Signal Jamming Devices Protecting The Conclave At Sistine Chapel
Many Catholics and representatives of other Christian confessions all over the world breathlessly watched the conclave at The Sistine Chapel in Vatican, where a new Pope was elected. The conclave started at 12th of March and it was probably the most interesting and the most secure conclave for a pretty long time. That was the first time when the informational security of this truly epochal event was at such a high stake. The whole Sistine Chapel and Santa Maria living complex was mounted with signal blockers, to prevent information leaks.
Cell phone jamming devices
Those special cell phone jamming devices were installed in order to prevent the 115 cardinals, which were participating in the election, from using modern wireless gadgets, and to block any surveillance and eavesdropping devices in the Chapel and the Santa Maria living quarters. Despite the fact that all the staff and cardinals are swearing oaths not to spread the information about the election process and everything that goes on during the conclave, they still have no rights, and now any possibility to use any devices for communications.
3G and 4G jamming devices
But that were not the all restrictive measures. Cardinals made a decision that an excommunication awaits anyone who will try to break the secrecy, despite his of her range. Media relations director of the US Conference of Bishops Mary Ann Walsh thinks that: “In our electronic age, there is always a risk that someone among the cardinals will use an iPad or Tweeter during the conclave”. Such a measures are not really new to the conclave, they were adopted in 2005, but then there were no need to use a 3G and 4G jamming devices, because smartphones and tablets were not so widely spread and they used only anti-eavesdropping devices.
One of the reasons of those strict security measures was the fact that there are lots of young cardinals at this conclave and many of them have their own blogs and microblogs, and Vatican was really concerned with a possibility of information leaks through those blogs, if the conclave would last for a really long time. There was such a precedent, when a German cardinal gave the name of the newly elected Pope to the German press, before his name was officially called.
Many people think that it was a rather wise decision, because eavesdropping and surveillance devices are widely spread nowadays, and cardinals have modern smartphones, which can pose a danger too. Those smartphones have lots of vulnerabilities and evildoers may have used them for eavesdropping. For doing that it is enough to hack the target phone over Bluetooth, or install a special app, that will be able to dial random phone numbers. In that case any mobile phone at the Chapel may be turned into an eavesdropping bug. We at Jammer-Store think that this act of Vatican will show people that signal blocking device may be really helpful and that their only goal is to protect your information.
As we've already mentioned, the conclave began at 12th of March and finished and at 14th of March faithful people have seen a white smoke, coming from the Sistine Chapel pipe and heard the bells ring. Archbishop of Buenos-Aires Jorge Mario Bergoglio became a new Pope.
