This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Turning off our phones isn't the answer, prohibiting this invasive and predatory practice is the solution. They couldn't follow you around town and all the way home, and take note of your address without getting flagged for stalking, or at least a restraining order.
They shouldn't be able to stalk you electronically, any more than they can do it on person.
Shouldn't be able to but the vast majority of the public ceded their privacy to corporations long ago for discounts or features or content (or just no reason at all), corporations will always be buddy-buddy with the state, so here we are. The horses are out of the barn, the barn's been burned down, the horses have been cremated and the ashes snorted by Don Jr. I sure would like to see a return to pre-techno-dystopian values tho.
That needs to change through legislation. A government that operates on behalf of the people should be prohibiting those sorts of invasive programs for any reason, whether commerce or law enforcement.
And yes, we would hear LOTS of excuses as to why this can't end, but it can end. All we have to is end it, and the corporations and law enforcement will adapt to operating without tech they didn't have only 5-10 years ago, you know like back in the olden days when they couldn't solve any crimes because they couldn't track anybody's phone because all the phones were hanging on the wall in everybody's kitchen? I wonder how they solved crimes back then?
They'll figure it out.
Everyone should be using an ad blocker for this reason exactly.
Ads are often the culprit of data for the location data brokers. Fuck the ads.
Important to note that it isnt just ads. Any app on your phone with location permission can share it, including some OEM aps qnd bloatware depending on the phone.
If you dont want to be seen, dont take your phone. About the only reasonable way to be sure your data isnt being collected is to not create the data in the first place.
Stay safe out there.
I disable location services, I dont have sim on my phone all the time, I only put the sim on the phone when I expect a traditional(insecure and shit) call or SMS (which I only ever get whe verifying phone number), my phone is always in airplane mode
If you are not specifically targeted d/t your status... start first with phone free Fridays. You will feel at first some discomfort... but after that initial feeling... you will start to feel free. Make sure your family has your work number. Turn off the phone on the weekend and put it in something like a lead lined or metal mesh sack... what they used to call a Faraday Cage/Bag.
People get offended whenever I've said that even random app developers are part of the problem. They can't or won't see that what we have arrived at is a Kafkesque world. It has been death by millions of papercuts. The collective rush to make an "app for everything" was in net effect building a global surveillance dragnet. It was inevitable the aggregate of data would turned into an authoritarian system of oppression.
All you wanted to do was make a 99 cents a sale for your basic phone app. You blindly stuffed it with copy-paste analytics APIs that voraciously collect data from users without transparency at all. You insisted that these random data brokers are 100% super honest. Just trust them, bro. You ridiculed anyone of trying to warn people how reckless this is. Good job, guys.
The people should start buying this data to identify ICE personnel involved in incidents. It's not like you need to be law enforcement to get access to this. You just need money.
Pretty sure someone was able to pose as a PI and get paid access a while ago.
Darknet Diaries had an episode on it
Remember that tv series "Person of Interest?"... we need someone to be that guy and his team.
I bet a nonprofit would have a reasonable chance of raising the funds to buy the data and publicly publish it.
We need to be more careful than that, no one wants to end up on a list when a non-profit is required to show its books.
Should be a very private and affordable for-profit with some reasonable way to keep payments off the books
Are nonprofits required to track who they receive donations from? I could be wrong, but I don't think they are. They have to have financial records, but I don't think that means maintaining a donor list.
"Required" isn't the right word but they do record who donates to them because people usually want them to. People donating to non-profits will receive statements from those non-profits at year end so they can deduct the donations from their taxes when filing their return.
People can donate anonymously but if they do so, they give up their right to claim the tax deduction so most do not.
I feel like most people are on the standard deduction these days, right? It's pretty high and while we've itemized in the past, our mortgage interest isn't high enough to push us over and without that everything else is a tiny drop in the bucket.
It certainly depends. I'm not sure what qualifies as "most people" now. Plenty of people have higher interest rates on their homes from recent purchases than those who've purchased homes 4 or 5 years ago, and if you live in a state with higher income tax you'll have more to deduct. Also self-employed contractors and non-incorporated small business owners are likely going to itemize. My wife and I itemize but we're fortunate enough to be in a place where we support a lot of charities so itemization is worth it.
It depends on the details of the non-profit. In the circumstances I see, you're not required to make it public, but you ARE required to provide the list to the government.
I can say, If you started a non-profit and used it to track ice, they most certainly would obtain a list of your doners if they had to go and take it from the hands of your payment provider. Even most crypto isn't fully safe because of banking reporting required
That's a good point, they'd definitely just subpoena your bank records. If crypto is used properly, it can be nigh impossible to trace, though. Bitcoin isn't very private at all on the blockchain, but if you send over lightning network, my understanding is that it becomes effectively impossible to track, unless your adversary controls enough lightning network nodes to track the payment as it bounces between nodes. They wouldn't need to control the whole path, but they would need to control nodes VERY close to origin and destination, ideally the adjacent nodes, and enough of those in the middle to be reasonably sure they can accurately follow the money. The lightning network doesn't leave a detailed ledger behind, so only way to trace a payment is to be involved in its processing, which means controlling the nodes the money passes through on its way to the recipient.
Of course, that's way too obscure and unknown for the vast majority of people, so I don't see a nonprofit succeeding that way these days. Maybe if crypto actually does get mainstream, but that's still a pretty big if.
Noem is so dumb she could not figure out how to train a dog and she felt her best idea was to shoot it in the head. These are not smart people.
but if you send over lightning network
Heh onion routing for bitcoin payments, that's pretty neat. The receiver ends up hanging a bit in the wind.
