5 ms·

> The Washington D.C.-based conservative think-tank then continued tracking the movement of the devices across the country over the course of at least a month i

> The Washington D.C.-based conservative think-tank then continued tracking the movement of the devices across the country over the course of at least a month in January 2022. How is that even remotely legal?

lrvick 4y ago
You give your cell phone carrier your location at all times, and you consent for them to sell it to anyone they want. Cell phones providers are private companies, not utilities. You can just choose not to have one.
paxys 4y ago
Plenty of stuff in this country is de facto legal if you have an (R) next to your name (and to a lesser extent D as well), simply because no one is going to prosecute them.
- TechBro8615 4y ago
  I'm not sure why the reaction to the news that a citizen organization that is non-law enforcement is tracking user data should be "well, it's legal if you have an (R) next to your name." The better question is, why is this data available in the first place? If senators were actually interested in fighting "big tech" beyond making a show of "banning TikTok" and "investigating Twitter," they would spend the time to craft privacy legislation making it illegal to collect, store or transmit this location data in the first place. Perhaps someone should start a non-profit to buy and publish the location data of anyone who spends time in the Capitol building. Maybe then we would see some movement on reasonable legislation to curtail this practice.
  - anigbrowl 4y ago
    Part of the reason for the impasse is that there is no explicit Constitutional right to privacy in the US (other than that provided by the 4th amendment, which has arguably been hollowed out in its own right). But the first amendment does confer protection for publication of information, notwithstanding that it may be published for sale to other businesses and abused for everything from irritating robocalls to complete surveillance. So that makes legislation a steep hill to climb, as interested parties are likely to immediately challenge the constitutionality of anything that makes it through the (often dysfunctional) legislative process. There's also the less formal reality that business is culturally privileged in the US, and the trope of busybody lawmakers interfering with honest business people who are creating jobs and prosperity is easy to market.
  - lrvick 4y ago
    Relevant: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/john-oliver-data-brokers_n_6253db8ae4b066ecde08a5f8 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/john-oliver-data-brokers_n_62...
TechBro8615 4y ago
Most likely the users of the devices granted location services permission to at least one app they installed, and that app includes a terms of service that allows its owner to sell location data to third parties.
- largepeepee 4y ago
  Reminds me of a news piece that covered how a popular Muslim app, think it was a simple direction of Mecca, was selling data to brokers who resold it to govts who tracked the people. Kinda spooky how data is being abused these days, pretty sure religious people aren't the only ones being targeted.
- lrvick 4y ago
  That is one issue, but the bigger issue is that even dumb phones leak their current location via cell tower triangulation at all times.
  - TechBro8615 4y ago
    Yeah, and can I just buy that from the cell phone company without being a law enforcement agency in possession of a legally valid search warrant? If I give you my phone number, how will you find my current location? It also seems a bit dubious to call this a "leak," since it seems unavoidable - how would the tower send data to my phone if it didn't know where I was?
    - mrguyorama 4y ago
      The radio station sends signals to my car without knowing it's location. It's only when my phone responds or pings a tower that they will know my accurate position. The hospital needs to know my details like cholesterol to provide me health services, but they are broadly not allowed to sell those details and if that data ended up somewhere it shouldn't be, you could adequately call it a "leak". Cell phone data should be the same way. Verizon will always know my location, because that's how physics works, but they should not be able to give that info to anyone or anything without my express permission or a warrant.
mindslight 4y ago
There is close to zero privacy regulation in the US, so commercial surveillance is de facto legal. It is pervasive and widespread but not well advertised, because when people find out how many records are being kept on them they tend to feel violated. This dataset was likely obtained from a combination of cell companies and app companies. The only way to change this state of affairs for society is through privacy legislation. And it needs to be competently written so that it doesn't just end up amounting to another paragraph in the legalese that nobody reads.
- nerpderp82 4y ago
  The Heritage Foundations means and methods used here is abhorrent and should be seen as un-American. This is the kind of precursor action to Kristallnacht. To you and @TechBro8615, it feels like there is some other law being broken here. > The Heritage Foundation locked on to the locations of at least 30,000 cell phones at non-government (NGO) migrant aid shelters and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) facilities. This sounds like they are getting device/tower information directly. Again, this sounds like an illegal interception/wiretapping. https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibillion-dollar-market-for-your-phones-location-data https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibilli... https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/how-federal-government-buys-our-cell-phone-location-data https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/how-federal-government... https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibillion-dollar-market-for-your-phones-location-data https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibilli...
  - mindslight 4y ago
    I take "locked on to the locations of at least 30,000 cell phones" as sensationalist embellishment, rather than any sort of technical description. The articles you linked are exactly what I'm talking about. It's abhorrent, but not illegal as there is currently no general privacy regulation. It's not wiretapping because it's not audio. It's not illegal interception or any other kind of tort because the subjects "agreed" to their telcos and app providers doing this when they signed up for their cell plans and installed apps. It should be illegal. The US needs comprehensive privacy legislation akin to the GDPR, which crucially defines 'consent' in such a way that it cannot just be nullified by unilateral terms of service. Until then, surveillance companies will keep building totalitarian surveillance systems ripe for abuse by the government, politicians, and plain old commercial interests.
NotYourLawyer 4y ago
Hoo boy wait until you hear about what the tech companies have been up to.

lrvick 4y ago

You give your cell phone carrier your location at all times, and you consent for them to sell it to anyone they want. Cell phones providers are private companies, not utilities. You can just choose not to have one.

paxys 4y ago

Plenty of stuff in this country is de facto legal if you have an (R) next to your name (and to a lesser extent D as well), simply because no one is going to prosecute them.

