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Big Brother watching you via your phone

This is what I found on a local papers. My God, Big Brother watching you via your phone
IBM revealed in its Next Five In Five study that one of the biggest innovations that will change our lives in the next five years is mobile phones that can read our minds.
The study said that advanced "presence" technology, which IBM is testing with Norway's biggest telecommunications group, will allow mobile devices and networks to learn about users' whereabouts and preferences as they commute, work and travel.
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i would not put much trust it that source
when
1 they dont name the norwegian isp
2 norway have pretty strict privicy laws

What exactly is new about this?
At least in the US (I think in other places too by now) all mobile phones are required to have a GPS chip by law so they can be tracked in case of emergency or "criminal situation".
Believe me, if big brother wanted to watch you, they would not advertise the technology. I think this is more of a "phishing trip" (thats phishing whit "ph" as in internet scam) so cell companies can shove targeted commercials up your @@@ and make more money.

Rudegar said:
i would not put much trust it that source
when
1 they dont name the norwegian isp
2 norway have pretty strict privicy laws
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They say Norwegian telecoms group, not isp. That would probably indicate Nokia...
also
Privacy is one thing, but "features for customer benefit" are another... remember what was said when people wanted to put CCTV in city centres? These days you just kinda accept that they will be under constant scrutiny...
not exactly the same, but it would be the "customer benefit" that eventualy outwieghs the more sinister uses for the technology.
Already some of us are using MSN live search, or Google Maps and seeing the advantages that brings... as soon as the more widespread acceptance of these new uses is apparent people will let it slip to the backs of their minds that the evil people in the shadows could use this information to great effect for anything they wanted....
When im rich, im buying an island and building a huge farraday cage around it so they cant read my brain with microwaves and lasers. heeheh

nokia is from finland not norway
no mobil producers i know of are based in norway
a norwegian telcom company is telenor though that could be a player i doubt it though it's not really atune with the nordic system to test out a big brother system least of all in norway
and normal mobils dont! have gps's in them but they connect to antennas and the antennas know who are connected to them and from what direction they are connected from thats all
if the operater let people this can be used as a pretty crude form of gps but it's prob closer to a 1km pricision then a 1m or what ever gps is today

Hmm, I distinctly remember reading something about GPS1 even in normal phones but i could be wrong.
Just wanted to make a point that if they want to find you they will, though making this point is hard to do without sounding paranoid.
P.S. Not too relevant, but I am fairly sure (don't have a link to prove it) that commercial GPS (like those in PPCs) are accurate to about 10 meters and the nav software compensates by assuming you are in a car on a given street.
There is a something called DGPS (differential) that is accurate to less then one meter but it relies on ground stations in addition to satellites and is only available in certain areas.

we are traceable as is via our phones and there are no such things as private calls
9yrs in the militray and 11 in the gov security uk/overseas

trace over phone ... do you know "gsm cell id" ... in the future, all provider in austria must store "cell ids" and connection data for 6 months. the first steps to build a visible user are done!

in the uk people have already been located in court case for serious crimes ,using the monbilephone to give times and locations within feet

Theft alarm

Does any one know of a theft alarm that will give a warning when my mobile is away from the receiver (in my pocket) more than a certain distance? Maybe built on RFID technology or blue tooth?

Your question made me imagine a phone tied by a piece of string to one of your pockets, so if someone jerks it out without you noticing, it would also jerk your pants. lol

that would be the simplest solution; still, I prefer technology, a very tiny transmitter hidden in the mobile, preferably a passive RFID tag so it will not contain a battery which then will be paired to a receiver that can only detect this tag. If the mobile is out of range, a buzzer and vibrating alarm is activated in the receiver.
I know that this seems possible, however, current RFID readers are priced in Ks of $, and this will not make it feasible for every one to buy it.
There are some alarms in the market with the same idea but built on different technology, their problem is that the transmitter is noticeable and the thief can simply remove them the moment he picks the mobile.
http://www.tradekey.com/selloffer_view/id/887081.htm

ok so you are running late for work and forget to put the non mobile side of the detector on your person one morning, you get part of the way out the door up the street and your phone starts buzzing and beeping like crazy.... run back to pick up the chip???
yeah if you really want this that bad string sounds good.

cktlcmd said:
Your question made me imagine a phone tied by a piece of string to one of your pockets, so if someone jerks it out without you noticing, it would also jerk your pants. lol
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Also, if the phone slip of your hand, the string will prevent it from drop to the floor. Not a bad idea, expecially you get two protections for the price of one.

