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GOOD GRIEF: SNIPPED FROM ARTICLE
North Sound 911 Service Repeatedly Targeted
Chris Halsne KIRO 7 Eyewitness News Investigative Reporter

POSTED: 2:18 PM PST October 31, 2003
UPDATED: 2:48 PM PST October 31, 2003

A KIRO Team 7 Investigation has uncovered disturbing details of a plot to disrupt all telephone, computer and cell service to the North Sound.

Investigative Reporter Chris Halsne proves our most precious infrastructures are still vulnerable to attack.

The FBI won't tell you this, but we will: For the past two years, federal investigators have been trying to catch a criminal who has repeatedly tapped into a major fiber optics cable north of Seattle.

This person hasn't been randomly chopping entire bundles of cables, but rather he or she is using surgical precision to black out one particular 911 emergency call center.

Early in the morning of Sept. 3, some criminal strolled into a Qwest Telecommunications server station with tools in hand and carefully sliced one strand of wire.

For the next 8 hours and 41 minutes Whatcom County, Bellingham and northern Snohomish County lost all telecommunications. Even 911 service was disconnected.

"If phone lines go out, somebody could call for help and die as a result of not being able to receive help. We are very concerned," said Bill Eflo, Whatcom County Sheriff.

Operators couldn't help but feel a sense of déjà vu. KIRO Team 7 Investigators have learned that someone intentionally rerouted, cut or altered 911 service to Whatcom County on three occasions in two years. Each time the criminal entered the same Qwest fiber optics "hut" to create the chaos.

"Communications can be vulnerable if you don't safeguard them," said Chuck Busick.

Busick is a retired Army Special Ops commander and now a telecommunications security expert. He says it's naive for the FBI and Qwest to pretend the series of fiber optics cuts is "vandalism."

"From a special operations perspective, it's called 'probing the target.' Trying to find out what their true vulnerabilities are. Sometimes you hit it the first time, sometimes you don't. So going in and doing multiple tests to make sure this is, in fact, a good way to disrupt the communications system is certainly feasible," said Busick.

While the FBI scrambles to find a suspect, KIRO Team 7 Investigators went to check out security measures at the Qwest routing station.

http://www.kirotv.com/news/2601577/detail.html