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

Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

theregister.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–36 of 36 posts

Re: Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

#31

Post by post_break »

fortran77 wrote: post #22
post_break wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know what you cant turn off? TPMS. I mean you can remove them from your car, but those little guys broadcast and with the right equipment you can track cars with them.

Yes. The IDs are unique, fixed, and easy to pick up. You have to broadcast a low-frequency signal first to enable them and they'll emit a signal. There are several projects on GitHub to pick them up, and I've successfully done it. See: https://github.com/merbanan/rtl_433

Did you do anything useful with the data? I'd love to just have a raspberry pi scanning and logging them with timestamps to archive with video.

Re: Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

#32

Post by [deleted] »

anakaine wrote: post #30
meowster wrote: post #2

In Houston, TX, USA, I noticed antennas placed over individual highway lanes. It turns out they track the Bluetooth signals from cars to determine traffic. They even have a message on their website saying people should be more worried about license plate tracking. https://www.houstontranstar.org/faq/traffictech.aspx On the OEM infotainment center in my vehicle, I can't even find a way to turn off Bluetooth.

In one state I cannot mention, in Australia, there are at least 4000 of these things by the side of the road. During criminal cases its not unusual for a vehicles MAC address to be run through the database of collected data and matched to the vehicles location at a point in time. If the vehicle was also carrying correct plates then ALPR can be included. Prosecution gets to present a very pretty map with detailed time…

[deleted]

Re: Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

#33

Post by anakaine »

0xdeadb00f wrote: post #3
meowster wrote: post #2

In Houston, TX, USA, I noticed antennas placed over individual highway lanes. It turns out they track the Bluetooth signals from cars to determine traffic. They even have a message on their website saying people should be more worried about license plate tracking. https://www.houstontranstar.org/faq/traffictech.aspx On the OEM infotainment center in my vehicle, I can't even find a way to turn off Bluetooth.

Similarly in NSW Australia they had installed similar antannas on traffic lights/traffic light boxes. Iirc they would also track Bluetooth signals. Not sure they tracked the OEM infotainment stuff or just the drivers phone Bluetooth IDs

Can confirm that they do vehicles infotainment systems. NSW is also not the only state to have them.

Re: Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

#34

Post by fortran77 »

post_break wrote: post #31
fortran77 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. The IDs are unique, fixed, and easy to pick up. You have to broadcast a low-frequency signal first to enable them and they'll emit a signal. There are several projects on GitHub to pick them up, and I've successfully done it. See: https://github.com/merbanan/rtl_433

Did you do anything useful with the data? I'd love to just have a raspberry pi scanning and logging them with timestamps to archive with video.

No, but I've been collecting all this data for a while and trying to see if there's a security business to be built around this. I do a lot of "RF" projects, so this is a natural extension.

Re: Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

#35

Post by spyder »

bsksi wrote: post #17
spyder wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GDPR applies to organizations, he is not an organization and not doing it as a business.

He's storing private data that can geolocate people (mac address + exact geolocation + timestamp)

Even if he stores private data GDPR would not apply to him as an individual, but other laws may apply depending on the data and the country.

Re: Student tracks Bluetooth headset wearers by wardriving around Oslo on a bicycle

#36

Post by mmgu »

bsksi wrote: post #10

What's his gdpr policy?

There are exemptions for academic research and journalism in the GDPR under article 85 [0]. That is why the original news article (that I wrote) clearly mentions right away that the information was collected for a academic project.

[0] https://bookdown.org/fede_caruso/bookdown/the-journalistic-e...

Post reply on HN