plunet

Well, you learn a new word every day, I didn't realise that cyberflashing was a thing but apparently it is a thing enough that a word has been created, which is sad. Inappropriate or unsolicited Bluetooth transfer would have been what I would have called it.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/ent...b0dbe871aa2d73Whilst it's annoying that someone else on that aircraft instigated this act, it does seem that BA is being unfairly called out here. How many other airlines have a cyberflashing policy? Some awareness and guidance for staff might be useful, but if you leave your personal device open for incoming Bluetooth transfers (airdrop in the iOS world) in a public place on public transport then you probably have to accept some personal responsibility...

Pascoe

I'm afraid I 100% disagree here. What about the case of less than perfectly tech savvy people who have done so by accident, for whatever reason (maybe trying to connect with a member of their travelling party, or whatever, doesn't really matter). Are they just 'asking for it'? What about younger people with connected devices? (no point in just saying that they should be a certain age, as that genie is already well and truly out of the bottle).

This is just malicious and disturbed behaviour pure and simple.

kaka

why did they open up their bluetooth availability? mine is always shut - or if on, it's for contacts only
and how is BA responsible?

this is like if one gets sent porn mail and blames the postman.

windowontheAside

I can see both sides here. In my opinion, BA is not responsible for people leaving their devices open and therefore enabling this nasty practice. However, they should have a policy for dealing with it, just as with any other forms of antisocial behaviour on board. Quite how they would do that escapes me though, since the perpetrator isn't obvious.

I wouldn't care to sit for hours in the vicinity of someone who sent me dick pics, even if I had inadvertently left my BT open.

simonrp84

More to the point, if they're waiting to take-off then why have they not switched their device into flight-safe mode?
(edit) I see that BA have already covered this.

Scots_Al

Ldnn1

frandrake

You can still have wifi and bluetooth enabled while in flight safe mode.

Anyway I frankly think this is a non-problem. A bit of awareness and if you are so terrified by a dick picture you should be in the know of BASIC things to do in order to secure your devices. I really can't see what role should an airline company play here.

TWCLAM

Yes totally BA's fault that people leave their phones open in such a way. The bloke who did it is a cretin but it's in no way BA's fault.

I see the angle of the entire article is broadly in line with huff posts exemplary, non agenda, reporting.

simonrp84

Not during taxi, take-off and landing. For those portions of the flight BA says that bluetooth must be disabled.

Pascoe

To be clear I personally did not suggest BA was accountable / at fault here. I merely objected to the idea that it was ever somehow the recipient's problem. Preventative measure better taken than not, agreed, but that is the nature of all attacks on the vulnerable - no-one WANTS to be attacked. And in hindsight I am sure they'd rather measures had been taken. So one has to assume there's a reasonable reason for why they weren't.

We have had a spate of car breakins in my area that appear to have been the result of some little cretin 'cloning' the bippers remotely. So while the antidote for that seems to be to revert to manually locking the car centrally with one's keys at night, it's no substitute for these people deciding NOT to do bad things I am afraid.

Calum

I've never used airdrop before but how does she want them to police this? Make everyone hand in their iphones as they board?

Unless the person who is sending the 'd*** pics' is stupid enough to have their iphone name as 'seat 17a's-iphone' or 'joe boggs-iphone', they won't know who's it is and chances are they aren't going to detain everyone on the plane to find out.

Kgmm77

midu

sxc