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This also happens on TV, and you probably have no idea. There are applications on iPads and phones that work with ratings firms, like Nielsen and so forth. Thes

This also happens on TV, and you probably have no idea. There are applications on iPads and phones that work with ratings firms, like Nielsen and so forth. These firms work with content producers, and they embed inaudible tones into TV shows and even advertisements. The phones and iPads pick up this tone and report back that the user is, indeed, watching said TV show or ad. It's a way of confirmed tracking of views.

e1ven 7y ago
I know iOS requires permission granted in an app when it tries to use the microphone, and I presume Android does similarly. I would imagine to do such tracking, you'd need to have an app open which already had those permissions for some reason, such as Skype.
thenewnewguy 7y ago
That's a pretty incredible claim, you got a source on that? My searches can't find anything.
- mikewhy 7y ago
  While not this exact claim, years ago I wrote an app for a TV show to detect ultrasonic tones embedded in episodes of the show. While not solely for tracking (it was to sync a clock to the episode you're watching), there were special tones to trigger ads. I could easily see this being expanded upon and included in a tracking SDK.
  - rimliu 7y ago
    How did you get around the permission to use the microphone restriction? And if it is in use the status bar turns red on iOS.
    - layoutIfNeeded 7y ago
      >How did you get around the permission to use the microphone restriction? An app can already have recording permissions for legitimate reasons. >And if it is in use the status bar turns red on iOS. It only turns red if a background app is recording.
    - mikewhy 7y ago
      > How did you get around the permission to use the microphone restriction The app asked for permission as usual.
- tomrod 7y ago
  "Marketing Beacons": https://www.wired.com/2017/05/hundreds-apps-can-listen-beacons-cant-hear/ https://www.wired.com/2017/05/hundreds-apps-can-listen-beaco...
- pmontra 7y ago
  I can't help you about that but it reminds me of the Spanish Liga listening to their app to look for pubs that were illegally streaming their matches. https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/12/18662968/la-liga-app-illegal-soccer-streaming-fine https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/12/18662968/la-liga-app-ille...
- salawat 7y ago
  https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/416712/ https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/416712/ Not Nielsen related per se, but this technique has been circulating for at least a few years. That's a 2015 article.
- rapnie 7y ago
  The technology is called ultrasound cross-device tracking (uXDT) and companies like SilverPush are doing it. There is an ever-growing amount of android apps that contain this tech. DDG'ing should yield quite a bit of interesting articles about this practice.
XCSme 7y ago
I think that was ruled as illegal recently, or was always illegal.
palimpsests 7y ago
what applications on iPads and phones are you talking about, specifically?
matheusmoreira 7y ago
Which applications do this? I need to make sure they're either uninstalled or that their microphone permissions have been revoked.
- roxil 7y ago
  Here is an incomplete list: https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php PilferShush is an experimental F-droid app that is supposed to prevent this kind of tracking by blocking your phone's microphone and jamming the Audio frequencies used for tracking. F-droid page: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjammer/ https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjam... Edit: Wikipedia says there are 234 android apps that use ultrasound audio tracking, but the article it references is from 2017 and behind a paywall... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applicat...
- roxil 7y ago
  I did some further research and I'm stumped, but I thought I'd share my findings. It looks like your question doesn't have an easy answer and requires more research. I couldn't find much new information on Ultrasound Cross-Device Tracking (uXDT). This could be good, meaning that it's not being widely used, or it could be bad and mean that simply not much is publicly known about the extent to which it is used. (or my google-fu is weak) To clarify my post form earlier. The "list" only has the SDKs used for uXDT, not the apps that make use of them. This is the list of SDKs possibly used for uXDT: acrcloud, actv8, alphonso, axwave, beatgridmedia, bitsound (soundlly), chirp, cifrasoft, copsonic, cueaudio, digimarc, dv (dov-e), fidzup, fluzo, gracenote, hotstar(zapr), hound, inscape, instreamatic (VIA), lisnr, moodmedia, mufin , prontoly (now sonarax), redbricklane(zapr), shopkick, signal360, silverpush, sonarax, soniccode, sonicnotify (now Signal360), soundpays, tonetag, trillbit, zapr I got it from PilferShush's project page which is an experimental F-droid app researching uXDT. It's worth a look, but a bit messy: https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjammer/ https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjam... --- Wikipedia says there are 234 android apps that use ultrasound audio tracking. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applicat... If you google around, you will find this number repeated in a lot of articles. It's an old number from a research paper from 2017: http://christian.wressnegger.info/content/projects/sidechannels/2017-eurosp.pdf http://christian.wressnegger.info/content/projects/sidechann... Here's good summary of the research: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/234-android-applications-are-currently-using-ultrasonic-beacons-to-track-users/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/234-android-a... Only a few specific apps were mentioned in the research paper. It probably only scratches the tip of the ice berg. The researchers looked for SilverPush in an 8 TB dataset of 1,320,822 apps submitted to VirusTotal. --- These were the only apps that were mentioned: (Apps with 1,000,000 – 5,000,000 downloads) 100000+ SMS Messages, developed by Moziberg Pinoy Henyo, developed by Jayson Tamayo (100,000 – 500,000 downloads) McDo Philippines, developed by Golden Arches Dev. Corp. Krispy Kreme Philippines, developed by Mobext (50,000 – 100,000) Civil Service Reviewer Free, developed by Jayson Tamayo --- Here's a List of Apps from 2015 (Mostly from India and Phillipines) that use SilverPush: https://public.addonsdetector.com/silverpush-android-apps/ https://public.addonsdetector.com/silverpush-android-apps/ And here a list from 2016 with Apps containing Signal360: https://public.addonsdetector.com/signal360-android-apps/ https://public.addonsdetector.com/signal360-android-apps/ It looks like you can use this Addon Detector to find at least a couple of the uXDT apps: http://public.addonsdetector.com/ http://public.addonsdetector.com/ The Addon Detector only seems to be able to find three uXDT app SDKs from the whole bunch mentioned by PilferShush: lisnr, signal360 and silverpush --- SoniControl is also an interesting project worth looking at. It's goal is to detect acoustic tracking information. https://github.com/fhstp/SoniControl https://github.com/fhstp/SoniControl Audio Tracker Demo - It's a link on PilferShush's project page: https://kaputnikgo.github.io/acr.html https://kaputnikgo.github.io/acr.html

