4 ms·

or they just triangulated using his cell phone, it can be very accurate in urban settings

internetter 3y ago
Seems like much more work. Based on the stories I've seen about these operations to track down phones over the years, it's a little more complicated
paxys 3y ago
Police need a warrant to get location data from your cell phone provider. No department is bothering with that for a welfare check unless the situation is really dire, and the process still takes a while to carry out. "Where do you think your brother is?" "Oh probably at XYZ's place" is a much more straightforward and common process.
- fsckboy 3y ago
  > Police need a warrant if the information they gather is to be admissible in court as evidence against a person. Police do not need a warrant to save the life of a person.
- neoromantique 3y ago
  I don't know the processes in US, but in Europe I saw this in action first hand done in minutes, so I don't know. edit: Over a stolen phone, no less, not even a person being in danger.
  - paxys 3y ago
    In the US the process is you go to the police to report a stolen phone and they say "tough luck, hope you had insurance".
- AmericanChopper 3y ago
  I have some family who are dispatchers (not in the US), and they have the ability to immediately get location data directly from providers if they think somebody is in imminent danger. They can’t do it to track a suspect (not without a warrant), but they would regularly do it for suspected suicides, or when a caller communicated they were in danger but failed to give their location for what ever reason. I wouldn’t be surprised if many jurisdictions around the world had similar systems.
  - soared 3y ago
    That’s for the person who is actively calling 911 though, not a random persons phone.
    - AmericanChopper 3y ago
      In the cases I’m familiar with it was often used for other people calling in suspected suicide attempts (or other types of self harm, or drug overdoses, ect…)
      - trogdor 3y ago
        I am a reporter who covers crime. Your account is 100% accurate. Federal law allows for the disclosure of customer records “to a governmental entity, if the provider, in good faith, believes that an emergency involving danger of death or serious physical injury to any person requires disclosure without delay of information relating to the emergency.” 5 U.S.C § 2703(c).
- drexlspivey 3y ago
  But they said themselves that they pinged his phone.
  - paxys 3y ago
    They may have done both. Or they may be lying. In most cases it's best to assume that the police won't give you any info unless they are compelled to do so (and sometimes not even then).
- sidewndr46 3y ago
  Police need a warrant to demand that data. Nothing stops the provider from handing it over willingly.
  - ROTMetro 3y ago
    Hopefully this new 'the Government can't compel companies' trial shuts this down as well https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36614678 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36614678 Either corporations are allowed to be 'pressured' by the government or they aren't. But of course the legal system will make themselves a nice carveout for their uses like always.
    - hackmiester 3y ago
      It won't shut it down. The cops aren't compelling or pressuring the providers to give the info. They're just doing it.
Kirby64 3y ago
Seems much more likely that his sister knew the friend, and suggested he might be there? Or there was some relation to the friend to know the exact address. Unless he lived at a single-family house, it's unlikely a phone's GPS would be exact enough.
orangepurple 3y ago
You experienced a type 0 SMS. It can wake the GPS on a modern phone and return a GPS location. Last time I checked cell tower triangulation is accurate to between a few hundred and a few thousand feet. Cellular A-GPS can be good to within a few feet inside houses usually but often its within a few tens of feet in accuracy.
- mcpackieh 3y ago
  > Last time I checked cell tower triangulation is accurate to between a few hundred and a few thousand feet That was about what LTE could do. With 4G, they got it down to 20-50 meters. Now they can do much better.

Seems like much more work. Based on the stories I've seen about these operations to track down phones over the years, it's a little more complicated

paxys 3y ago

Police need a warrant to get location data from your cell phone provider. No department is bothering with that for a welfare check unless the situation is really dire, and the process still takes a while to carry out. "Where do you think your brother is?" "Oh probably at XYZ's place" is a much more straightforward and common process.

fsckboy 3y ago
> Police need a warrant if the information they gather is to be admissible in court as evidence against a person. Police do not need a warrant to save the life of a person.
neoromantique 3y ago
I don't know the processes in US, but in Europe I saw this in action first hand done in minutes, so I don't know. edit: Over a stolen phone, no less, not even a person being in danger.
- paxys 3y ago
  In the US the process is you go to the police to report a stolen phone and they say "tough luck, hope you had insurance".
AmericanChopper 3y ago
I have some family who are dispatchers (not in the US), and they have the ability to immediately get location data directly from providers if they think somebody is in imminent danger. They can’t do it to track a suspect (not without a warrant), but they would regularly do it for suspected suicides, or when a caller communicated they were in danger but failed to give their location for what ever reason. I wouldn’t be surprised if many jurisdictions around the world had similar systems.
- soared 3y ago
  That’s for the person who is actively calling 911 though, not a random persons phone.
  - AmericanChopper 3y ago
    In the cases I’m familiar with it was often used for other people calling in suspected suicide attempts (or other types of self harm, or drug overdoses, ect…)
    - trogdor 3y ago
      I am a reporter who covers crime. Your account is 100% accurate. Federal law allows for the disclosure of customer records “to a governmental entity, if the provider, in good faith, believes that an emergency involving danger of death or serious physical injury to any person requires disclosure without delay of information relating to the emergency.” 5 U.S.C § 2703(c).
drexlspivey 3y ago
But they said themselves that they pinged his phone.
- paxys 3y ago
  They may have done both. Or they may be lying. In most cases it's best to assume that the police won't give you any info unless they are compelled to do so (and sometimes not even then).
sidewndr46 3y ago
Police need a warrant to demand that data. Nothing stops the provider from handing it over willingly.
- ROTMetro 3y ago
  Hopefully this new 'the Government can't compel companies' trial shuts this down as well https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36614678 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36614678 Either corporations are allowed to be 'pressured' by the government or they aren't. But of course the legal system will make themselves a nice carveout for their uses like always.
  - hackmiester 3y ago
    It won't shut it down. The cops aren't compelling or pressuring the providers to give the info. They're just doing it.

Kirby64 3y ago

Seems much more likely that his sister knew the friend, and suggested he might be there? Or there was some relation to the friend to know the exact address. Unless he lived at a single-family house, it's unlikely a phone's GPS would be exact enough.

orangepurple 3y ago

You experienced a type 0 SMS. It can wake the GPS on a modern phone and return a GPS location. Last time I checked cell tower triangulation is accurate to between a few hundred and a few thousand feet. Cellular A-GPS can be good to within a few feet inside houses usually but often its within a few tens of feet in accuracy.

mcpackieh 3y ago
> Last time I checked cell tower triangulation is accurate to between a few hundred and a few thousand feet That was about what LTE could do. With 4G, they got it down to 20-50 meters. Now they can do much better.