Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

motherboard.vice.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 253 posts

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#221

Post by vsl »

dogma1138 wrote: post #141
zorga wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How about we start with not allowing people to legally kidnap individuals? Then you'd have to give up being able to afford bail; without bounty hunters, bondsman would have no recourse when you didn't show up to court and thus not much incentive to loan you bail money. You're not being legally kidnapped, you agreed to those terms when you borrowed the bond money for bail.

The bail system itself is abhorrent if there isn’t a reason to lock you up until trial then you shouldn’t be locked up, if there is you shouldn’t be able to buy your way out. Most other countries have figured out how to serve justice without a system that discriminates against the poor. Too many people can’t afford the down payment or can offer a collateral to get a bail financed those who can end up being indebted t…

Bail is a common mechanism outside of US too.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#222

Post by zaarn »

Tsubasachan wrote: post #99
jlarocco wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is kind of our own fault, though. Judging by the sentiment on HN when GDPR was coming into effect, if something like it came up for a vote in the US, a lot of HN users and other tech people would vote against it. There was no shortage of angry geeks posting articles about their service turning away EU users rather than complying with GDPR.

If you work in tech or marketing your salary comes from eroding privacy. There is a lot of money at stake here and people don't vote against their interests. Europeans aren't inherently better: if Facebook and Google were companies founded in Germany or France who knows if GDPR would exist.

People living in Germany and France think differently, if Facebook had been invented there, there is IMO a good possibility it would be less privacy-invading.

That plus there are good historical reasons for our strong privacy laws.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#224

Post by kakarot »

zorga wrote: post #142
dogma1138 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bail system itself is abhorrent if there isn’t a reason to lock you up until trial then you shouldn’t be locked up, if there is you shouldn’t be able to buy your way out. Most other countries have figured out how to serve justice without a system that discriminates against the poor. Too many people can’t afford the down payment or can offer a collateral to get a bail financed those who can end up being indebted t…

Most other countries don't have our intractable political system; bondsman solve a problem, they let people get out of jail when the government is being absurd.

I grew up in a town where the mayor was the bail bondsman. His son was the district prosecutor.

A perfect, no-frills example of the typical dynamic between bail bondsmen and government.

How strange that I received the maximum possible bail amount for a crime that I didn't even commit. Surely there couldn't have been an incentive for the son of the guy who makes the laws to illegally prosecute and fine a minor whose only way to finish graduating high school is to pay the damn fine, so that the guy who makes the laws could collect that fine... That would just be corrupt.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#225

Post by dogma1138 »

User23 wrote: post #150
dogma1138 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The vast majority of bounty hunting cases are going to the addict/drunk’s door and reminding him he’s got a hearing to be at. The kind of glorifications you see on the teevee are virtually nonexistent. I somehow doubt that's what they make the money on because they make money on bail skippers usually a percentage of the set bail. In any case if you need someone to appear in court there is something we call a police…

You do realize the fugitives in question voluntarily entered into a contract with the bondsman right? Frankly, getting driven to the court appearance is a mild and totally appropriate response to the default. It’s way better for the fugitive than having the marshals called in.

As far as I am aware the marshals are called only in federal cases or cases where state lines are crossed, in all other cases it would be your local sherif department.

We have contract law for a reason any contract can be made illegal regardless if someone has went into it of their own volition or not.

By this definition we can also legalize slavery or indentured servitude, not to mention that I wouldn't call a situation were the choice is either debt or prison having freedom.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#226

Post by salawat »

DoctorOetker wrote: post #162
megablast wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea what your story is trying to say.

I am saying I believe the creditcard-sized card that contains a fresh prepaid SIM card, probably contains an RFID loop antenna. This is trivial to verify or falsify, just buy some acetone in the hardware store: https://learn.adafruit.com/rfid-iphone/dissolve-the-card I already bought the acetone, but I did not yet dissolve the SIM card, I want to do this in front of my sister, so she understands why I attach importan…

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r28362704-RFID-sim-cards-goo...

https://patents.google.com/patent/US7784693B2

Neat read, and Godspeed.

Not sure whether your theories on there actually being an infrastructure for doing these sorts of things is correct, but even a 5 minute google search seems to suggest it is well within technical capabilities to do so.

Might do some more searching for ISO's and other Engineering standards related to them. Telephony is highly dependent on uniform technical standard adherence, so it's out there somewhere. I doubt that the RFID is in the plastic containg the card, it's probably in the card itself.

The unusual coincidences should be pretty easy to replicate with a P.O. Box, and could be consistent with holding times for information propagation or authorization.

Definitely seems like something to mess with if you are bored!

You'll be amazed the things you can find out when you start to peel back the layers, but don't be disappointed if it's just a coincidence.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#227

Post by lol768 »

astura wrote: post #191
brohee wrote: post #3

I wonder if any of those companies had access to, and sold, roaming European users location data. The GDPR may possibly be weaponized if it was the case...

The GDPR doesn't apply to "roaming European users."

What's your reasoning for this assertion? If the user is a European citizen, I was under the impression that GDPR was applicable. The location at which the user is at does not matter one iota.

US companies need to understand this, or risk losing trading abilities with citizens and organisations in EU member states.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#228

Post by Legogris »

vsl wrote: post #221
dogma1138 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bail system itself is abhorrent if there isn’t a reason to lock you up until trial then you shouldn’t be locked up, if there is you shouldn’t be able to buy your way out. Most other countries have figured out how to serve justice without a system that discriminates against the poor. Too many people can’t afford the down payment or can offer a collateral to get a bail financed those who can end up being indebted t…

Bail is a common mechanism outside of US too.

Depositing money as part of bail is only really a practice in the U.S. and Philippines.

https://www.politifact.com/california/statements/2018/oct/09...

> "Only Duterte’s Philippines and Trump’s United States of America have money bail."

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#229

Post by zorga »

rypskar wrote: post #211
zorga wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The GDPR doesn't apply to most of the world, it's awful legislation anyway. It's not your data, it's my data about you, I own it, it's in my databases, and if you don't want me to have it, you shouldn't have given it to me freely to begin with.

> It's not your data, it's my data about you, I own it, it's in my databases And there you have the main difference between European and US laws and mindset. Because it is my data, you are only allowed to store it in your database as long as I say you can, and you can only use it for what I have agree on. Since it is my data you cannot give or sell it to anyone else

No, it isn't; the product of my labor belongs to me. Whether it's photographs of public spaces or data logged in public spaces, the data I put in the labor to collect belongs to me. If I write a book about you, it belongs to me, it doesn't matter that it contains data about you: you don't own everything that happens to be about you.

Re: Mobile customer location data is ending up in the hands of bounty hunters

#230

Post by Klover »

dingoegret wrote: post #161
zorga wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're putting the cart before the horse; until you change the government and thus the bail system, we need bondsman. Making bounties illegal won't stop judges from setting bails people can't afford and is thus not a valid solution.

Very dumb argument. There is no cart and there is no horse. Eliminate the bail system and something has to fill the void.

I remember seeing one in LA. I thought it was fake! Like a tourist attraction.
Post reply on HN