e1ven 7y ago

I know iOS requires permission granted in an app when it tries to use the microphone, and I presume Android does similarly. I would imagine to do such tracking, you'd need to have an app open which already had those permissions for some reason, such as Skype.

thenewnewguy 7y ago

That's a pretty incredible claim, you got a source on that? My searches can't find anything.

mikewhy 7y ago
While not this exact claim, years ago I wrote an app for a TV show to detect ultrasonic tones embedded in episodes of the show. While not solely for tracking (it was to sync a clock to the episode you're watching), there were special tones to trigger ads. I could easily see this being expanded upon and included in a tracking SDK.
- rimliu 7y ago
  How did you get around the permission to use the microphone restriction? And if it is in use the status bar turns red on iOS.
  - layoutIfNeeded 7y ago
    >How did you get around the permission to use the microphone restriction? An app can already have recording permissions for legitimate reasons. >And if it is in use the status bar turns red on iOS. It only turns red if a background app is recording.
  - mikewhy 7y ago
    > How did you get around the permission to use the microphone restriction The app asked for permission as usual.
tomrod 7y ago
"Marketing Beacons": https://www.wired.com/2017/05/hundreds-apps-can-listen-beacons-cant-hear/ https://www.wired.com/2017/05/hundreds-apps-can-listen-beaco...
pmontra 7y ago
I can't help you about that but it reminds me of the Spanish Liga listening to their app to look for pubs that were illegally streaming their matches. https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/12/18662968/la-liga-app-illegal-soccer-streaming-fine https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/12/18662968/la-liga-app-ille...
salawat 7y ago
https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/416712/ https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/416712/ Not Nielsen related per se, but this technique has been circulating for at least a few years. That's a 2015 article.
rapnie 7y ago
The technology is called ultrasound cross-device tracking (uXDT) and companies like SilverPush are doing it. There is an ever-growing amount of android apps that contain this tech. DDG'ing should yield quite a bit of interesting articles about this practice.