TechBro8615 4y ago
I'm not sure why the reaction to the news that a citizen organization that is non-law enforcement is tracking user data should be "well, it's legal if you have an (R) next to your name." The better question is, why is this data available in the first place? If senators were actually interested in fighting "big tech" beyond making a show of "banning TikTok" and "investigating Twitter," they would spend the time to craft privacy legislation making it illegal to collect, store or transmit this location data in the first place. Perhaps someone should start a non-profit to buy and publish the location data of anyone who spends time in the Capitol building. Maybe then we would see some movement on reasonable legislation to curtail this practice.
- anigbrowl 4y ago
  Part of the reason for the impasse is that there is no explicit Constitutional right to privacy in the US (other than that provided by the 4th amendment, which has arguably been hollowed out in its own right). But the first amendment does confer protection for publication of information, notwithstanding that it may be published for sale to other businesses and abused for everything from irritating robocalls to complete surveillance. So that makes legislation a steep hill to climb, as interested parties are likely to immediately challenge the constitutionality of anything that makes it through the (often dysfunctional) legislative process. There's also the less formal reality that business is culturally privileged in the US, and the trope of busybody lawmakers interfering with honest business people who are creating jobs and prosperity is easy to market.
- lrvick 4y ago
  Relevant: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/john-oliver-data-brokers_n_6253db8ae4b066ecde08a5f8 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/john-oliver-data-brokers_n_62...

TechBro8615 4y ago

Most likely the users of the devices granted location services permission to at least one app they installed, and that app includes a terms of service that allows its owner to sell location data to third parties.

largepeepee 4y ago
Reminds me of a news piece that covered how a popular Muslim app, think it was a simple direction of Mecca, was selling data to brokers who resold it to govts who tracked the people. Kinda spooky how data is being abused these days, pretty sure religious people aren't the only ones being targeted.
lrvick 4y ago
That is one issue, but the bigger issue is that even dumb phones leak their current location via cell tower triangulation at all times.
- TechBro8615 4y ago
  Yeah, and can I just buy that from the cell phone company without being a law enforcement agency in possession of a legally valid search warrant? If I give you my phone number, how will you find my current location? It also seems a bit dubious to call this a "leak," since it seems unavoidable - how would the tower send data to my phone if it didn't know where I was?
  - mrguyorama 4y ago
    The radio station sends signals to my car without knowing it's location. It's only when my phone responds or pings a tower that they will know my accurate position. The hospital needs to know my details like cholesterol to provide me health services, but they are broadly not allowed to sell those details and if that data ended up somewhere it shouldn't be, you could adequately call it a "leak". Cell phone data should be the same way. Verizon will always know my location, because that's how physics works, but they should not be able to give that info to anyone or anything without my express permission or a warrant.

mindslight 4y ago

There is close to zero privacy regulation in the US, so commercial surveillance is de facto legal. It is pervasive and widespread but not well advertised, because when people find out how many records are being kept on them they tend to feel violated. This dataset was likely obtained from a combination of cell companies and app companies. The only way to change this state of affairs for society is through privacy legislation. And it needs to be competently written so that it doesn't just end up amounting to another paragraph in the legalese that nobody reads.

nerpderp82 4y ago
The Heritage Foundations means and methods used here is abhorrent and should be seen as un-American. This is the kind of precursor action to Kristallnacht. To you and @TechBro8615, it feels like there is some other law being broken here. > The Heritage Foundation locked on to the locations of at least 30,000 cell phones at non-government (NGO) migrant aid shelters and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) facilities. This sounds like they are getting device/tower information directly. Again, this sounds like an illegal interception/wiretapping. https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibillion-dollar-market-for-your-phones-location-data https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibilli... https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/how-federal-government-buys-our-cell-phone-location-data https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/how-federal-government... https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibillion-dollar-market-for-your-phones-location-data https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibilli...
- mindslight 4y ago
  I take "locked on to the locations of at least 30,000 cell phones" as sensationalist embellishment, rather than any sort of technical description. The articles you linked are exactly what I'm talking about. It's abhorrent, but not illegal as there is currently no general privacy regulation. It's not wiretapping because it's not audio. It's not illegal interception or any other kind of tort because the subjects "agreed" to their telcos and app providers doing this when they signed up for their cell plans and installed apps. It should be illegal. The US needs comprehensive privacy legislation akin to the GDPR, which crucially defines 'consent' in such a way that it cannot just be nullified by unilateral terms of service. Until then, surveillance companies will keep building totalitarian surveillance systems ripe for abuse by the government, politicians, and plain old commercial interests.

NotYourLawyer 4y ago

Hoo boy wait until you hear about what the tech companies have been up to.