Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by Fnord666 on Friday February 09 2018, @08:12PM   Printer-friendly
from the you-can-run-but-you-can't-hide dept.

Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard

As it turns out, turning off location services (e.g., GPS) on your smartphone doesn't mean an attacker can't use the device to pinpoint your location.

A group of Princeton University researchers has devised of a novel user-location mechanism that exploits non-sensory and sensory data stored on the smartphone (the environment's air pressure, the device's heading, timezone, network status, IP address, etc.) and publicly-available information to estimate the user's location.

The non-sensory and sensory data needed is stored on users' smartphones and can be easily accessed by any app without the user's approval, which means that the data can be captured through a malicious app or harvested from databases of many legitimate fitness monitoring apps.

Source: https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2018/02/07/location-tracking-no-gps/


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Friday February 09 2018, @08:54PM (4 children)

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Friday February 09 2018, @08:54PM (#635711) Journal

    No need for hacking. The app, like a social media app, might be one you chose to install with your free will.

    Where you've been is probably related to where you are now.

    As others point out here, being able to see certain WiFi APs or cell towers is probably a very good indication of approximately where you are right now. Maybe not pinpoint accuracy.

    --
    People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +1  
       Insightful=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Insightful' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   3  
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 09 2018, @09:16PM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 09 2018, @09:16PM (#635723)

    That what location services in Android does. According to Google [google.com]:

    Google's Location services use sources like Wi-Fi and mobile networks to give location information faster and more accurately.

    You can turn Google's Location services on or off at any time.

    When the article talks about turning location services off (first sentence) that's what it means.

    • (Score: 5, Informative) by frojack on Friday February 09 2018, @09:33PM (1 child)

      by frojack (1554) on Friday February 09 2018, @09:33PM (#635728) Journal

      Even with location services turned off, (and wifi turned off) Google has fessed up to still gathering coarse location data data from the cellular towers that the phone can "see". Supposedly this was remove late last year, but since they never announced they were doing it in the first place who could possibly know that for sure.

      https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/21/16684818/google-location-tracking-cell-tower-data-android-os-firebase-privacy [theverge.com]

      The problem I have with this is not so much with Google knowing where I am, but every scrap of data they collect is warrant bait.

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
      • (Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Saturday February 10 2018, @05:38PM

        by Hyperturtle (2824) on Saturday February 10 2018, @05:38PM (#636067)

        That's how the original google maps application worked on phones without GPS. They were the preferred solution for situations like that, at least back when they still said they'd try not to be evil.

        Way back when, the blackberry with wifi was the same price as the one with GPS. However, the GPS model came with "10 free GPS lookups per month" and cost extra per utilization, and did not come with wifi. There was no model that had both. Android was not out yet.

        That wifi model still worked just fine with google maps and even the integrated blackberry maps; it used the cell phone towers to triangulate your position. The denser the urban environment (and cell phone towers), the better the coverage (perhaps contrary to GPS wisdom). Anyone that needed to map their route with any frequency did not buy the GPS version; it was way too expensive and was priced crazy after those 10 uses; like $1.50 per instance. Imagine if they tried to do that today! The signals are still the same ones from space; it was just a restrictive licensed feature controlled by the Telco.

        Anyway, that tracking ability... I wouldn't call it coarse; it was the way to do it before GPS integration was ubiquitious. It was very good for what it was and could quite accurately place you and your movements based on the nearby cell towers and your signal.

        Back then, GPS was crummy because it was imprecise for consumers and expensive besides; the cell tower method was free and not as arbitrarily fuzzy as what consumer GPS was required by law to be. Using GPS at the time, your place on the road could drift by 10 feet and end up showing you were in on-coming traffic. That was with high end consumer gear. GPS became more precise later on after the US government lifted the requirement to make the precise location more fuzzy; they had been afraid of terrorists making guided missles with the GPS and whathaveyou, but industry pressure (and a few 'think of the children mobile 911 location tracking!') helped integrate GPS into all phones and make it almost as useful as military gear. THe change was instant when they allowed the precision; nothing on the consumer side had to be updated. Everything just got signals that weren't messed up and could display correctly with no upgrade or update or costs.

        During that same time period, I did have a seperate GPS for my car; one of those portable 'trackmate' devices that plugged into a computer serial port, such as on a laptop. I actually did just that, and had installed the metro area maps for the surrounding states and it worked even when off-line, much to the amazement of people that couldn't understand how a map program could be actually installed on something you own, and taken with you. Just plug the laptop into the cigarette lighter and it was good for the entire trip. I brought the whole darn CD with me and did a cross country road trip with the GPS and blew the minds of my passengers that there were no data charges or anything like that. Later, when android became more common, people could not believe that you could have maps locally and not use Google. (Google did a good job keeping people in-network even back then...)

        Of course, those maps and the CD I used are old now; some of the advice it gives will not include new routes to the same destination. But it all still works and comes at no extra cost since it was from an era where you paid up-front with your money, and not forever with your data.

    • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Saturday February 10 2018, @03:25PM

      by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 10 2018, @03:25PM (#636018) Journal

      With location services turned off, an app might independently implement techniques which can identify your location.

      --
      People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.