I have found that tinfoil has many uses like duct tape in solving everyday problems like yours. Just wrap your cellphone in several layers of tinfoil and they won't be able to track you, really! Trust me. ;-)
Posted on 08/29/2011 1:56:47 PM PDT by NewHampshireDuo
I am reading a very interesting book on surveillance (Surveillance or Security? - The risks posed by new wiretapping technologies by Susan Landau). In it the author makes a passing comment that cell phone locations (proximity to a tower) can be tracked even with the phone turned off. The implication is that turning the phone off only turns off the user interface, not the periodic pings. Removing the battery will turn this off.
I have seen some statements that this is correct and others that say it's not but nothing (in a quick search) that's definitive.
Does anyone have an authoritative source with an answer?
Antistat bags have a highly resistive coating that works as a static protection guard but it’s useless as a RF shield. You need metal or a dense metal mesh.
So how do you take the battery out of IPHONE.
The specific line in the book is:
“Users broadcast their location whenever their phone is turned on - and the phones can be manipulated to do such broadcasting even when the phone is off.”
A key word is “manipulated” which I would take could mean a possible default setting in the phone, a command signal from the service provider, etc.
The author has a strong engineering, cybersecurity and public policy background so I don’t dismiss the comment although there was no footnote associated with the statement.
Have you tried a hammer?
I always keep a few of those cellophane-foil potato chip bags with me and toss my phone in there when I’m not using it.
So how do you take the battery out of IPHONE
2 ways
1 throw it hard against a wall
2 Lay it on the floor and stomp the crap out of it or until the battery falls out.
You could drop that sucker in a mini-potato chip bag (those thing METAL types) and be fine, I think.
Here’s an experiment that will convince you of the value of a Farraday Cage:
Put phone A in a microwave, door open. Call the phone, observe ring.
Close the door of the OFF microwave:
Call the phone. It does not ring.
Those are the effects of a (small) Farraday Cage.
Use throwaways from WalMart and your concerns about being tracked are over.
Just make sure you really do throw them away every so often.
If you keep it in a bucket of water you will not be tracked.
“Believe me, if they want to track you via this device or any other, like GPS or computers in your car, they can.”
That’s why I always keep two cell phones registered in my name: one on my person, the other tied to a balloon which randomly floats around the neighborhood.
I guess its design this way to sell another phone. Battery not replaceable and loses 20% capacity every year. Wow what genius marketing ploy. NOT.
“Use throwaways from WalMart and your concerns about being tracked are over.”
They did this on “The Wire,” I believe, in which case the cops sold dummied-up throwaways, with a wiretap all ready to go, directly to the drug dealers.
Hammer to 500.00 phone? LOL Steve Jobs is probably the ONLY person on this planet able to convince buyers to spend 500.00 and 100.00 a month for 2 year contract with a product useful life of 3 years.
I dunno that I’d trust that, but I’m sure some freeper has one sitting around that came off a replacement hard drive or video card or whatnot...any self respecting geek has half a dozen nice ones they’ve kept from various upgrades.
Don’t know how much of this should be public info. My friend works for the Secret Service, and according to him the phone must be on before it can be tracked.
I have found that tinfoil has many uses like duct tape in solving everyday problems like yours. Just wrap your cellphone in several layers of tinfoil and they won't be able to track you, really! Trust me. ;-)
I'm an electronics engineer, and I have a spectrum analyzer (measures transmit power, even short pulses). By making a call, I established the frequency range and power that it operated on. I also established a controlled radio environment where no signals except the cell phone's would register on the analyzer. Then, I turned off the cell phone and continued monitoring it.
No transmission for a half hour now.
As soon as I turned it back on, it started transmitting again.
They can't track ya if ya don't transmit.
Or if they can't hear ya -- y'all with the Faraday Cage ideas are on the right track. Just wrap it in good ol' aluminum foil.
an article came out in 2006 that the FBI could use cell phones even phones that were turned off as a wiretap
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1029-6140191.html
you can track any cell phone at http://www.gpsspying.com/
By "controlled environment" - would your phone have been able to receive a ping from the tower? Closely reading the statement in the book, it (sort of) implies that the phone may have to be commanded to transmit when switched off.
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