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Stealth Wear, Coming to a Store Near You
- ams6110 13y agoIf you're going to keep your phone in a Faraday cage pouch, why not simply turn it off?
- pfraze 13y agoThis is arguably a better UX, but for $85, I agree.
- NathanthePie 13y agoSpecifically mentioned in the video: "Some electronics may still be active and power-cycling may take upwards of 30 sec". Then again, you could just do a battery pull. Then again, there might be a cap which keeps the GPS on... Thus it's probably safer to put your phone into a Faraday cage so one doesn't need to worry about trusting hardware manufacturers.
- lobotryas 13y agoUnfortunately many modern smartphones precent you from removing the battery.
- eikenberry 13y agoBecause turning it off doesn't work. You can't fully turn it off without popping the battery out.
- eksith 13y agoThe battery itself may have a transmitter built in if someone else got a hold of it.
- mindslight 13y agoI recall seeing some work on fingerprinting phones that are off by the differences in passive radio signatures of their communication circuits.
- njharman 13y agoWon't "Airplane Mode" prevent phone from radiating any active signal?
- wmf 13y agoIf you believe that airplane mode does what it says, which customers of this product do not.
- Strilanc 13y agoI can easily verify my phone is in a pouch, but I can't easily verify if my phone is really off.
- ars 13y agoUm, what is the use of a shield that blocks signals from going to your cellphone? What is the value of a cellphone inside such a shield? You can never take it out of the shield, and you can never use it.
- mitchty 13y agoThe use is knowing your phone isn't sending or receiving a signal. The value is anonymity with the option of being able to use it when you want. The true value is having a real "off" switch.
- ars 13y ago> The true value is having a real "off" switch. Despite the conspiracy theories, your phone already has an off switch.
- mitchty 13y agoAnd? Doesn't mean this isn't of use, or that I'm reaching for a conspiracy. But a faraday cage to prevent communication might come in handy every now and again.
- srivast 13y agoI think you'd use it to connect to the grid when you want to, make your call and then go off the grid quickly again. It gives the power to you to have a untraceable one-way communication device (if you don't have landlines available ie).
- ars 13y agoAn "untraceable one-way communication device"? Really? It does no such thing. Your phone is completely traceable when on, and it's not one way, and the pouch does nothing because the phone can still record where you are and what you say when in there, and then transmit it later.
- njharman 13y ago
- PilateDeGuerre 13y agoWhat material are they using that creates the Faraday cage effect?
- njharman 13y agoI'd wager a wire mesh.
- matthewbadeau 13y agoA conductive cloth will give the Faraday cage effect.
- ars 13y agoIt's not that easy. I put a cell phone in a metal lunchbox with a metal lid and it still rang when I called it.
- eksith 13y agoThere's one potential issue with this in that all electronic devices these days can store data. It may not be able to transmit while in the pouch, but there's no reason it could store and forward when you next come into rage of a wifi station. We already know malware exists for mobile devices; there's no reason a 0-day exploit can't be implanted to do just that. Besides, it's not just your phone that could be transmitting signals. Whether accidentally or not, pretty much any gadget sophisticated enough to pick up audio may also be transmitting : http://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR/comments/1le3if/so_i_discovered_that_my_hp_laptop_leakstransmits/ http://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR/comments/1le3if/so_i_discover...
- mikegioia 13y agoStore and forward what? The only thing I'd want to prevent my phone from beaming to the mothership is my location. If your phone is inside this Faraday shield then it can't get a GPS location to store. Edit: microphone will still work inside pouch
- tghw 13y agoWhy wouldn't the microphone pick anything up? Sound waves are unaffected by a Faraday cage.
- mikegioia 13y agoYea you're right, I thought the microphone itself wouldn't work but it still does.
- eksith 13y agoStore and forward any audio it picks up. Why stick to GPS when your location can be triangulated by cross referencing the sounds around you? E.G. A fire engine/ambulance, school bus with loud children or garbage truck passing by at a particular time or the voice of someone else who's cell isn't protected and is being monitored. Software to accomplish these things already exist.
