Does my mobile phone communicate with the base-station tower every now and then?
Mk asked:
Sometimes when i leave the mobile phone close to the TV, the TV seems to detect some signal from the mobile phone. What is happening?
Sometimes when i leave the mobile phone close to the TV, the TV seems to detect some signal from the mobile phone. What is happening?
Is the mobile phone sending some packets to the basestation or the other way around? What are these packets and why is this communication important?
Mydomain.com

First, when you power up the phone, it listens for special frequencies (control channel) that the phone and tower use to talk to one another. If there are no control channels, the phone displays a message ñno service, because it knows it is out of range. Second, the phone transmits a registration request, so that the MTSO keeps track of your phone location in the data base. It is important for the MTSO to know which cell you are in when it wants to ring your phone.
Yes it exchanges packets to update the tower about its current cell location.