Secret Apple undercover propaganda blog!
and he shameless deactivated the comment-function in his blog.
What an asshole! But seriously, I don't know why it isn't allowing comments. It used to. I promise I'm not an Apple propagandist though!
Apple is not “recording your moves”
71–80 of 81 posts
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it really "readily accessible"? It's on your phone, and in backups on your computer if you've synced your phone. So to access it, a person needs access to either your phone or computer. But if they have access to your phone or computer, is a cache of cell towers you've connected to really a significant concern compared to the other things the accessor could get ahold of from either of these devices?
I've had phones stolen enough that I'd say "yes, too accessible" - your mileage may vary. Timestamped travel information generally equates to "hey, this guy returns home between 7 and 8:30 most nights, works in the office five days a week, and here's where his home is". It's no great stretch to equate that to "he will not be home during this time frame" and suddenly a lost phone turns into a much larger burglary. The…
The iPhone is not storing travel history information. It's only storing a "last seen" timestamp for each cell tower. And again, the most accurate they'd be able to get was "this guy was within 500 meters of these dozens of cell towers at 5PM, and with 500 meters of these dozens of other cell towers at 7PM." They'd in no way be able to get your physical address, unless you lived alone in the countryside.
Please read my previous comment for more details:
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
This entire thing is in the FAQ. http://petewarden.github.com/iPhoneTracker/#9
The FAQ has nothing to do with it. Nobody is contesting that cell tower location information is being used. The differing claim is this: the O'Reilly researchers claim that the co-ordinates logged are those of the device itself and these co-ordinates are possibly calculated using cell tower triangulation, while this blog post claims that the co-ordinates logged are those of the cell towers themselves rather than the…
Seems unlikely since there are a ton more dots on my map than there are cell towers around here.
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#74F-secure noticed tha the data gets sent out twice a day... Cannot provide the link because I'm on my phone which is not an iPhone...
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#75There is a bit of a logical fallacy here. He says "the data is not extremely accurate", "metadata indicates apple intended to store locations of access points", "therefore the phone is not traking your location".
That's simply false. It is tracking your location, regardless of how accurately it's doing it, and irrespective of Apple's intentions.
That means someone reading the data can know roughly where you where when, the direction you where traviling in, and how fast you going.
Does that mean Apple set out to track you? No! But it does mean that your phone is tracking your position, all the time, everywhere you go, and is storing that data in a way that is not protected from exploration by any third party that happens to acquire access to it.
That's a serious bug, and is worth a little sensationalism.
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not the author. But I believe the O'Reilly researchers claim that the co-ordinates logged are of the device itself. It is not clear at all that this is true and the author of this post presents some evidence that would suggest otherwise.
The device location is not logged in this database at all. What it does is log the locations of all cell towers that it can communicate with at a point in time. So for a given timestamp, there will be dozens of points logged. So while the data will be able to say "You were somewhere in downtown Pittsburgh at 1:59PM on Monday", it won't be able to say "You were at 517 Liberty Ave at 1:59 on Monday." Also, timestamps f…
Does it record signal strength from the towers, which would allow triangulation?
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've had phones stolen enough that I'd say "yes, too accessible" - your mileage may vary. Timestamped travel information generally equates to "hey, this guy returns home between 7 and 8:30 most nights, works in the office five days a week, and here's where his home is". It's no great stretch to equate that to "he will not be home during this time frame" and suddenly a lost phone turns into a much larger burglary. The…
The iPhone is not storing travel history information. It's only storing a "last seen" timestamp for each cell tower. And again, the most accurate they'd be able to get was "this guy was within 500 meters of these dozens of cell towers at 5PM, and with 500 meters of these dozens of other cell towers at 7PM." They'd in no way be able to get your physical address, unless you lived alone in the countryside. Please read m…
>They'd in no way be able to get your physical address, unless you lived alone in the countryside.
You seem to be using this claim to dismiss the importance of the data, but I lived in a very secluded area, do I not matter?
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
why does such a small difference matter?
Because for a given timestamp, the iphone logs dozens of cell towers. So while you might be able to tell I was in Pittsburgh on Monday, you won't be able to figure out what address I was at.
but isn't the important thing whether or not these are public or private, and whether you have control over them? the precision of the location may affect some use cases, may not affect others, but doesn't strongly affect why this is important or not (on the other hand, it;s the kind of thing people can have a nerd fight over, which seems to be a big attraction...)
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#79tl;dr... All it’s showing is cell tower location heatmap, which is anywhere within a 2 to 3 mile radius. (Basically what city you are in.)
Cue false outrage... Endless CNN coverage.
Trolling rant: Meanwhile, US phone carriers, advertisers, and the government have known your location within 9 feet, ever since the warrentless wiretapping scandal. To the point that NSA, has a direct fiber split of all AT&T customer internet traffic. http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Rm4GQZm... America, choose your battles and get a grip on reality.
Re: Apple is not “recording your moves”
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
The iPhone is not storing travel history information. It's only storing a "last seen" timestamp for each cell tower. And again, the most accurate they'd be able to get was "this guy was within 500 meters of these dozens of cell towers at 5PM, and with 500 meters of these dozens of other cell towers at 7PM." They'd in no way be able to get your physical address, unless you lived alone in the countryside. Please read m…
>They'd in no way be able to get your physical address, unless you lived alone in the countryside. You seem to be using this claim to dismiss the importance of the data, but I lived in a very secluded area, do I not matter?
But the data is not that important, relatively. The assumption is that some "Bad Guy" has gotten a hold of your phone. Here's a list of other vectors that this person could use to identify you, your residence, etc.
1) Your cell number is going to be readily available from the device itself. Using this, he'll be able to look up your address information in the Address Book.
2) Unless you notice the missing device right away and change your passwords, this guy also has access to your email accounts. Ever order anything online? Your address is most likely in your emails.
3) Ever use Google Maps? They can look at your recent searches. "3 different searches originating at 123 Main St? Might be his home address"
4) Phone app. Recent calls/favorites. With a little social engineering, your address is known. "Hi, I found this phone on the ground, can you tell me where they live so I can drop it off?"
5) SMS. Ever text someone your address?