Teen behind hundreds of swatting attacks pleads guilty to federal charges

If they can be summoned by just placing an anonymous phone call with an unverified claim, that might be a problem though.

This. There are valid reasons to have the big guns, though I still think we’ve overreached. It is terrifying that a damn teenager managed to trick the cops into whipping out the big guns hundreds of times.

Despite that the teenager will likely be going to jail, the most damning indictment is of the police forces that were repeatedly co-opted by the teenager. It should really take something much more clever to trigger this kind of systemic response repeatedly.

What's the alternative? Waiting for New York Times to verify a home invasion has indeed taken place before sending over cops?

Maybe just sending out a single squad car first to get a credible assessment?

I'm not sure who aided in constructing this mental representation for you that the number of cops is directly proportional with the scale of conflict that's about to happen.

I'd challenge that view by claiming that if the threat is of someone holding their family hostage threatening to kill them (just a guess at what these "swatters" might say to the dispatcher to get cops to actually kick in some doors, I don't know what their state-of-the-art accusation is), then sending one cop car, poorly equipped, sounds a bit silly for multiple reasons.

Just to be clear, your version of the ideal response to an unverified claim of a hostage situation is to immediately escalate?

It's because they have to assume it's real. Same reason behind weather warnings. They can't know for sure if it's real, but it's 'better' to assume it's real and respond accordingly only to discover it's a hoax, than it is to assume it's a prank and show up unprepared only to have it be real and they aren't ready to handle it. It's Schrodinger's hostage.