If you carved some gooves into the side of the phone you could make a yoyo too.

come on guys, where I live, 3 out of 5 mobile owners had their mobiles theft at least once, if we use the string alarm, I imagine every one walking down the street is screaming out of pain because a thief tried to steal his mobile and had to let go when he found it stringed, this sudden release hearts I think

phones are considered disposable technology these days, i remember a few years back when insurance companies in australia use to offer insurance on phone theft but no one really bothered with it much.
if someone wants my phone badly enough to try and take it from my pocket i garentee there will be some sort of weapon involved and they will want my wallet and keys too and that being the case they can have it.
also considering that most people are aware that a phone can be tracked via the cell network who would buy it? its not like you will pay $50 down the pub for it knowing that someone would have reported it stolen and ur average thief aint smart enough to know how to change the IMEI number nor would anyone who is stupid enough to buy a $50 phone at a pub with half a string attached to it (LMAO)

st3v3 said:
phones are considered disposable technology these days, i remember a few years back when insurance companies in australia use to offer insurance on phone theft but no one really bothered with it much.
if someone wants my phone badly enough to try and take it from my pocket i garentee there will be some sort of weapon involved and they will want my wallet and keys too and that being the case they can have it.
also considering that most people are aware that a phone can be tracked via the cell network who would buy it? its not like you will pay $50 down the pub for it knowing that someone would have reported it stolen and ur average thief aint smart enough to know how to change the IMEI number nor would anyone who is stupid enough to buy a $50 phone at a pub with half a string attached to it (LMAO)
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Obviously you have not been on any poor parts of the world, based on your opinion. But in reality, there are parts of the world where cell phones don't have insurance, and they do sell it on the nearby pub, and people actually will buy them believe it or not. Just my observation.
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where I live, it is exactly as what cktlcmd described, a phone may cost the salary of several months to some people, police can not track all of them and they get stolen only when you loose your attention for one moment (it takes less than 30 seconds of not paying attention to loose your mobile as per statistics), so may be a theft alarm does not sound feasible where st3v3 lives, but here, it sure is. Besides, loosing the data and having someone looking at your personal data is what hearts more.

hatamata said:
where I live, it is exactly as what cktlcmd described, a phone may cost the salary of several months to some people, police can not track all of them and they get stolen only when you loose your attention for one moment (it takes less than 30 seconds of not paying attention to loose your mobile as per statistics), so may be a theft alarm does not sound feasible where st3v3 lives, but here, it sure is. Besides, loosing the data and having someone looking at your personal data is what hearts more.
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point taken but having the phone vibrate and beep still isnt going to act as much of a deterant, a running thief will just keep running!

hatamata said:
Besides, loosing the data and having someone looking at your personal data is what hearts more.
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Backup frequently (automatically - see my Backup Bible at http://www.pocketpcmag.com/blogs/index.php?blog=3&p=1270&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1 ) and use a Secure Information Manager. The four best are:
CodeWallet Pro (Developer One, Inc., www.developerone.com)
eWallet Professional (Ilium Software, www.iliumsoft.com)
FlexWallet (WebIS, Inc., www.webis.net)
Spb Wallet (Spb Software House, www.spbsoftwarehouse.com)

st3v3 said:
point taken but having the phone vibrate and beep still isnt going to act as much of a deterant, a running thief will just keep running!
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Not the phone that will vibrate, it is the receiver which should be in my pocket
As for Menneisyys's back up idea, it sure will save most data but not all of it, still, it will not prevent others from seeing my sensitive data stored on the phone.

hatamata said:
where I live, it is exactly as what cktlcmd described, a phone may cost the salary of several months to some people, police can not track all of them and they get stolen only when you loose your attention for one moment (it takes less than 30 seconds of not paying attention to loose your mobile as per statistics)...
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I know that there are countries where a phone cost a few months of salary.. but I'm pretty sure that in those countries, there are always cheaper alternatives. E.g. India's gazillion-aire may buy an A380 as private jet.. build a tower as his own house.. but they do have pretty cheap cars (as I heard, £1,000+). Hence, I don't really understand when people are willing to spend several month of salary on a phone. If that's the case, then probably that's a risk they have to take. E.g., you don't get a convertible car in China unless you are prepared to hire body guards.
AND, if that phone is going to cost the person buying the phone x months of salary, I would think it would cost y (where y > x) months of salary for the person who is stealing it, and some beeping gadgets will not do the job. The beeping gadget will probably make a `theft` to a `robbery`, I think.
Anyway, cute beeping gadget .

hatamata said:
Not the phone that will vibrate, it is the receiver which should be in my pocket
As for Menneisyys's back up idea, it sure will save most data but not all of it, still, it will not prevent others from seeing my sensitive data stored on the phone.
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You can encrypt everything on, say, your card in the background - WM6 already supports this. Also, there already are Remote Wipe solutions.

