Of all the privacy violations of the world we live in, this is the biggest for me. I do NOT want people keeping tabs on where I am, where I am going, and where I have been. This shit is big.
If there is one thing that I miss about the ‘good old days’ (and I am elder millennial born in the early 80s) is that while there were security cameras in various places at the time it was a lot easier to be relatively anonymous with many interactions in the past.
I need to make it clear. Privacy and people obsessing about privacy isn’t new. I read old Sears-Roebuck catalogs from pre-WW1 and one guarantee that they have is that the packaging they will send you is super private: As in, only your address and name is on it for the post office to deliver it to you and nothing else. Plain brown paper wrapping and nothing indicating what could be inside. It could be something as simple as clothes or kitchenware or stationary, or something spicy like firearms and ammunition (and they sold handguns very freely in their catalogs prior to 1918) . People in the old days didn’t want people to know what books they were reading, or much of anything. Privacy was a big fucking deal.
The carrier is probably the most important part of this. One can choose to use a dumbphone with limited system services, hell, an IOT board with a speaker and a microphone attached. It is comparatively easy to silence local software.
However, one can not stop the cell carrier from gathering e911 “required” telemetry (GPS geolocation and cell site location ranging data) except to keep the modem turned off. (If one believes “off” is off.)
There used to be telecom regulations around privacy way back when, but those days are apparently long behind.
Oh yeah, but even that can be worked around. GrapheneOS on a Pixel without any Google services doesn’t say a peep to anyone. Graphene even has proxies set up for Android services that may “need” Google. So it is at least possible. You can’t stop the carrier from looking inside your pants. Even voice-only mode, the carrier still has telemetry connections established. It used to be they’d keep the data they harvested themselves for network diagnostics and throw it away, then they had government-mandated data harvesting time limits. Although none of that matters when it can just be funneled away and stored forever.
AMPS analog cellular was neat. No reason to keep the phone on. No reason to be contacted. Even if it was on, the privacy radius was huge. Maybe the solution is to replicate that “turn it off” behavior today.
Of all the privacy violations of the world we live in, this is the biggest for me. I do NOT want people keeping tabs on where I am, where I am going, and where I have been. This shit is big.
If there is one thing that I miss about the ‘good old days’ (and I am elder millennial born in the early 80s) is that while there were security cameras in various places at the time it was a lot easier to be relatively anonymous with many interactions in the past.
I need to make it clear. Privacy and people obsessing about privacy isn’t new. I read old Sears-Roebuck catalogs from pre-WW1 and one guarantee that they have is that the packaging they will send you is super private: As in, only your address and name is on it for the post office to deliver it to you and nothing else. Plain brown paper wrapping and nothing indicating what could be inside. It could be something as simple as clothes or kitchenware or stationary, or something spicy like firearms and ammunition (and they sold handguns very freely in their catalogs prior to 1918) . People in the old days didn’t want people to know what books they were reading, or much of anything. Privacy was a big fucking deal.
What sort of device (and what internet provider) did you post this reply with because I’m afraid I might have some bad news
Not T-mobile.
Good, but there’s more to it than that. I’d argue the carrier is actually the least important part of this
The carrier is probably the most important part of this. One can choose to use a dumbphone with limited system services, hell, an IOT board with a speaker and a microphone attached. It is comparatively easy to silence local software.
However, one can not stop the cell carrier from gathering e911 “required” telemetry (GPS geolocation and cell site location ranging data) except to keep the modem turned off. (If one believes “off” is off.)
There used to be telecom regulations around privacy way back when, but those days are apparently long behind.
The carrier point is where they connect the persona to the person.
The Google/Apple account arguably does worse.
You can create a complete new Google account, using a burner phone paid in cash.
However, the PHONE is what is tracked, all the time, on the network.
You’re not wrong, just saying there’s a lot of data being stolen from most every device that most people use, regardless of carrier.
Oh yeah, but even that can be worked around. GrapheneOS on a Pixel without any Google services doesn’t say a peep to anyone. Graphene even has proxies set up for Android services that may “need” Google. So it is at least possible. You can’t stop the carrier from looking inside your pants. Even voice-only mode, the carrier still has telemetry connections established. It used to be they’d keep the data they harvested themselves for network diagnostics and throw it away, then they had government-mandated data harvesting time limits. Although none of that matters when it can just be funneled away and stored forever.
AMPS analog cellular was neat. No reason to keep the phone on. No reason to be contacted. Even if it was on, the privacy radius was huge. Maybe the solution is to replicate that “turn it off” behavior today.