BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / How did Sherlock do mobile phone trick?

**Posted by Sherlock Holmes** February 10, 2012 1:27 pm

At the beginning when he texts everyone in the room saying "Wrong!". Pretty amazing....

Anybody know how something like that can be done?

**Posted by Ceto** February 10, 2012 4:57 pm

Unfortunately not But it would have been totally awesome if someone knew how to do it Just think about the possibilities!!

**Posted by kazza474** February 10, 2012 9:23 pm

I think he must have channelled Abby or McGee from NCIS to help do that one!
A lot of things like that will never be explained I daresay, makes for perfectly good 'forum discussion' fodder and 'Moftiss' is smart with this show. They make sure there are plenty of 'discussion points' to keep interest at a peak because they understand the modern way of communications etc.

**Posted by arkemiffo** February 21, 2012 5:34 pm

Ok, here comes my take on it.
Technically it would be fairly easy, but with a big caveat.
This requires hacking into the phone system.

Given that he knows where Lestrades phone is (at the press conference as he knew Lestrade would be there), a simple triangulation by the mast connection would give all locations of the phones that are connected to those masts. From that he can simply surmise that the attendees will be within a certain proximity of Lestrades phone, specially if they are all clustered (to avoid phones on another room and such) and send a text to all those phones.

We know however that Sherlock is at least adapt with some computer skills (he breaks Watsons password). It is quite a step to go to being able to hack the phone network though, so its a big nut to swallow, but I believe that would be the best way to be able to send to all the phones in one room.

Another way would require to know who was present, which he of course could get from the newspapers if he had contacts there, but he would have to know all the papers attending. Even if this would be the easiest technically (no technical knowledge required), it would be harder to get all of the numbers of all the phones in that room.

**Posted by kazza474** February 22, 2012 2:17 am

Oh it wouldn't be hard for Sherlock, he's a hero after all!
lol.

I'd actually imagine he would seek out someone who could do it for him, as he did with the graffiti artist. In this day & age there are probably techs & geeks among the homeless network. Lost their high flying careers, etc etc.

In general I have noticed that people forget that he will ask others for help when he needs it. He's good at outsourcing.

Another thought is that he probably 'borrowed' a list of the numbers from Mycroft. He'd have connections to all teh press people's names & numbers.

**Posted by Nutek** May 30, 2012 8:55 am

I would rather think he just texted to a "Source" he has on telephone company to send a mass message thru the network. Fit to those in that room only. Press attendees are pretty much always the same group for Lestrade let's say.

**Posted by kazza474** May 30, 2012 9:02 am

Thanks Nutek, see I wouldn't have the foggiest idea about those things. I still remember dialling numbers, even remember turning a crank & speaking to an operator.

**Posted by SoundOfBaskerville** August 8, 2012 6:22 am

"I pickpocket him when he's annoying."

Get the contacts straight off Lestrade's phone, in some instance previous to A Study in Pink.

**Posted by Sherlock Holmes** August 8, 2012 1:16 pm

SoundOfBaskerville wrote:
"I pickpocket him when he's annoying."

Get the contacts straight off Lestrade's phone, in some instance previous to A Study in Pink.

Yes, that's entirely possible. It's not really a trick at all...he just has everyone's number and sends out a mass text message. He probably has some device or thing that can disguise his number and make it come up as "unknown" or "withheld".

**Posted by Arya** August 8, 2012 6:58 pm

I don't know how press confernces work, but would Lestrade have all of those journalists' numbers?

**Posted by SoundOfBaskerville** August 8, 2012 7:14 pm

Beat journalists (in this case reporters whose focus is criminal reports) maintain regular contacts within police departments--a regular source with official authority, thus credibility as a citation. This may not account for as many reporters as were present, though additionally Lestrade might have some extra numbers saved if he wants to ignore specific reporters and know when they're trying to contact him. And who's to say Sherlock didn't pickpocket other police and get their reporter contacts, and just compile everyone's over time to maximize the theatrics.

