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Flight cancelled when “Al-Quida” Wi-Fi network became available

D

Dari

Lifer
link

A Los Angeles International Airport flight bound for London was cancelled Sunday when a passenger's phone picked up the Wi-Fi signal "al-Quida Free Terror Nettwork" (sic) that was emanating from a fellow flier's hotspot minutes before the United Airlines flight was set to liftoff.

After a concerned passenger notified a flight attendant of the network at about 9:30pm, the plane taxied to a remote section of the Los Angeles airport and was held there for three hours. The plane was searched as passengers of Flight 136 were ordered to power off electronic devices, local media said.

"After an hour, (the captain) said there was a security threat and that we didn't have clearance to take off," passenger Elliot Del Pra told ABC7.com. The person responsible for the hotspot was not discovered, LaWeekly said.

"After further investigation, it was determined that no crime was committed and no further action will be taken,"LAX said in a statement. American Airlines said the flight was cancelled "out of an abundance of caution."

It was the second time in as many months that an Internet indiscretion caused an airline scare. An American Airlines flight from Dallas to San Diego was cut short in August following a tweet that there was a bomb on a plane carrying a Sony executive.
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waggy said:
rofl. whoever it was is a idiot and the airline was a idiot for canceling the flight.
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Would you want to be 35k above land where such a network is live and you have people thinking and talking about it? I wouldn't. Nervous people make me nervous, especially on a damn plane.
 
.. and this is why we can't have nice things.

... and even I could spot the mis-spelling right away
 
That is pretty hilarious.

I don't know if I'd risk my life doing something like that though. I imagine this guy's life is probably over once they find who did it.
 
Red Squirrel said:
That is pretty hilarious.

I don't know if I'd risk my life doing something like that though. I imagine this guy's life is probably over once they find who did it.
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no. they said no crime was committed.

Dari said:
Would you want to be 35k above land where such a network is live and you have people thinking and talking about it? I wouldn't. Nervous people make me nervous, especially on a damn plane.
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it's a fucking wifi hotspot. I doubt they would use "al-quida" in a name if they were them.
 
After a concerned passenger notified a flight attendant of the network
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This person is a douche

Dari said:
Would you want to be 35k above land where such a network is live and you have people thinking and talking about it? I wouldn't. Nervous people make me nervous, especially on a damn plane.
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Nervous of what? The zeros of US airline terrorist incidents in the decade or so?
 
You know what would be funny if someone did this:

After the plane gets to cruising altitude start broadcasting the following:

"There is a bomb on this plane" a few minutes later
"Prepare to die infidels"
"20 minutes until you all die"
"15 minutes until you all die"
"10 minutes until you die infidels"
"5 minutes until your doom"
"Allah is great, Allah is great"

That would be amusing.
 
Blanky said:
Modern America is truly dictated by fear of monsters under the bed.
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Well said for only 35 posts.

Wireless networks are meant to be ridiculously named.
Whoever thought the "terrorists" would have named their secret network hotspot Al-Quida deserves to be sent back to high school.
 
Do UTF-16 characters work for wifi hot spot names? Using arabic characters would probably have been more realistic and really spark a scare LOL.

Make it spell out something silly like "i like kittens" in arabic.
 
Red Squirrel said:
Do UTF-16 characters work for wifi hot spot names? Using arabic characters would probably have been more realistic and really spark a scare LOL.

Make it spell out something silly like "i like kittens" in arabic.
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That is good, but alternate between Arabic and English, and alternate between "Die Infidels", Allah Is Great".
 
DCal430 said:
You know what would be funny if someone did this:

After the plane gets to cruising altitude start broadcasting the following:

"There is a bomb on this plane" a few minutes later
"Prepare to die infidels"
"20 minutes until you all die"
"15 minutes until you all die"
"10 minutes until you die infidels"
"5 minutes until your doom"
"Allah is great, Allah is great"

That would be amusing.
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Hilarious. :/
 
I find it silly that the TSA/FAA/FBI doesn't have the skill to find out which handset was used with this stupid joke. Surely there are log files on every handset on the plane that spotted the network, which includes the MAC, and thus identifies the handset.

Just goes to show gobbermint agencies are behind everyone else when it comes to intelligence.
 
BarkingGhostar said:
I find it silly that the TSA/FAA/FBI doesn't have the skill to find out which handset was used with this stupid joke. Surely there are log files on every handset on the plane that spotted the network, which includes the MAC, and thus identifies the handset.

Just goes to show gobbermint agencies are behind everyone else when it comes to intelligence.
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So you feel that the person should be prosecuted for creating a mobile hotspot?
 
BarkingGhostar said:
I find it silly that the TSA/FAA/FBI doesn't have the skill to find out which handset was used with this stupid joke. Surely there are log files on every handset on the plane that spotted the network, which includes the MAC, and thus identifies the handset.

Just goes to show gobbermint agencies are behind everyone else when it comes to intelligence.
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It wasn't a crime, man. It was just an apparent threatening SSID. This is not like you are threatening the President. They're not going to confiscate cell phones and search for MAC addresses all on account of a SSID.
 
waggy said:
no. they said no crime was committed.



it's a fucking wifi hotspot. I doubt they would use "al-quida" in a name if they were them.
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Whether or not he was Al Qaeda is immaterial. It's the other passengers I'm worried about. There's no telling what people are capable of when faced with death (or the perception of death) and I don't want to find out in an environment I cannot easily escape from.
 
Why does it say it was a United flight and then later say it was an American flight?
Ars needs to get someone to proofread before they post things.
 
Simple fix:

Pilot: "Good afternoon folks. Seems we have a wiseguy on the flight today. I'm directing whoever has a wifi hotspot that includes the poorly spelled name of a terrorist organization to change it, or this flight goes nowhere. We will be standing by until the person fesses up, changes it, and allows us to go on our way."

- or -

Passenger (with guts): "Miss flight attendant. I noticed someone here has a hotspot that references a terrorist organization. Now, you may not be familiar with how this works, but I am. I don't suppose I could address the cabin and ask that the person change the name of it to something else before this caused more issues could I?"

Ridiculous to do anything else. I simply cannot believe that we as a population are that fucking scared of the world around us. Grrrr...this stuff pisses me off. It's not what I fight for when I put on my uniform, it's just not.
 
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