Security scares and the end of the world

First it was copper being stolen from telco ducting in the USA and Australia, now it’s wireless base stations in the UK being targeted.

Reports have emerged that Vodafone UK suffered a major network outage on Monday following a break-in on Sunday night at one of its ‘technical facilities’, leaving many customers without voice, SMS and Internet services. The break-in occurred at an exchange located in Basingstoke, UK. 

An operator spokeswoman told Light Reading Mobile that "specialist networking equipment" and "IT hardware" were stolen and that police are investigating the incident. The spokeswoman was unable to provide details regarding exactly what kind of equipment and hardware was stolen.

The Insider has been highlighting the potential loss of service from natural disasters, of which we have seen many of late, but may need to switch attention to ‘theft disasters’. Just what can be done with the stolen components is uncertain, and information on exactly what was stolen was not forthcoming.

It may have been an isolated case or part of some evil plot to disrupt communications in Basingstoke on a quiet Sunday night. Maybe it was just a group playing dare to see what they could get away with. Maybe it’s the beginnings of a pirate wireless network! Perhaps its industrial espionage at work, a very intriguing thought so close to reports from MWC in Barcelona of Asian-looking ‘spies’ disguised as cleaners working in and around the NSN stand! I kid you not.  As the market hots up, the technology stakes heat up, too. Anything is possible. 

If you factor in just how competitive the network components sector is getting, plus the new technology being released weekly, you can see just how important security is becoming. And it’s not just about the technology. Google has also had a big scare having suffered a ‘glitch’ that ‘accidentally’ deleted 150,000 GMail accounts.

Looks like the market for security consultants and business continuity experts will be booming along with most other telco associated sectors. No doubt, the expected demise of the world in December 2012, as predicted by the Mayan calendar, will be used to instill fear in telco operators. It is likely to have the same effect as the dreaded ‘Millennium Crash’ predicted in 2000 that resulted in millions of dollars being spent in anticipation of planes falling from the skies and networks ceasing to operate at the stroke of midnight on December 31, 1999.

Yikes, is it just another conspiracy theory or should we make the best of what time we have left!