Phreaks often dumpster dove for this info.
How does it not change often? There are constantly new departments starting, departments/precincts merging, and departments shutting down.
For the telephone number of their local police department? Is it supposed to be secret? My point is that it should be public!
> How does it not change often? There are constantly new departments starting, departments/precincts merging, and departments shutting down
There is simply no reason for a newly-started/merged police department to be able to unilaterally issue an Emergency Data Request, and I say this as a father of three young kids.
For $deity's sake, some new and/or newly-merged and/or micro police force must surely have their local, regional and national-level police forces on speed dial on all their phones. If someone is missing and needs to be found quickly, all they need to do is pick up the phone and reach out to "higher authority" (who can be quickly authenticated, because they definitely have been around for decades), not start acting like the local heroes.
This isn't a technical problem, folks :(
If I have a list of all the agency numbers, then I can look for organizations that disbanded and use those numbers. Since they could still exist in the book (because it wasn't updated instantly), the other party could think you're legitimate.
"There is simply no reason for a newly-started/merged police department to be able to unilaterally issue an Emergency Data Request, and I say this as a father of three young kids."
How so? For the first year of existence they can't issue anything because they have to wait for the next book to be publish. That's sounds dumb. There's no reason they shouldn't be able to issue anything they have the lawful authority to do so. Have any support/logic for your claim that they have no reason?
"some new and/or newly-merged and/or micro police force must surely have their local, regional and national-level police forces on speed dial on all their phones. If someone is missing and needs to be found quickly, all they need to do is pick up the phone and reach out to "higher authority" (who can be quickly authenticated, because they definitely have been around for decades), not start acting like the local heroes."
Um... so how does this higher level authority authenticate this lower level authority if they aren't in the book we are using for authentication? In some cases, jurisdiction can get in the way of the scenario you just described. And again, how long are you going to prevent a department from doing what they are lawfully allowed to do?
"This isn't a technical problem, folks"
Ok, then how do you solve the authentication issues in my previous comment? So far your system hasn't addressed them.
Q: Would one expect police departments to be the kind of places which would change their main telephone number regularly?
Consumers change providers often. Institutions? Maybe not so much. (As an aside, I've just checked, and my old university's phone number is exactly the same as it was 30-odd years ago when I enrolled).
To be frank, I'd prefer a printed version for something like this. Harder to hack a directory that's hard copy and whose entries really ought not to be changing very often. If ever.