Best use for OLD smart phones and pdas?

Here's one I've been contemplating lately, what to do with my old smart phones and pdas after I upgrade.
Sure I'd hand them off to any friend or associate who wanted them, re use recycle and all that, but often no one seems to want them since they're well old and out dated.
So what to do? Some have nice stands and make decent clocks for my desk, or snooze alarms for my night stand, but I feel like that's such a waste.
Anyone find any creative and usefull things to do with their old gear?

If it has a decent sized screen and bluetooth you could mount it into your dash and make it a dedicated GPS. If it has a headphone outlet you could also hook it into your car stereo and load it with with music over bluetooth from a laptop etc...

why not sell them if they recently-released phones? many people can't afford a new phone, and don't want to be stuck with a contract, and don't care an older model.

I use my old O2 XDA 2i for my tomtom in the car, it may be old but it runs TomTom perfectly and the screen is much bigger than recent devices. (It also runs video files much better than my Tytn II)
I havnt soft re-set it in about 3 months, so its also very reliable.

ebook reader is also an options

you can set them up as router for your network

After I bought my Kaiser, I used my old Palm LifeDrive as a digital photo frame. It has a 4 GB hard drive and a cradle, so it sits on my desk quite happily. They also make good universal remote controls if they have IR ports.
Dave

I've always just sold mine on Ebay for fair price....Many users are looking for 2nd hand devices.

i still have my ancient trium mondo from 2000 (or was that 1999?). it's still working and i use it as my alarm clock. still pretty good despite it's age and the "night mode" green hew looks great in the dark. the battery, though, doesn't charge anymore so she's forever stuck on her cradle.
cheers

You can always donate them to someone on this great community!
or sell it on marketplace

you could use it as a secondary display with innobec sidewindow that is what i did with my old toshiba before i sold it.

i was just thinking back to an old thread and googled.
this is the site http://www.wmwifirouter.com/

josefcrist said:
you could use it as a secondary display with innobec sidewindow that is what i did with my old toshiba before i sold it.
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+1. Using this you can use your phone to display temps, fan speeds, an IM chat window, external TV. Brilliant.

Use it as a camera, or a Business mini computer (Office, and Internet)
Dont donate it... Its not like giving food to starving kids, thats a diff story, its more like giving a guy free money.

I collect mine (as you can see from my sig), but if I were to ever start considering getting rid of it, Marketplace would be my first choice, Craigslist would be second, and eSpray would be last. Long as it's done for a fair price, or a good trade, there's no problem with that in my book.
With that in mind, I still have all of mine. Once I get one of my wizards working right, the other will go up in Marketplace. I just gotta have the time to fix my mini-usb port... Figures, huh?

Who-m3 said:
Once I get one of my wizards working right, the other will go up in Marketplace. I just gotta have the time to fix my mini-usb port... Figures, huh?
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Craigslist or Ebay, The Forums Marketplace isn't Safe to make Transactions and sales. Atleast with my Previous "Purchase"

For those who have cellular, wifi and GPS or cellular, wifi and a bluetooth GPS, why not use them to earn some money?
Navizon is a wireless positioning system that works a little bit like a GPS, only that it uses Cellular Towers and Wifi access points instead of satellites. In addition to being a wireless position system, Navizon offers cool features like the Directions, Buddy finder, Geotags and many more...
This software relies on a community of users who contribute data to the system (WiFi and Cellular towers) when they have a GPS device. And the cool thing is that we can earn money doing it with the Navizon reward system.
I'm already using it and you could make money too with it if you're interested. All you need is to install it on your phone and have Navizon connected to your GPS. Every Wifi access points that you pass, every cell tower that you log will mean money in your pocket. So if you have a phone that is compatible with this software, you should really check it out.
If you plan on registering, please do so by clicking on the link below:
Navizon
That way, I can also earn some referral points since I'm the one who introduced you to the system ;-)

I've got an old Athena that I'm currently in the process of mounting in my car, once I've built the custom cradle for it. Because the screen is so big it'll perfect for in car video, mp3 play back and of coarse good old tomtom!

