June 20, 2003
Jamming cell phone signals in changing rooms, an option to banning?
Yet another article, this time by MSNBC, rounding up bans worldwide on mobile phones in swimming pools and changing rooms or, as in the extreme case of Saudia Arabia, forbidding them altogether throughout the kingdom. This article is interesting because it brings up a new angle, the option of installing (costly) jamming devices, which would scramble radio signals so that cellular phones could not be used at all in changing areas, preventing paedophile or other mal intentioned photographers.
Known as GSM jamming, this system exists in theaters in Australia and Japan to prevent cell phone ringing, but is illegal in Great-Britain, the US and other countries as it can create interference with emergency communication signals. Yet as early as 2001, cell phone jamming devices were reported a booming business.
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