I went back and re-read the article myself. I see what you mean about the Swisscom phones being normal cell phone chips. the article does note that OBL was reportedly heard using a satellite phone in the Tora Bora area in 2001, but that he has since moved to more secure currier communication.
One would have thought that others that run in those circles would have gotten the message that calls, whether landline, cell or satellite, can be traced. Maybe Nek thought talking with the BBC made him invulnerable.
This is one of the things that tripped up Tim McVeigh. He used "anonymous" telephone calling cards and thought that protected him. But the FBI was able to trace the calls he made with those cards and got a mountain of evidence on him. IIRC, they tracked down his purchase of those infamous blue barrels as well as his purchase of the nitro-methane.
A good example of how slow these guy are to learn, is their reliance on computers and how much we glean from the hard drives when we capture a HVT.
--Boot Hill