Drone that Hacks T-Mobile and ATT Devices

Not a single regulation violated, pretty cool if you ask me:
Built by Mike Tassey and Richard Perkins, the Wireless Aerial Surveillance Platform (otherwise known as the WASP) is a flying drone that has a 6-foot wingspan, a 6-foot length and weighs in at 14 pounds. The small form factor of the unmanned aerial vehicle allows it to drop under radar and is often mistaken for a large bird. It was built from an Army target drone and converted to run on electric batteries rather than gasoline. It can also be loaded with GPS information and fly a predetermined course without need for an operator. Taking off and landing have to be done manually with the help of a mounted HD camera. However, the most interesting aspect of the drone is that it can crack Wi-Fi networks and GSM networks as well as collect the data from them.
It can accomplish this feat with a Linux computer on-board that’s no bigger than a deck of cards. The computer accesses 32GB of storage to house all that stolen data. It uses a variety of networking hacking tools including the BackTrack toolset as well as a 340 million word dictionary to guess passwords. In order to access cell phone data, the WASP impersonates AT&T and T-Mobile cell phone towers and fools phones into connecting to one of the eleven antenna on-board. The drone can then record conversations to the storage card and avoids dropping the call due to the 4G T-mobile card routing communications through VOIP.
Amazingly, this was accomplished with breaking a single FCC regulation. The drone relies on the frequency band used for Ham radios to operate. Not wanting to get into legal trouble with AT&T and T-Mobile, they tested the technology in isolated areas to avoid recording phone conversations other than their own. The duo play to discuss how to build the WASP at the DEFCON 19 hacking conference.
http://news.yahoo.com/men-build-small-flying-spy-drone-cracks-wi-172803720.html

Let it hack my g2x, my phoe will probably knock it down when it reboots, or gps will take so long to lock up the drone will run out of juice.

That thing is a felony arrest waiting to happen.
G2X CM7

Wow. I'm more frightened of the gov't using it than hackers. Pretty incredible innovation, though. Thx for the link!
Also, I think it'd be nice to have one thread that doesn't have a bitter G2X user segue any topic into how much they hate their phone. FFS!!

Nice! I want one!
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Probably not breaking any laws as long as they are given permission to record the conversations (which are their own so far).
I have a swiper drone at work for testing our surveillance equipment. Never really thought about this application though.
Thanks for posting an interesting story. I rarely even open the general forums these days because it seems like every thread is "hate my phone," "should i trade," or "gb update brick." Nice change of scenery.

1984 Big brother comming our way

[DISCUSSION] Unlimited data or lack thereof

The way I understand things is that with "4G" aka hspa+ and LTE id that the towers are now glorified wireless routers with a hard line (fiber or something ) routing all Internet access from your phone (which has its own unique Mac address) through your carriers servers. So why does it cost $50/3GB of data when if you have Internet access through an isp at your home you're paying the same for pretty much unlimited usage? Greed? All the carriers talk about people straining the network with all the band with usage, it's like how they charge for texting when it doesn't cost anything extra since it's sending your text through the towers pinging between themselves and your phone? Any thoughts or do you think I'm just rambling and don't have my information correct?
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It's not that simple.
Obviously all this wonderful technology costs a bunch... if it was as cheap as you make it sound, either one of two things would be true:
1. The phone companies would be insanely wealthy.
or
2. Someone would start a phone company that undercut the others, since everyone else is 'overcharging'.
Neither of which has happened.
The infrastructure to carry all that data costs BILLIONS, and then you can tack on all the money it costs to actually run it, and make sure that it stays running.
Frankly, you should be happy that they can get it to you for the reasonable value they do.

FearTheCowboy said:
It's not that simple.
Obviously all this wonderful technology costs a bunch... if it was as cheap as you make it sound, either one of two things would be true:
1. The phone companies would be insanely wealthy.
or
2. Someone would start a phone company that undercut the others, since everyone else is 'overcharging'.
Neither of which has happened.
The infrastructure to carry all that data costs BILLIONS, and then you can tack on all the money it costs to actually run it, and make sure that it stays running.
Frankly, you should be happy that they can get it to you for the reasonable value they do.
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Good points, 1 the telcos are wealthy pulling in billions in profits every quarter
2 they've effectively made it so you can't make your own upstart to undercut them, as far as isps go
With all this money being spent on technology and the fact that as technology gets more advanced it becomes cheaper to produce. I do understand needing revenue to use towards R&D and updating and maintaining equipment, but if you lived in a city that's blanketed in "free" wifi you could effectively use it for voip and all your data needs.
I get you'd be paying more from an isp to be getting lte speeds per month, rather from the carrier of your choice, but it's a flat rate, you don't get X GBs of data and they charge you more if you go over, even with the billions the isps use to maintain and update their equipment, but what about the existing infrastructure, it's not like it was built over the past few years. Mobile data just tunnels through the Internet, like I said it really is just specialized 802.xx wireless equipment essentially. It's not like every time I access the Internet on my phone that it has to chain between 30+ towers to get to me. How is it that the price of mobile data has gone up but to have high speed at home its gone down?
Sorry now I'm just rambling lol
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