I submitted this three hours earlier but apparently my links are now shadow-banned?
eh at least it's being seen
Be sure to read their other DHS coverage
ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
41–50 of 314 posts
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#42Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#43Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#44Dissolve ICE. Prosecute and/or disallow all ERO agents from any future public service positions.
A decade ago I put this stance into my LinkedIn profile tag line, and was a little surprised how many engineers reached out to praise that decision. I think it's rapidly, finally , entering the realm of political viability.
All it took was a white mother (and US citizen) getting shot in broad daylight. As much as I hate to admit it, a large enough segment of the population needed something blatant like this to care.
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#45When I first heard the advice to ditch your phone when you go a protest, I thought maybe that's a little extreme. But it's a real threat. We already knew post Snowden there is an extensive big brother apparatus. We saw post 911 that all rights can be taken away in the name of counter-terrorism. Now with a government that's operating outside the law and labeling peaceful protesters as terrorists, I don't think we can…
Basically: if it has a modem in it, it can be used against you in some way. Phones, routers, cars, public signs, cameras.
It's been so turbulent lately, that it's hard to register events that would have blown our minds if so many things didn't also happen around the same time. Remember when Israel made a bunch of pagers explode indiscriminately across Lebanon and Syria? So many things going on, one worse than the other, that it is hard to stop and really consider the implication of these single events fully.
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
....cameras exist :)
True, cameras can be taken away or smashed after the fact destroying evidence. With my phone I can stream video to a cloud so that it can't be deleted. The ACLU used to have an app specifically for this but it seems to have been discontinued. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACLU_Mobile_Justice
Sure, just be careful not to fall into the trap of technosolutionism.
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#47Any tips on how to avoid this? I suppose those tin foil signal blockers might be useful?
Do not use devices that can be trivially tracked through the cell network, or that can be surveilled by big tech. This means a device bought anonymously, a free/libre OS like Graphene, no Google/Facebook/Apple spyware apps, and an anonymous SIM paid for with cash or crypto. This should be done by everyone to avoid the possibility of mass surveillance, not only people who have something to hide from a three-letter agency. If you really have something to hide, then the cellular network shouldn't be used at all.
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#48The most maximally vindictive candidates are earning my votes in the coming election.
> most maximally vindictive candidates I think that's how we got to this point today, tbh.
It's been building for a long time; it's not recent per se, just accelerated.
2025 showed that you can't just go "ok, it's over now, we'll go back to business as usual" (like I know the limp-wristed Dems will want to do) or it'll repeat after every other election until it's successful. You just cannot have this many people constantly being convinced they live in this alternate reality for much longer without civilization collapse.
But I think it's gone too far and we're witnessing the fall of the empire in real-time. I'm just hoping that fall won't screw up the rest of the world too much, but I'm pretty sure it will.
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
Phone on airplane mode and with location services disabled?
I doubt that would do anything…
Is there any evidence that "NSA can turn on your phone even if they're off" or "location toggles on phones don't actually do anything" conspiracy theories are true? Even if the NSA has such capabilities, is there any reason to believe that they'll burn it to go after some ICE protester? That's the type of stuff you'd save so you can use it to go after bin laden, not burn on some run of the mill protester.
Re: ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
#50When I first heard the advice to ditch your phone when you go a protest, I thought maybe that's a little extreme. But it's a real threat. We already knew post Snowden there is an extensive big brother apparatus. We saw post 911 that all rights can be taken away in the name of counter-terrorism. Now with a government that's operating outside the law and labeling peaceful protesters as terrorists, I don't think we can…
If we all ditch our phones then how will we record the abuses of power?
People have allowed themselves to become so dependent on mobile phones that I'm frankly disgusted. You're talking about a scenario where you're worried about being illegally arrested by the secret police -- aided by their tracking of your phone, but it's still not enough to consider using your phone less. It's no different that a rat starving to death but continuing to push the lever for the cocaine hit.
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Vote me down all you want. If a bulletin went out that said "we're going to use your phone to steal your children and torture them" you'd have people saying "but, but .. how am I going to do my banking and check my messages." It's the height of absurdity.