U.S. Secret Service Dismantles Massive Telecommunications Threat Near UN

Investigators from the U.S. Secret Service reportedly dismantled communications equipment, including more than 300 servers and 100,000 SIM cards housed in at least five sites within 35 miles of the United Nations headquarters in New York. It was described as one of the largest communications threats uncovered on U.S. soil. The Secret Service stated that while there have been no credible threats to the UN General Assembly, this system was capable of knocking out all regional communications just some 150 heads of state and government converge this week at the United Nations. Traditionally, this UN gathering is the biggest protective event of the year for the Secret Service. The telecom network could have been used to overwhelm cell towers by sending 30 million text messages per minute and placing an untold number of phone calls, to severely cripple communications, including in the case of an emergency response. The system was also built to transmit anonymous, encrypted messages among participants in criminal enterprises. The forensic analysis is still in the early stages, but the Service issued a statement to the public.