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New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

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Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#321

Post by juunpp »

pnw wrote: post #319
juunpp wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The phone company is still tracking your IMSI/IMEI, and they sell data too. The former is directly linked to your identity; the latter also trivially so for most people.

I understand there is a separate level of privacy issues caused by phone companies selling data, but all of the reports refer to data collected from apps which can't be IMSI/IMEI since that's not available from apps?

Phone companies track you by virtue of your phone talking to cell towers, and they do sell your data. What OS or software you run on the phone is irrelevant. Recent versions of Android do not allow user-level applications to read the IMEI/IMSI as far as I know, but that was not always the case. And in any case, it doesn't prevent the carrier from tracking you.

https://www.zdnet.com/article/us-cell-carriers-selling-acces... https://www.wired.com/story/carriers-sell-location-data-thir... https://www.ccmihub.com/blog/fcc-fines-mobile-providers-sell... https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/05/06/at-t-verizon-... https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/09/us-cell-carriers-still-sel...

Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#322

Post by bmazed »

n4r9 wrote: post #314
pmoriarty wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can believe that some employees of these companies are genuinely shocked and surprised that this is being done, but few will refuse to do it, and fewer still will quit. The sad fact is that our surveillance society was built with the willing cooperation of countless developers for whom money was far more important than the privacy of their users.

Framing this as "money vs privacy" is disingenuous. There are many other factors at play. It takes a lot of courage and social/emotional skill to be able to say "no" to a work request in a way that is assertive, respectful, and doesn't lead to becoming a pariah. Consistently doing this in the face of deadlines and incoming requests is a big investment of energy. Switching jobs whenever you find yourself in that posit…

if you are that talented enough where companies will continue to offer you $$ to program whatever they say, then yea you do have a lot of POWER and can say NO..

Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#323

Post by bmazed »

dogleash wrote: post #282
whyagain1885 wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always get annoyed how these programmers can have a good sleep at night given what they have done. Note that blaming it on the marketing VP is not fair. If even 50 % employees have a thought this tracking can be stopped.

Programmers selling out is the goal in and of itself these days. It's gotten to the point where we just sorta accept that people want to work at places like Facebook and Google. There's so many of them that the thing to do is treat it like a morally neutral job or be seen as a weirdo. And when the largest and most pervasive global surveillance systems history has ever known "aren't so bad", then nothing is.

yup..how do we change this

Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#324

Post by bmazed »

benwad wrote: post #228
philderbeast wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the programmers sleep at night because doing this is the only thing that lets them feed there families. like it or not, there are always people who will see this as the lesser evil because of their personal circumstances don't give them other options.

I'd agree if we were talking about low-skill work where people are just scraping by. Programmers have the luxury of choosing from a wide range of places to work. We're all in a position where we can refuse work we find unethical, even if it means taking a pay cut.

yup if you are that talented enough where companies will continue to offer you $$ to program whatever they say, then yea you do have a lot of POWER and can say NO to whatever you want

Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#325

Post by bmazed »

actually_a_dog wrote: post #301
benwad wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd agree if we were talking about low-skill work where people are just scraping by. Programmers have the luxury of choosing from a wide range of places to work. We're all in a position where we can refuse work we find unethical, even if it means taking a pay cut.

You say that as if we all started out fresh from college with the ability to pick and choose the kind of dev work we do. Not everybody has the kind of safety net starting out that implies the ability to do that.

you are right but then you should work to get to a point where you can and will do whatever you want..you can destroy a system 2 ways, within or create your own

Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#326

Post by lrvick »

ProllyInfamous wrote: post #320
lrvick wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha, I don't even have a pager. Just another thing being triangulated by cell towers that sell the location. I have VoIP landlines... and SMS can go to my email, but that is the closest thing to telephony that I have. I check email and chat from my desktop when I am in my home office when I want to be reachable. I am mid 30s, so almost everyone in my social circle has their face buried in their phones at all times whi…

>Ha, I don't even have a pager ... [trackable] I use a one-way pager with a receiver-only module. The downside to this is there is no error correction/receipt.confirmation. >I simply schedule time with them when they want it, and set a 24 hour response expectation. This is how it has to be done. I also require minimum billing hours if they don't meet this expectation (or don't show up within 15 minutes of scheduled s…

A receiver only module? I was not aware this was a thing, but that would indeed avoid all tracking and allow a method for important notifications to reach you. This is a really interesting option for my needs.

I imagine this must only work over 2g or 3g? Sadly both are being shut down soon and I can not see anyone making a 4G pager.

Re: New documents reveal scale of US Government’s cell phone location data tracking

#327

Post by n4r9 »

bmazed wrote: post #322
n4r9 wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Framing this as "money vs privacy" is disingenuous. There are many other factors at play. It takes a lot of courage and social/emotional skill to be able to say "no" to a work request in a way that is assertive, respectful, and doesn't lead to becoming a pariah. Consistently doing this in the face of deadlines and incoming requests is a big investment of energy. Switching jobs whenever you find yourself in that posit…

if you are that talented enough where companies will continue to offer you $$ to program whatever they say, then yea you do have a lot of POWER and can say NO..

Your financial power is mostly irrelevant to the effort and skill of saying no.
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