Teknovis

I read earlier this week that a man was found guilty of a hit and run in which the victim ultimately died. The man did not deny that the car was involved in the incident, but he did claim that he sold the car before the incident occurred. Therefore, he claimed that it was the new, and unidentified, owner who was guilty of the hit and run.

However, the police presented evidence from a mobile phone company that the man’s mobile phone, and by extension the man, was in the area of the incident at the time of the incident. Indeed, they even knew that the man was on a call at the time of the incident. The full article is Man jailed for fatal Dublin hit and run, but you need to view the video in order to hear about the location based evidence.

I think that it is very interesting the way that mobile phone location information is being increasingly used to solve crime in Ireland.

The first investigation that highlighted the use of location information relating to a mobile phone was the disappearance and death of Robert Holohan. See Holohan search called off for the night for more information.

More recently, mobile phone evidence was used to successfully convict Joe O’Reilly of the murder of his wife. For more about this see Mobile record clashes with O’Reilly alibi and O’Reilly trial hears details of mobile calls. Indeed, in this case the location aspects of the mobile phone evidence were questioned in the unsucessful appeal case, as described in Joe O’Reilly’s appeal is dismissed.

Tags: Ireland, Mobile Phone, Police

I read an interesting article in The Irish Times over the weekend (but I was too busy to write about it then :o ) The article reports that the head of the Irish Police (known locally as Garda) has asked Vodafone Ireland to provide the Internet browsing details of all of its customers. Furthermore, he wants all of this information in real time! The full article is Garda chief asks mobile phone firm to retain web-browsing data. Apparently, Vodafone are being asked to do this as a “good citizen”, or as a small favour!

I think that this is a typical example of how things are often done in an unofficial way in Ireland, where the rules (or laws) are not seen to have any relevance! I can imagine the reported conversation between the Garda Commissioner and the Vodafone Representative:

Garda Commissioner: “Right lads – could you do us a favour? We need all the Internet browsing details of all your users in real-time.“

Vodafone Representative: “Do you have a warrant for that?“

Garda Commissioner: “Nah – don’t worry about warrants. Sure we are the Garda! That’ll be grand.“

Although the article is not very clear, I think that the police want the full contents of every webpage that is viewed. It is a mystery why they want this information in real-time. In fact, it is a mystery to me why they want this information at all! Surely a targeted approach (with warrants) would be more efficient!

There are also so many ways of circumventing this proposal using software that is readily available in the Internet. So I do not think that it will deter serious criminals.

All of this is especially pointless when you consider that one can (and criminals do) legally buy a prepaid mobile phone without providing any identity information.

So who is this new measure really targeting?

My take on it is that it is the bright idea of somebody who wants to grab headlines with a great new security measure, but that this person has no concept of the practical use or implications of the idea. It certainly would not be the first time this ever happened!

Tags: Ireland, Mobile Phone, Police, The Irish Times, Vodafone, Warrant