XCSme 7y ago

I think that was ruled as illegal recently, or was always illegal.

palimpsests 7y ago

what applications on iPads and phones are you talking about, specifically?

matheusmoreira 7y ago

Which applications do this? I need to make sure they're either uninstalled or that their microphone permissions have been revoked.

roxil 7y ago
Here is an incomplete list: https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php PilferShush is an experimental F-droid app that is supposed to prevent this kind of tracking by blocking your phone's microphone and jamming the Audio frequencies used for tracking. F-droid page: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjammer/ https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjam... Edit: Wikipedia says there are 234 android apps that use ultrasound audio tracking, but the article it references is from 2017 and behind a paywall... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applicat...
roxil 7y ago
I did some further research and I'm stumped, but I thought I'd share my findings. It looks like your question doesn't have an easy answer and requires more research. I couldn't find much new information on Ultrasound Cross-Device Tracking (uXDT). This could be good, meaning that it's not being widely used, or it could be bad and mean that simply not much is publicly known about the extent to which it is used. (or my google-fu is weak) To clarify my post form earlier. The "list" only has the SDKs used for uXDT, not the apps that make use of them. This is the list of SDKs possibly used for uXDT: acrcloud, actv8, alphonso, axwave, beatgridmedia, bitsound (soundlly), chirp, cifrasoft, copsonic, cueaudio, digimarc, dv (dov-e), fidzup, fluzo, gracenote, hotstar(zapr), hound, inscape, instreamatic (VIA), lisnr, moodmedia, mufin , prontoly (now sonarax), redbricklane(zapr), shopkick, signal360, silverpush, sonarax, soniccode, sonicnotify (now Signal360), soundpays, tonetag, trillbit, zapr I got it from PilferShush's project page which is an experimental F-droid app researching uXDT. It's worth a look, but a bit messy: https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php https://www.cityfreqs.com.au/pilfer.php https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjammer/ https://f-droid.org/en/packages/cityfreqs.com.pilfershushjam... --- Wikipedia says there are 234 android apps that use ultrasound audio tracking. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-device_tracking#Applicat... If you google around, you will find this number repeated in a lot of articles. It's an old number from a research paper from 2017: http://christian.wressnegger.info/content/projects/sidechannels/2017-eurosp.pdf http://christian.wressnegger.info/content/projects/sidechann... Here's good summary of the research: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/234-android-applications-are-currently-using-ultrasonic-beacons-to-track-users/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/234-android-a... Only a few specific apps were mentioned in the research paper. It probably only scratches the tip of the ice berg. The researchers looked for SilverPush in an 8 TB dataset of 1,320,822 apps submitted to VirusTotal. --- These were the only apps that were mentioned: (Apps with 1,000,000 – 5,000,000 downloads) 100000+ SMS Messages, developed by Moziberg Pinoy Henyo, developed by Jayson Tamayo (100,000 – 500,000 downloads) McDo Philippines, developed by Golden Arches Dev. Corp. Krispy Kreme Philippines, developed by Mobext (50,000 – 100,000) Civil Service Reviewer Free, developed by Jayson Tamayo --- Here's a List of Apps from 2015 (Mostly from India and Phillipines) that use SilverPush: https://public.addonsdetector.com/silverpush-android-apps/ https://public.addonsdetector.com/silverpush-android-apps/ And here a list from 2016 with Apps containing Signal360: https://public.addonsdetector.com/signal360-android-apps/ https://public.addonsdetector.com/signal360-android-apps/ It looks like you can use this Addon Detector to find at least a couple of the uXDT apps: http://public.addonsdetector.com/ http://public.addonsdetector.com/ The Addon Detector only seems to be able to find three uXDT app SDKs from the whole bunch mentioned by PilferShush: lisnr, signal360 and silverpush --- SoniControl is also an interesting project worth looking at. It's goal is to detect acoustic tracking information. https://github.com/fhstp/SoniControl https://github.com/fhstp/SoniControl Audio Tracker Demo - It's a link on PilferShush's project page: https://kaputnikgo.github.io/acr.html https://kaputnikgo.github.io/acr.html