[GreenKeys] telecommunication infrastructure vulnerabilities

[Bryan Brodie]

As the telco veterans on this list may already know, vast portions of
telephone voice communications are now routed over the public
internet.

Bye bye resilient electromechanical switching and isolated
communications networks. Hello digital transmission over the public
internet with all of the associated risks and cost savings. (But, for
the time being, next quarter telecom profits are looking good!)

On September 11, 2001, landlines kept working even as cellphones
failed. This will not be the case next time. One EMP or several failed
satellites later, our telecommunication infrastructure will become a
pile of "obsolete junk".

I should note that I take no satisfaction from this.

From: hwhall at compuserve.com
To: GreenKeys at mailman.qth.net
Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2011 20:59:49 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] an idea

 If you rely on the phone company landlines, the event that wipes the
computers will take it down, too, I imagine. It's computer switched,
optic fiber connected (with solid state optical signal boosters all
over), and so on. In the event of that flare, the power lines are
going away, too, so much of our ham stations will be offline.
--Wayne
 WB4OGM