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France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

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Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#341

Post by mcpackieh »

trollied wrote: post #315
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is how accurate is cell tower triangulation?

Phones don’t just use triangulation. Modern smartphones will also use GPS (A-GPS).

They won't use that if the GPS / "Location" service is turned off. But the cell network still knows where you are anyway, within ten meters or better. The FCC asks for z-axis accuracy within 3 meters; good enough to determine what floor of a building you're on (for E911 purposes.) 5G Rel 17 can supposedly locate people within a meter.

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#342

Post by boeingUH60 »

pessimizer wrote: post #289
boeingUH60 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically speaking, all cops can’t be bad, so the phrase is pretty dumb anyways even if one has issues with their country’s policing system.

> Technically speaking, all cops can’t be bad What technique are you using? Who was the good concentration camp guard?

Does France have concentration camps manned by police or something? What are you even saying..

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#344

Post by saiya-jin »

gumballindie wrote: post #171
estebank wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking at European history, I don't think that we can claim that the continent is today more authoritatian than it has been in the past.

Long term that is correct, but compared to a few years back it is. Snooping on people's phone conversations is a thing of the STASI, Securitate and NKVD era. Having everything you do monitored by the government through casual on street surveillance, and then introducing that to phones is not particularly flattering.

But that's not unique to EU, look at US post 9/11. Let's say there was a period of more freedom in the west, and its declining steadily. I've heard some US reporter predicting live in TV exactly this happening as towers were falling, I wish I remembered his name.

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#345

Post by tivert »

paxys wrote: post #193
donatj wrote: post #180

United States, couple years ago my friend in his mid-thirties was feeling depressed after his mom died. Came over to hang out, and wasn’t responding to his sisters calls. His sister called in a welfare check on him and suddenly I have three cops knocking at my front door. They ask for him by name, say he isn’t in trouble. I go get him; he asks “how did you know where I was?” and the cops say “we pinged your phone”. W…

Despite all the technology in the world the majority of police work is still plain old-fashioned knocking on doors and making phone calls. People will always voluntarily give up all the information in the world to be seen as good citizens. In your friend's case I'm willing to bet that they asked the sister for the names of his close friends and acquaintances and yours matched up.

> Despite all the technology in the world the majority of police work is still plain old-fashioned knocking on doors and making phone calls. People will always voluntarily give up all the information in the world to be seen as good citizens. In your friend's case I'm willing to bet that they asked the sister for the names of his close friends and acquaintances and yours matched up.

Sure, but that doesn't pass the smell test in this situation:

1. That's a lot of work, which would take a lot of time to do. For instance, does the sister know the OP's number. His full name? His first name? Are they going do all the work to piece together fragmentary information for a wellness check?

2. The technology exists and is widely deployed for the police to straightforwardly take a quick shortcut around all that work.

And most importantly:

3. The police said they took that shortcut.

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#346

Post by aaomidi »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #74
aaomidi wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not our fault you’ve made that slogan a partisan issue. A real republican would actually hate cops.

> A real republican would actually hate cops Most Americans don't hate cops [1]. There is real desire for police reform [2]; slogans like "defund the police" and #ACAB shut that down. [1] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/10/26/growing-s... [2] https://news.gallup.com/poll/393119/americans-remain-steadfa...

I said a real republican. Not what the current status quo is.

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#347

Post by ihattendorf »

JohnFen wrote: post #333
miohtama wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is about asking the cell network where the phone is. This is not about asking the phone where the phone is.

I think the question was "how did the phone company know the location", and GPS may be part of the answer. In the US, E911 requires all phones to be able to report their physical location. Phone companies may use this ability to respond to police location requests. I don't know one way or another, but it seems likely.

Do phone companies have access to that when the phone isn't actively placing a 911 call?

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#348

Post by hollerith »

meragrin_ wrote: post #328
varispeed wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and removable batteries Probably that's why the batteries are not removable in the phones...

Nah, profit motive by the companies is reason enough.

Or making the phone more reliable, particular in high-humidity climates, where you want to prevent air from getting to the electronics as much as practical.

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#349

Post by px43 »

fsflover wrote: post #323
AdamJacobMuller wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google could likely refuse this on the basis that rolling a personalized update for a single user would be an undue burden on them. The particulars and thus validity would be for a court to hash out.

According to Snowden't documents, Google is collaborating with NSA, so I think your point is moot.

No, according to the Snowden documents, the NSA spun up the MUSCULAR program specifically because Google was refusing to play nice. This was where they dug up dark fiber between Google data centers to tap into the information being sent between them. Within a month after the MUSCULAR leak, Google was encrypting all comms between data centers, which in theory, killed all the MUSCULAR taps.

Re: France passes bill to allow police remotely activate phone camera, microphone

#350

Post by aembleton »

jocaal wrote: post #293
hinata08 wrote: post #34

I regret getting a pixel, and not a fairphone with a removable battery With the current level of oversight on the police (police of police is a meme by now), and the level of cybersecurity at the government, everyone's phones will be activated within a few months. At least some government agent will have fun watching what ppl visit on the internet during their spare time, and can enable the camera to watch what they'…

GrapheneOS is a project that is hardening android and they mostly develop for pixels. If you are really paranoid, you can check that out.

Unfortunatelly the baseband is not controlled by GrapheneOS
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