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Using Ultrasonic Beacons to Track Users
- kakarot 9y agoI have been following the progress of this tech for a few years now. People used to take me for a kook but I wish I didn't have a reason to say "I told you so." This is downright scary. Having trouble finding this list of 234 compromised android apps or any such list. Could anyone point me in the right direction? I would be very sad if my minesweeper app has been listening to ads.
- ArchD 9y agoIs there a way to distinguish permission to use the microphone in the foreground vs in the background? AFAIK on Android, no such distinction is made. Many apps have legitimate reasons for using the microphone while in the foreground, but very few in the background. If there were a simple way to allow foreground use but deny background use of the microphone, a lot of offending apps would be neutered, but I'm not holding my breath for Google to change this, just like I'm not holding my breath for them to allow apps to be silently denied permission by being supplied with fake data (e.g. empty image for camera) so that they cannot refuse to run if denied permission.
- mikeash 9y agoApple doesn't make this distinction either. However, they show a BRIGHT RED BAR at the top of the screen any time an app is using the microphone in the background, so it never happens without your knowledge. Seems like Google should at least do that, and letting people block access in the background would be great too.
- gene-h 9y agoPerhaps one could prevent this by restricting said apps from using any frequencies above a certain bound.
- lucaspiller 9y agoWhy use ultrasonic beacons instead of cameras and image recognition to track where people walk? It seems like that would be more effective as you don't need customers to have a certain phone, and a certain app, and you probably already have CCTV blanketing your store (at least in Europe).