Illinois man accused of fooling S.F. cops (fake caller ID on 911 dispatch)

[alp227]

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

(03-10) 09:31 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- An Illinois man has been charged in federal court with using a caller ID spoofing system to fool San Francisco police into responding to fake emergencies, court records show.

Max Stringer of Machesney Park, Ill., was charged with four counts of making a threatening interstate communication by engaging in what is known among pranksters as "swatting" - getting police SWAT teams to respond to bogus incidents.

Stringer rigged his phone to make it appear on the police dispatch's caller ID display as if he was calling from a San Francisco number instead of from his town of 20,000 people near the Wisconsin border, authorities said.

In one of his four alleged prank calls last year, Stringer said he had a gun and was going to shoot a woman or responding police officers, prosecutors said. In another, he allegedly said he had planted a bomb.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/10/BA6L1I88UN.DTL

[virgogal]

1. Idiot----hope they give him the max.

[AsahinaKimi]

2. Meh...

Idiot. Throw the book at him! He was probably sitting at home laughing his ass off. Well, now he can sit in Jail and laugh his ass off.

[Exultant Democracy]

3. I wonder f his attack on San Fran can be seen as having political undertones.

It seems to me that the attack on SF may not be random with the way the right wingers demonize the city.

[alp227]

4. Machesney Park is in IL-16, a Republican House district

The representative there is solidly conservative.

[spleedoe]

6. Conservative?

Yeah, the district is held by the GOP. Machesney Park is solid Democratic though and referred to as Machesney PArkansas, mainly because it is a blue collar working family type community. Manzullo(R) IL-16 was swept in with the class of 94' and he ran on term limits, 3 at the most he said. Seemed like a good idea till he had the job. Of course due to gerrymandering Rockford Illinois and its suburbs, incl. Machesney Park, are stuck with a bunch of rural small town farmers and they are republican. You know as Sarah puts it, "Real America". Unfortunately flax news gets in every crack it can and I suspect Mr. Stringer is a typical Beckian.

[kirby]

5. Doesnt make sense...

911 does not use Caller ID. They use ANI which cannot be spoofed.