisted location.

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4.  

   Re: Locating cell phones

   

   Mike (profile), Aug 18th, 2003 @ 4:52pm

   
   

   Not unaware. In fact, I write about E911 service all the time over on the Techdirt Wireless site. My point was that the article did not indicate which technology was used, and thus it *could* just be that they used the tower it was closest to.

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