Submitted to Google maps
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Actually talk to people at Google about this when I first noticed that location access was needed to enable Wi-Fi and other kind of stuff⊠Particularly anything RF.
The reasoning they gave actually kind of made sense? Basically they were saying that with their location API you can feed in almost any RF unique ID like a MAC address and because of the way they do their mapping where they take in GPS coordinates and also pretty much any other RF beaconing from Wi-Fi or Bluetooth beacons or anything sending packets with the unique identifiable address, if you enable any of those RF radios for an app, then technically that app could attempt to locate you based on the signals itâs seeing around it.
Of course itâs not explained at all, youâre just asked to enable location access for Bluetooth or Wi-Fi so it seems pretty dumb⊠But the reality is if you enable an app to have any access to the RF radios at all, there is a chance that app could then derive your location.
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Circular reasoning: itâs Google who sneakily tied Wifi SSIDs and GPS data to derive rough locations from the SSIDs in the first place, and now they claim apps could abuse the SSIDs? What a joke.
Anyhow, this must be for newer Android versions, because Iâve yet to see an app that requests access to BT or Wifi request location access as well on my Android 9.
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Well, if you want to talk about sneaky⊠Apple does this as well with their map data but apps that use Wi-Fi or otherwise could submit signals collected from RF to alternative location APIs have no such warning.
I never said Google was the only turd in the big data outhouse.
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Itâs more of a froth up smoothie
My stomach is strangely upturned all of the sudden 
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Iâm actually curious, do you make a point to choose a cell phone with a user removable battery? Iâm not into conspiracy theory but Iâm pretty sure that every phone maker in the world has transitioned to internal undisconnectable batteries from the sole purpose of constantly monitoring things about their users even while the phone is âoffâ.
Even if there are no signals, the device is still on and recording things. I saw a video of some interesting things being recorded on an Android phone while it was supposedly powered down. Things like detecting activities based on the accelerometer such as walking, entering or getting out of a vehicle, climbing stairs, etc. Of course I canât find that video now⊠But it basically confirms that the phone is always on and always recording things and once you âturn it back onâ then it transmits the stuff it recorded.
That particular conspiracy theory is easily disproved: charge up your phone to the brim and keep it turned off for a good long while, and youâll see the battery stays charged - something that would never happen if the phone was quietly recording you and transmitting data behind your back.
The reality is much more prosaic: manufacturers make devices hard to repair (including replacing the battery of course) so people buy new ones, is all.
As for evading surveillance, the best approach is not to hide your data (disconnecting the battery, putting the cellphone in a metal boxâŠ) but to use it to poison the well: keep your regular cellphone with you, use it normally during your normal routine, and use another one - or none at all - when you donât and arrange for the normal âdecoyâ cellphone to be where it should be if you kept your routine.
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Actually this is the point of contention because the phones that I have and have used for the past several years do discharge their battery over a relatively short amount of time even when supposedly powered off. My slightly older phones running Android 8 with user serviceable batteries can stay in drawers for months and still have well over 90% battery⊠But my Samsung S7 and my Pixel 2 and my Pixel 5 and a couple other random Android phones, which have significantly higher milliamp hours ratings, will deplete their batteries to 75% or worse in a matter of just a couple weeks.
I guess the real test for this is to crack open some phones and put a highly sensitive amp meter on them to check for current draw while off. Of course there has to be a few electrons kicking around to enable the power button to function how it needs to, but anything like accelerometers or sensors or anything like that should in theory draw significantly more than a power control circuit.
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None of my phones do that, but perhaps Android 9 - my most recent - qualifies as slightly older.
Anyhow, I donât really buy into this conspiracy theory for another reason: there are many people in the world who seriously look at these things with proper forensic equipment, and if anything sneaky-sneaky was proven to go on, this would be a major MAJOR scandal. Just look at dieselgate: this would be 100x bigger. Even Google canât afford that much bad publicity.
So Occamâs razor tells me itâs just that - another conspiracy theory. But of course as always, in doubt, assume the giant companies behind your little convenient handheld surveillance device are not working in your best interest. A bit of paranoia is healthy.
Just donât go overboard with how much you decide to mess up your life to act upon the perceived threat, because ultimately, neither you nor I nor nobody is worth anything more than a bit of data to sell to shitty advertisers. Unless youâre a major drug lord, a high-ranking politician, a spy or someone of interest. And youâre not. ProbablyâŠ
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Potentially. Iâm really annoyed that I canât find that video now because the guy basically set up an SSL man in the middle attack⊠or perhaps it was in that style⊠But it was on a rooted phone. He was able to see the actual events transmitted back to Google while the phone was operating normally. Then they powered off the phone and went around town with it powered down and got in and out of cars and walked around a bit and then came back and powered back on and after it was powered on it transmitted a bunch of data with event logs that basically covered all the time that the phone was off⊠Stuff like vehicle entrance or exit and walking and I think there was even some very sparse map markers in there as well. All collected while the phone was supposedly off.
Iâm going to look around for that video again because clearly there are certain kinds of scandals that blow up and there are other scandals that just flow like water under the bridge⊠nobody seems to care. I think the reason that the emissions scandal was such a big deal was because there were clear laws being broken and nobody expected it. In the case of Google collecting data, there are no specific laws against this and everybody sort of already expects it. So I think when confirmation is handed over that this is actually happening, nobody really is surprised and it just gets lost.
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Well itâs possible of course. Possibly even likely, but like you say
A tenth of a quarter of what big data companies routinely do and get away with these days would have resulted in a big scandal only 30 years ago. Why people today donât react and seem to accept it as inevitable is totally beyond me.
But I donât care anymore either. I just donât have enough time left in me to give a flying fuck. Thatâs how the future is like I guess.
Iâd be curious to see it.
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I will definitely look for it because it really was surprising the level of detail
Like I said, use the data collection to your advantage - whether itâs collected with the phone on or off: assume itâs collected, and build a pattern of routine that you can use to fool whoever is watching when you do decide to do something out of the ordinary. the din of routine data will hide your unusual activities.
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Big data fuzzing
Mission Darkness makes a signal blocking bag, I actually own 2 of these and some smaller ones for my key fobs. Just pop your phone in when your conspiring mischief.
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