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- tristanj 13y agoIf the pouch doesn't work as intended and the phone still has a very weak connection to the tower, the phone will transmit at maximum power, which will just eat through the battery life when sending and receiving data. I can't see this becoming successful if the pouch has this issue.
- lostlogin 13y agoConfirmed. I work next to a Faraday cage and I get almost no signal - none when I need it - and battery life sucks. At weekends I get plenty of life despite using the phone more.
- aviraldg 13y agoAm I the only person who thinks they haven't though the OFF Pocket through? Any phone inside that thing will go from 100% to 0% power in a matter of hours.
- aroch 13y agoShove an RFID patch in it that causes airplane mode to turn on
- switch007 13y agoSo we pay $400+ for these devices every couple of years. But we don't trust the manufacturers nor the carriers. Some are paranoid that they're tracking every detail and transmitting at every opportunity. Yet we continue to buy them? Seeing the picture of the phone in the case, I can't help but think that this is a rather ridiculous state of affairs. If we don't like being tracked, if we don't trust them and if they breach our privacy, why don't we stop using/buying them?
- mindslight 13y agoReread your Kaczynski.
- switch007 13y agoWhat are you trying to say?
- mindslight 13y agoNew technologies are like ratchets. When they become commonplace, it's extremely hard to not participate. Cars were a luxury in 1908, but today (except for a few dense areas), they're a basic necessity. It's certainly possible to not have a mobile phone, it's just not ever going to be a very popular choice.
- andrewljohnson 13y agoSome would ask why we keep using electricity and fossil fuels, when we know we're running out of energy. The answer is that we think we'll arrive at a solution for energy before we run out of oil. And the reason we keep using cellphones is because we believe we'll fix the privacy issues before we become enslaved. Boycotting cellphones would just be boycotting a symptom anyways. Governments have always been corrupted to spy on citizens, every government ever, through any means necessary.
- ars 13y ago> when we know we're running out of energy. This is a side note, but we're not running out of energy, we have enough for at least 10,000 to 100,000 years (depending on the rate of energy use increase). And that is NOT including solar - just nuclear.
- dguido 13y agoThis kind of stuff has been around since 2005: http://difrwear.com/ http://difrwear.com/ If you want to turn off your cellphone... turn off your cellphone. It has an off switch and airplane mode. This kind of protective casing is really only needed for the type of things you can't turn "off" like all the RFID chips embedded in credits card you own (and probably don't even realize you have). Also, this is pretty lol: "Mr. Harvey said that he could not afford to hire an outside firm to extensively test the effectiveness of his products, but that he tested them himself with most of the popular smartphones and major wireless carriers." If you haven't tested it, I doubt it works at all. http://difrwear.com/pages/certifications http://difrwear.com/pages/certifications
- rdtsc 13y agoUnless you take the battery out how do you know your phone is ever off. It doesn't just have hardware toggle button probably. So you'd have to take the battery out. Well then isn't it easier to put it in a Faraday cage than mess with the battery.
- ars 13y agoAnd how exactly do you plan to use your phone? As soon as you take it out it can transmit everything it captured while in there. This thing is useless for a cell phone.
- Sniffnoy 13y agoPeople are talking about cellphones, but another use occurs to me: It could be used to hold RFID cards that one has to use.
- MayankGoyal 13y agoBut if you take your phone out of the packet, your location will be "broadcasted" to the network. That is, everytime you want to make or receive a call, or do anything with your phone, the network will know your location. Flight mode would provide the same level of protection as this and at a much cheaper price.
- MayankGoyal 13y agoUnrelated to the product: Is it possible to throw the tracking off by blocking some cellular towers and only connect to one? Then they have a radius you are in, but not the exact location.
- luckysh0t 13y ago'stealth' & fashion: new levels of hipster martyrdom.
- jjp9999 13y agoCouldn't you just line a ziplock bag with a couple layers of tinfoil? Also, when you put your phone in there it cuts off its WiFi, cellular connection, and 3g/4g, which means your phone is useless while it's in there. You might as well just take the battery out when you don't want to be tracked and save yourself $400.
- inetsee 13y agoOne of the most important reasons I have a cell phone is so that my wife can reach me in an emergency. Disabling that functionality makes this a non-starter for me, even though I hate the idea of my every movement being tracked.