Maybe it could be a steam game or something with pausible deniablilty
Your phone company is selling this data. Your tax dollars are then used to spy on you. But let's place the blame with the enablers. If the data wasn't being sold, ICE couldn't buy it with your money.
Privacy is a myth in the United States.
yeah, you have to analog.
There's plenty of blame to go around on this, no need to only go after one party in the whole chain that allows this to occur.
While you are right, sounds like they are mostly getting the data through location data brokers that use advertisement industry to track you.
It wasn't that long ago we had phones that couldn't leave the house. This choice does still exist for us.
Does it? It was possible a while ago, but in the last years, we saw train tickets going to apps. There is no ticket machine at my local stop. There are areas where you can only park your car with an app. I need 2FA to get into my accounts. Restaurants have QR code menus. So going to protests or just living your life without a phone is getting harder
just living your life without a phone is getting harder
This is a bigger problem than most realize. Consider the barrier-to-entry for phones, internet access, and charging. Then add cashless payment on top of that. Combined, it creates a new red-line between economic classes, and a rather ugly one at that. At some point, this mode of commerce is going to get selected not for the convenience it provides, but for whom it excludes.
I'll also add that getting access to a smartphone with total anonymity is impressively hard to do.
I lived without a cell phone for about 3 years (2022-2025), and once in a while there was a small hurdle but overall it was surprisingly easy. 2FA can be done via text/email, I never ran into an instance where I needed an app. Every ticket I bought could be printed at home, so it takes a little more forethought but not a deal breaker. Never ran into any parking stations that couldn't be paid via a kiosk/card, but YMMV.
These days I own a phone per request of one of my business clients, but it stays turned off at home unless I'm on a job. Once in a while I'll break it out to use the GPS but most places I drive to I can find by memory. There are many "middle" ground solutions out there too (like Graphene OS), but as a general rule, I would make a habit of leaving your phone at home when you can, and definitely when engaging in anything spicy.
Yes, and printed maps still work. Keeping an address/phone book still works (so do sharpies on your arm).
The choice does exist, but it gets harder and harder to go without a phone
Many jobs expect us to be available at all hours. Younger generations cannot navigate without maps. Phones are also the primary way we record/observe ICE. They're also our calendar/organizer, notebook, and many other things
Sure, we can have an independent GPS, camera, calendar, and notepad, but the barrier keeps getting higher
We need to develop counter measures, and long-term pass strong laws banning this level of government surveillance
Public payphones in the streets and emergency phones alongside highways have also been removed (at least in my country). So yeah, our society expects us to have our own phones with us whenever we're away from home.
Do not take your phone to protests/rallies/organized events. Do not turn it off and take it with you thinking it's okay, they will know when and where you turned it off. Jury is still out if modern phones truly turn off as well. Use a regular camera for taking pictures, take lots of them, get faces, IDs, anything if you can of ICE. Let them start the violence first.
also, tape recorders. And if you travel out of the country... buy a burner flip phone to use.
It's worth adding that, if you are arrested, that phone is a treasure-trove of potential liability that will absolutely get used against you. Also, you're probably not getting it back, so you're better off without it. Carry cash, a map if you must, and coordinate rally points and fallback locations with your friends ahead of time.
A proper camera is a good tip, but make sure the camera memory and storage card are wiped ahead of time.
You can also use an old style camera that uses film or a polaroid. Take ziplocs or black bags to put in and hide like a cache bag.
Pardon the pedanticness: Phones do NOT completely power down. The jury is out on if they are still traceable in "standby"/psuedo-powered off mode. The generally accepted advice is to treat them like they are still tracable.
If "Find my phone" still works when it's turned off, then yes, phones are definitely traceable when powered down.
For iPhones, Find My only works powered off by Bluetooth connections to other devices. Unless someone is scanning and tracking Bluetooth radios, they can’t track you.
The vulnerability in the article is about apps that send location data back to a third party who makes it available to law enforcement.
Mainly, this is a problem for people who give any random app access to location data.
One of the best things about phones with batteries you can replace. You can take them out of the phone as well.
FYI, the most relevant information to avoiding your phone showing up in ICE's rented databases is how they are getting the location data:
The material does not say how Penlink obtains the smartphone location data in the first place. But surveillance companies and data brokers broadly gather it in two different ways. The first is from small bundles of code included in ordinary apps called software development kits, or SDKs. SDK owners then pay the app developers, who might make things like weather or prayer apps, for their users’ location data. The second is through real-time bidding, or RTB. This is where companies in the online advertising industry place near instantaneous bids to get their advert in front of a certain demographic. A side effect is that companies can obtain data about peoples’ individual devices, including their GPS coordinates. Spy firms have sourced this sort of RTB information from hugely popular smartphone apps.
This includes a link to a prior 404 story that may have a list of apps, but it's paywalled and none of the archive sites seem to have it indexed: https://www.404media.co/candy-crush-tinder-myfitnesspal-see-the-thousands-of-apps-hijacked-to-spy-on-your-location/
Per EFF: US a surveillance regime as much as North Korea, China and Russia.
US surveillance is far more effective than North Korea or Russia's domestic surveillance
Only China is in the same realm in terms of ability to surveil citizens. They're just more open about using it for low-level offenses
I thought this was going to say they were deploying Stingrays in neighborhoods. Pretty sure this is worse, because at least a Stingray requires something be physically present. Fuck all of this.
My guess is the get the phone info from protests and then use the data from location data brokers to track further.
"This is wrong" — Lucius Fox, The Dark Knight
Prescient, and also an example of copaganda/how corporate media conditions the public to accept this shit because the "good guy" is the one using it.
