SIM City

Our daily tour around the loony end of the blogosphere brings word of a new threat to America: pay-as-you-go cellphones. Powerline propagates a story from internment advocate Michelle Malkin (no links please, we're sane):

suspected terrorists have begun buying disposable cell phones in bulk. I take it that such phones are difficult if not impossible to trace. What makes the story potentially explosive is that the current buying spree seems to have begun suddenly, in various locations around the country, possibly as a reaction to the New York Times' blowing the secrecy of the NSA's cell phone intercept program.

To be fair to Hindrocket (yes, he really uses that moniker), he does provide some updates noting the dubious nature of the document on which Malkin's claim is based, but there is no exploration of the basic preposterousness of the claim itself. Consider for instance the impreciseness of the terminology: All cellphones are "disposable", it's the SIM card that gives them a number and makes them unique. So what they can only mean is that there's a surge in phones using SIM cards that have been paid for in cash, and thus can't traced back to a specific person.

Which presents several additional issues. First, it's not that easy to find cash-only pre-paid phones; most outlets in the USA (where Malkin's report originated) want to see some plastic. But more importantly, even when the name on a cellphone can't be traced, the phone can. Which is kind of obvious, since the phone achieves its functionality by having at least one radio tower know where it is.

So you'd think al Qaeda might have figured this out? Indeed. Because the previous, more truthy version of this scare story is that al Qaeda was using anyonymous SIM cards from Swisscom to escape detection. But:

[New York Times] For two years [as of March 2004], investigators now say, they were able to track the conversations and movements of several Qaeda leaders and dozens of operatives after determining that the suspects favored a particular brand of cellphone chip. The chips carry prepaid minutes and allow phone use around the world.

Investigators said they believed that the chips, made by Swisscom of Switzerland, were popular with terrorists because they could buy the chips without giving their names.

"They thought these phones protected their anonymity, but they didn't," said a senior intelligence official based in Europe. Even without personal information, the authorities were able to conduct routine monitoring of phone conversations.

Furthermore:

They also said they had strong indications that terror suspects, alert to the phones' vulnerability, had largely abandoned them for important communications and instead were using e-mail, Internet phone calls and hand-delivered messages.

Apparently the word to stop using pre-paid phones must be arriving to US operatives by carrier pigeon. There's another interesting incidental point in the NYT article:

During the American bombing of Tora Bora in Afghanistan in December 2001, American authorities reported hearing Osama bin Laden speaking to his associates on a satellite phone. Since then, Mr. bin Laden has communicated with handwritten messages delivered by trusted couriers, officials said.

This timing conflicts both with King George's claim that Osama stopped using his satellite phone in 1998 following a media leak, and the supposed debunking thereof on the grounds that he had already stopped using it by then. Of course it also conflicts with Republican General Tommy Franks' claim that Osama was not at Tora Bora in 2001, but that story is for another day.

Anyway, back to "disposable phones":

Last year, Switzerland's legislature passed a law making it illegal to purchase cellphone chips without providing personal information, following testimony from a Swiss federal prosecutor, Claude Nicati, that the Swisscom cards had become popular with Qaeda operatives. The law goes into effect on July 1 [2004].

One senior official said the authorities were grateful that Qaeda members were so loyal to Swisscom.

Another official agreed: "They'd switch phones but use the same cards. The people were stupid enough to use the same cards all of the time. It was a very good thing for us."

Almost two years later, would the terrorists be stupid enough to do the same thing again -- or would rightwing bloggers be stupid enough to believe that they would?

UPDATE: More from Mike Power and Tbogg, both of whom are much better with photos than us. Also Crooks and Liars.