Or perhaps enough journalists' numbers are listed on their websites/listed on the paper's websites (possibly within individual Bios, which he could've collected manually or whipped up a program to do it for him).

Or a little of everything.

**Posted by SoundOfBaskerville** August 8, 2012 7:16 pm

Or whitepages.com.

The internet can actually do a lot of the legwork for you.

**Posted by The Doctor** August 9, 2012 12:09 am

We sometimes work with newspapers. Most reporters carry their newspaper mobiles for work, and once you worked with them, you have got their number. Sometimes the phone is passed on but it usually stays in the division. In other words, a mobile number in the Sports section will most likely stay in the Sports section etc. These numbers are not listed in White Pages though, that's mostly just the editor's land line or Classifieds etc.

And, of course, Sherlock would have worked with most of the newspapers or at least observed Lestrade and Co working with them in the past.. it would probably be likely to assume that he would have also texted 1 or 2 phones/people, who actually didn't make it to the press room. etc etc

**Posted by sherlockskitty** August 9, 2012 4:45 am

the analysis here by everyone is very sound, I'll grant you that. But, how did Sherlock text wrong to donovan's and lestrade's phone too?

There's a thing that colleges do, when there's danger. There's also what we in USA call the reverse 911 calls. They somehow know everyone's phone numbers, because those ppl gave it to the authorities when they enrolled at the college, or when they bought a home. When there's danger, someone automatically makes a call to an emergency number, and that gives access to everyone else's number, who's in that area. I know this same thing happened at one of our colleges. But, as to HOW it's done, no one knows. I don't know, that's for sure. But, it IS possible.

**Posted by The Doctor** August 9, 2012 11:08 am

lol, it's really no big secret. Every phone sends out its unique ID code every time it is used, and government officials like police and ambulance services trace these codes and thus the associated phone number actively.
Thanks to cell phone transmitting towers we can also pinpoint your location rather accurately - that is, if you d not already have a smart phone that transmits its GPS location anyway. So that's why baddie soften use phones for a short period and then discard them, so even if you trace them it is no use.

**Posted by veecee** August 11, 2012 3:41 am

How does Sherlock know what's being said in the conference on a real-time basis so that his "Wrong!" comes at precisely at the right time? If it's a broadcast conference, isn't there a slight delay? Would he have some sort of remote tap in the room -- on a microphone or something?

**Posted by arkemiffo** December 28, 2012 9:29 pm

More intreresting is that the normal text is delivered within a minute, but next to never instantanously. It normally takes 10-30 secs for a text to arrive.

SPOILER

They use that delay to great effect twice in A scandal in Belgravia where Irene texts to Sherlock, has a quick conversation with John, and then hear Sherlock phone beeping (moaning). Its also used at the end where she texts him, preperes to be beheaded, and then 10 secs after you hear Sherlock s phone.

**Posted by anjaH_alias** December 28, 2012 11:49 pm

veecee wrote:
How does Sherlock know what's being said in the conference on a real-time basis so that his "Wrong!" comes at precisely at the right time? If it's a broadcast conference, isn't there a slight delay? Would he have some sort of remote tap in the room -- on a microphone or something?

He was also there?!

**Posted by equiraptor** December 28, 2012 11:56 pm

veecee wrote:
How does Sherlock know what's being said in the conference on a real-time basis so that his "Wrong!" comes at precisely at the right time? If it's a broadcast conference, isn't there a slight delay? Would he have some sort of remote tap in the room -- on a microphone or something?

Could be a broadcast or could be he has a bug in the room. Send the text a bit predictively, and timing could get close. I mean, he is certain they'll be wrong, whatever they say! It's not going to be absolutely perfect, though - that's movie (TV) magic.

**Posted by immortal** January 1, 2013 12:02 pm

I always assumed he was nearby and sent the text via Bluetooth or something like that.I read an article some time ago about how people always have their bluetooth on specially in public places.The phones we saw were quite modern (bluetooth enabled), so he could be nearby and sent the text to anyone in the room.This explains the speed of arriving the text.