Live data from Hacker News

Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

an.dywa.ng

571–580 of 622 posts

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#571

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These were the states that supported some form of stare sponsored segregation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jim_Crow_law_examples_... And saying that the “Supreme Court didn’t always rule the way you like” is minimizing an entire race of people - including my still living parents having to grow up in schools that were underfunded but supposedly “separate but equal”, people getting hung if you looked at a Whit…

>"minimizing an entire race of people" Not minimizing. Just acknowledging that this alone doesn't characterize the general take of the complete history of the country. It describes a nation divided on moral lines at best. Not all states participated in segregation and those states that didn't ultimately are those who won in the end. So to take that win away degrades the victory that your parents (probably) helped to…

If this was condoned by the US Supreme Court explicitly, this was the law of the United States that anyone anywhere could be discriminated against based on the color of their skin.

The federal army - ie run by the US was officially segregated until 1948 but it really was through the late 50s.

https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/executive-order...

The GI bill run by the federal government was discriminatory

https://heller.brandeis.edu/news/items/releases/2023/impact-...

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#572
post #547
post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You cant turn modern smartphones off. You may think you can, but you cant. What you could do is put them in a faraday cage if you wanted.

If you put them in airplane mode they are no longer permitted to contact cell phone towers by law and it is easy to form confidence the baseband modem is actually off because your battery life is so much better. Or pull out an SDR and prove it if you are extra paranoid. This turns them into wifi tablets. I started out doing this for a couple years before abandoning mine.

I've been doing this the last year (ish) and my battery lasts so much longer. I suspect my data usage has been slashed as well. I recommend everyone starts using airplane mode. I just wish I could put individual apps in airplane mode so that they wouldn't be able to communicate, even when I was on wifi, unless I specifically allowed it.

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#573

I’m not seeing this setting in UK. Am I being blind or is it genuinely not there?

It's only supported on EE/BT at the moment. https://support.apple.com/en-us/126101

Interesting, I’m on EE!

Edit: I’m not on 26.3. I hadn’t clocked this was a new release thing

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#574
I will say that I was on a jury for a murder trial back in 2018 that presented cellphone evidence as to the defendants location.

It was purely based on triangulation based on which tower the cellphone was connected to, so not precise at all (narrow down to a few city blocks).

So at least back in 2018, precise location was not possible.

That said the baseband modem in the phone could certainly be updated to collect and automatically send GPS based location data (notwithstanding security on the device).

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#575
post #486
post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can tell you with almost 100% certainty: no banks in the UK use any 2FA other than SMS-based. I spent December last year looking for a new bank to move to. One of my criteria (not the most important but it was on the list) was better-than-SMS 2FA. No one offers it. There may be some niche, loosely-based finance org that does but none of the banks or Building Societies do. So, unfortunately, you need it in the UK.

Barclays, with standard current accounts, provides several methods none of which are SMS. There's a separate pin-code device (called Pinsentry) that does TOTP and challenge-response, or passcodes for both telephone and Internet banking.

Yeah, Nationwide has the little PIN code device which definitely helps with transactions but not logging in: that's still old-school.

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#576
post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not a good excuse for mass privacy violation.

“A mentally ill person called 911 and said they were going to kill themselves” is a much better justification for pulling GPS data off a phone than any of the rationales I’ve heard from US companies or the government.

What about the other 329,999,999 Americans who aren’t trying to kill themselves at that time?

It’s a cost vs benefit analysis and the cost is pretty damn high.

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#577
post #547
post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You cant turn modern smartphones off. You may think you can, but you cant. What you could do is put them in a faraday cage if you wanted.

If you put them in airplane mode they are no longer permitted to contact cell phone towers by law and it is easy to form confidence the baseband modem is actually off because your battery life is so much better. Or pull out an SDR and prove it if you are extra paranoid. This turns them into wifi tablets. I started out doing this for a couple years before abandoning mine.

I am not trying to push conspiracy theories here.

But IF its possible for law enforcement to ping your phone when its on standby, dont you think its possible that it can be pinged whilst on airplane mode too?

If you are using it on wifi its game over anyway, hard internet connections are easy to track by law enforcement via ip and ISP. Even if you use a VPN your device is still connected to the wifi and can be pinged.

Not sure why people here are thinking they are more clever than than the smartphone makers.

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it so hard to believe that the police can use our devices to backtrack us, as both carriers and police officers have said numerous times?

Occams razor

says that police can locate phones

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#579

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please explain what this means, I can turn my cell phone off. How are they able to ping my phone if it has no power? Or are you saying even when you turn it off there's still some part of it that's energized or something?

The baseband isn’t controlled by you and can wake up without your knowledge. It’s less clear what is the “art of the possible” vs. practical for people who aren’t actively under surveillance.

No part of the phone is controlled by me. Can we stop getting spooked by the word "baseband" yet? It means the modem chip. The modem chip isn't controlled by me and can wake up without my knowledge. But neither is the wifi chip. Or the bluetooth chip. Or the RAM chip. Or the main CPU (application processor). Or the screen. Any one of these could hold malware.

Re: Mobile carriers can get your GPS location

#580

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious to hear someone explain why you're being downvoted

Its the demagogue problem in democracy. People love idealism. It never works, but it sounds amazing. Reddit, HN, and every democracy has the same problem... at least for a few years. I think after this bout of Trumpism, the republicans will not be able to elect another populist demagogue for a generation. I think democrats need to do a round as well.

Who said there will be elections?

Trump repeatedly said there won't be elections.

Post reply on HN