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Is your smartphone listening to you?

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#81

Post by jacquesm »

smaisidoro wrote: post #14

I have to say, I'm very sceptical about all of this, but one day a friend showed me a product (some speakers that use the table surface for resonance) and the ad showed a couple of minutes after on Facebook. I started thinking on how devices can emit audio signatures for other devices around it to be aware of its presence. A couple of years after, Chromecast uses audio for authentication of nearby devices. I honestly…

Welcome to the wonderful world of targeted advertising part #2. This and more is old hat in present day ad tech. How about tying together which user is the same person on a tablet, phone and a PC? And it doesn't need any kind of audio signal.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#82

Post by yrro »

digi_owl wrote: post #69
nickpsecurity wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean it's a soft-switch that tells you it does that. You have no idea if the radio is actually running at any time or not. That plus their reliability issues are why I don't like soft-switches.

Well in my case there is no sim in the slot, so i can't say i care.

That doesn't stop it communicating with the mobile network. At least in the UK, you can still call emergency numbers (999, Childline, Samaritans(?)) without a SIM.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#83

Post by mahyarm »

awqrre wrote: post #35
internaut wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After Snowden I just took a pliers to my laptop and ripped out the mic and webcam. It felt great.

Speakers can be used as microphones....

Very very shitty microphones, so the statistical risk is significantly reduced! And the hardware might not support doing that switch in software.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#84

Post by barnacs »

I wouldn't be surprised if your smartphone was listening to you, but sadly these particular feats would be feasible simply based on all the information these people have been willingly sharing with google/facebook/etc.

If a lot of her friends/family are searching for "Motorbike accident, Thailand", it seems likely google would suggest it to her.

Similarly, if someone's boyfriend mentions to a third party on facebook something along the lines of "sorry we missed the last night, @girlfriend was having a migraine", it's not so surprising if said gf is shown migraine ads soon after.

Bottom line is, I think people vastly underestimate how much private information they are willingly sharing. Sadly, these companies don't even need to listen in sneakily these days.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#85

Post by reitanqild »

dave2000 wrote: post #61
reitanqild wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However relevant this possibly is a court case it is less relevant when you are about to pick between a nexus, an iPhone and a Samsung S-series. Also while IANAL, note that in a number of jurisdictions EULAs like the ones you seem to think about might not be valid. Norwegians consumer authorities recently mocked them and I applaud them for it.

With a Nexus you're trusting Google with a lot more info than Samsung could hope to obtain. So if this isn't about legality then I'm not sure what it is. Presumably Samsung aren't storing your email credentials so they can launch a spam campaign, and you've not provided anything like enough information to deduce that they're doing anything other than, perhaps, keeping the email moving. I never read EULAs and I can im…

Google has shown that they fire sysadmins who put their nose into customer data even though tje sysadmin in question had good intentions. AFAIK they also have a fairly strong security record. I'm not saying Samsung doesn't but I don't know.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#86

Post by jokoon »

I have a huawei $60 android which is 2 year old. I don't have a data plan nor a SIM in it, I just use it for offline openstreetmap data with OSMAND and for watching youtube video. I'm not so rich so I use a nokia candybar cell phone for my calls.

I was at this park, and my battery was nearly dead. At the 20% mark, I noticed that the battery drained very quickly, and it lost 1% per 10 second. Maybe it's a battery physics issue, or maybe it was emitting my position/recording to a GSM antenna... I guess it was defintely a battery physics issue.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#87

Post by Exras »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #56
digi_owl wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least on my Huawei P6 i can set it to flight mode and then turn back on wifi and bluetooth. Actually i have used the thing more like a PDA than a phone, as i have a well functioning HSPA capable featurephone that i pair up if ever i need data on the go.

You mean it's a soft-switch that tells you it does that. You have no idea if the radio is actually running at any time or not. That plus their reliability issues are why I don't like soft-switches.

If your are equip like me with a EMF meter, then its easy to confirm what your phone is doing when in airplane mode, with normally is nothing. A mobile phone is after all just a computer with a radio modem. It can't do shit without sending out RF.

I would recommend something like the 'Cornet ED78S RF Meter' to every technician with the tiniest amount of AU in circulation.

The reason I got it was because I have become electro-sensitive, and that's almost a death sentence in the modern city.

Those pictures of Stallman sitting on a mountain top and not a mobile phone mast in sight looked very appealing...

My phone LG-L80 99£ is GSM only, all else is off, apps downloaded on wired PC and installed via ADB interface.

Currently used as book reader for C++11 fourth edition and as Wikipadia offline reader(Kiwix) 12GB on SD card - music/mp4 player and the battery last for a week or more.

I feel I'm in control of my phone, don't know if that is justified or not?

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#88

Post by somethingsimple »

smaisidoro wrote: post #14

I have to say, I'm very sceptical about all of this, but one day a friend showed me a product (some speakers that use the table surface for resonance) and the ad showed a couple of minutes after on Facebook. I started thinking on how devices can emit audio signatures for other devices around it to be aware of its presence. A couple of years after, Chromecast uses audio for authentication of nearby devices. I honestly…

I had a weird experience some time ago. I stayed with my family at a hotel and our room had an unusually shaped tap in its bathroom. I never looked it up online - in fact, I didn't even mention to anyone that I thought that was a very peculiar tap. But a few days after we came back, Amazon showed me that exact tap as a shopping suggestion. It felt a little creepy. I could see no connection between the site where I booked the hotel room and Amazon, but there must be one somewhere.

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#89

Post by MrMid »

drdaeman wrote: post #21
nickpsecurity wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's in my proposal for a secure or private phone that I drop on people trying to build one. Hopefully it will get in a successful product at some point. Need one for mic, front camera, rear camera, and radios. Might compromise to have a physical switch for mic and radios with something inside phone (eg a jumper) to turn off others. I want to be sure I can cut actual power to mic and wireless, though.

If your threat model concerns with hardware/firmware exploits, then you can't trust the physical switches unless they cut all the wires - and unless you can validate that this is what they do. Theoretically speaking, a malicious (or threatened/persuaded/forced) manufacturer may implement a non-standard way to power the supposedly disconnected component using still-connected wiring, to be used for a special occasions.…

Well, I just.. disconnected the mic in my laptop, the day it arrived (there is no webcam). As phones are concerned, I use my trusty SE ELM featurephone, so I'm not very worried about Googles, Facebooks, Samsunsungs...

Re: Is your smartphone listening to you?

#90

Post by awqrre »

mahyarm wrote: post #83
awqrre wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speakers can be used as microphones....

Very very shitty microphones, so the statistical risk is significantly reduced! And the hardware might not support doing that switch in software.

Actually, you can get pretty good quality (You could easily do speech-to-text on the produced audio)... If you want to do a simple test, plug-in your headphones into your microphone jack and start recording away. I just did it why my current cheap Amazon basics headphones and I can clearly hear my speech back. Also take a look at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqNrLfbwAH8, I think that this shows you how to record from your laptop's speakers in Windows using Audacity.
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