Here’s a snippit of headline and story that I have seen, in various guises, far too many times in the last 18 months:

London bombs ‘set off by mobiles’

The bombs that killed 56 people in London on 7 July were probably detonated using mobile phones, New York police officials have said.

They were made in Leeds from household chemicals like hair bleach and stored in a powerful refrigerator, they said.

Commissioner Ray Kelly was briefing New York security industry bosses on information given to NYPD officers monitoring the investigation in London.

Notice the excitement. Notice the high-tech tone that is being deployed to counter the possibility the bombers were just like any other person.

• Note how it’s a powerful, specialist sort of refridgerator they used. Not just any ordinary deep freezer.

• They used phones to detonate the bombs, just like they did in Madrid.

Actually, that last one bears greater analysis. I’ve heard the looming tones of the guy who presents The New Al-Qaeda on BBC2 [link] each week, repeating time and again about how the bombers are using mobile phones to set off their devices; they had team members who were specially dedicated to acquiring phones that would be used to detonate bombs. Oooh, scarey!

Now: if you are like the majority of people who hear this being repeated again and again out of context, you’ll be thinking of some terrorist who – like in some James Bond film – sends a SMS message or dials a number in order to blow up dozens of people on a train.

Very calculated. Very cool. And also: Very wrong.

The BBC page itself eventually explains this:

The bombs were transported to the outskirts of London in drink coolers stashed in the boot of two cars and detonated by mobile phones that had alarms set to 0850 BST, the officials added. The bombs were transported to the outskirts of London in drink coolers stashed in the boot of two cars and detonated by mobile phones that had alarms set to 0850 BST, the officials added.

So, there you have it. Terrorists are using the alarm function on mobile phones, because they are a cheaper and quieter alternative to buying the traditional tick-tick-tick kind of Alarm Clock that bombers are supposed to use from the Warner Bros cartoons of our youth.

All the mental images of people dialing-up-your-death are bogus; were I fabricating bombs then I wouldn’t want to use a mobile phone for remote detonation because – aside from any other reason – the number of spam-SMS messages and “Please Select A Different Network Provider” alerts I receive would probably see the bomb go off and kill me well before intended.

So – whip the SIM card out, crack open the case, and wire a detonator across the motor for the “vibrate” function. Presto: a cheap and reliable high-current no-thinking-required alarm-clock detonator that does not go tick-tick-tick like the cartoon bombs and is therefore deeply sneaky and evil.

Madrid was the same – the phones were on a timer setting and not detonated by a signal – but it suits the media, and perhaps the government, to let you think otherwise.

Yes, hypothetically someone can (and eventually probably will) try using a phone for remote detonation, but I don’t see it being in vogue when instead your goal is to get into heaven by committing suicide at the same time.

In the meantime, why not lobby the Labour party to ban all bombs that don’t have a proper ticking alarm clock attached to them? That’d have a positive effect on public safety, I’m sure…