Cell phones show human movement predictable 93% of the time

arstechnica.com...

researchers looked at customer location data culled from cellular service providers. By looking at how customers moved around, the authors of the study found that it may be possible to predict human movement patterns and location up to 93 percent of the time. These findings may be useful in multiple fields, including city planning, mobile communication resource management, and anticipating the spread of viruses.

Interestingly I couldn't find anything in the article the indicated that they got permission to collect this data.

I wonder how long cellular carriers keep this data archived? In these days of inexpensive backup storage, I see no reason that they wouldn't keep it indefinitely. So just think, they could go back perhaps years to tell where you were on any given day, who you called, what sms you sent, etc. Thoughts?

It's predictable under predictable circumstances. It would likely be somewhat less predictable under unusual circumstances. Most people naturally do a routine most of the time. Creatures of habit.

And thanks to the Patriot Act, all this information and tracking capability can easily be given over to law enforcement or federal agencies.

I guess I'm just pissed off that cell phones have GPS in the first place. It's bound to be abused given enough time...

Just another step closer to Big Brother watching us. So far we have Genetic ID, Phone call monitoring, Voice printing technology, Computer records, Credit reporting agencies,Interpol connections, Laser and optical scanners and if anyone has noticed our environmental laws and the war on drugs has also lessened our freedom. I still find it surprising when the less aware public are "shocked and appalled" when they find out their being monitored, Yet they fail to see how much of their privacy is already being invaded. Oh well, End of the worlds being coming for awhile now, I say party!!

We've been tracked for years, the cellphone company know the immediate area you make a call or text from due to the mast, text messages are saved on their system but not sure the length of time, I've no idea about GPS.
8 years ago I was on Jury service and the court case involved a text message that was incriminating against the defendant, all this went to court a year after the offence, for 3 days we had to sit and listen to the technicalities of how a phone signal is received and how you can be located due to the nearest mast, boring stuff but at least it made me aware to be careful what I text!
Somebody somewhere is reading your texts right now lol!

Originally posted by findlesticks
Somebody somewhere is reading your texts right now lol!

Yup, and service providers do indeed store them for a certain amount of time before they are completely wiped. The formal name is ESI (Electronically stored information). There's been a few instances in the past where ESI has been used as evidence against someone in court. As for how long, I'm not completely sure as it probably depends on the company. It wouldn't be surprising if it was a couple of years though. There's some information on ESI here.

When you think about it, tracking via cell phones is ideal for anyone wishing to keep constant surveillance on the population since it's pretty much considered to be an essential tool for everyday living.


From Wikipedia:

Nineteen Eighty-Four (sometimes unofficially abbreviated to 1984), by George Orwell, published in 1949, is a dystopian novel about the totalitarian regime of the Party, an oligarchical collectivist society where life in the Oceanian province of Airstrip One is a world of perpetual war, pervasive government surveillance, public mind control, and the voiding of citizens' rights.

Sound familiar? If not, from what I see, it will in the years to come.

Originally posted by Ghost in the Machine
End of the worlds being coming for awhile now, I say party!!

I started wondering about this, as soon as I installed that Koredoko App on my iPhone.

Every picture you take on/with your iPhone, can now be shown the location that it was taken - and it works, retroactively - meaning, when I installed the program, it was able to determine the exact coordinates of every picture I'd ever taken (the GPS coords had already been stored, as to where'd I'd been!)

reply to post by Blazer



This has been going on since early 00's.

Its not the phone that tracks you, its the interference from the cell networks signal passing through you and everything else.

www.guardian.co.uk...

Think about this for a second because its going on right now. Develop technology that can read cellphone signals, anything passing through a signal creates interference. Colour the interference on the 3d radar. What do you have, you have an all seeing eye. They can see you right now if they want.

Try blocking a mobile signal from entering your home, its a jailable offence.



You can read about this here if you want...

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 24-2-2010 by XXXN3O]

A possible solution... a combination of Internet Cafes and Telephone Booths of old.

That way, people don't have to carry a cellphone (i.e. trackable device on them) yet always have immediate access to everything they need - of course, they would be able to tell the last place you 'plugged in' to the grid, but that's about it.

Hell, I dunno.

Wow. They worked out everyone is stuck in an office or at home most of their lives. Truly rocket science.

lol

The tracking data for the average wage-slave looks like this:
- home
- slave for wealthy elite master class
- home
- slave for wealthy elite master class
- graveyard

What a breakthrough!

Well, on the iPhone at least, many apps ask to use your current location, whether or not it is relevant to the service provided. Relevant- my gps map feature that gives me turn by turn directions. Not relevent- my radio station or bookreader app-

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/34aba3608dbb.jpeg[/atsimg]

Doing my research i've found they collect this information to sell to advertising and demographic agencies-or any agency for that matter. If you have a jailbroken iPhone there are numerous ways to stay anonymous, from spoofing your location or mac address, to downloading an app that completely blocks transmission of this data. Just browse cydia under "networking" and also "security". I wanted to give you a thorough list, however I can't find the paper I wrote it on and as i'm tethering on a 3g cannot browse cydia at this time, but the apps are not hard to find.

Another good reason to prepare to ditch technology when TSHTF.

reply to post by Blazer


It should be predictable.
Wake up, go to work downtown , go to shop nearby, go eat nearby, go home.
Rinse and repeat the next day.

We can always throw our cellulars out the window. Do we need them with us every day?

[edit on 25-2-2010 by spacebot]

Originally posted by mike_trivisonno
lol

The tracking data for the average wage-slave looks like this:
- home
- slave for wealthy elite master class
- home
- slave for wealthy elite master class
- graveyard

What a breakthrough!

[edit on 25-2-2010 by spacebot]

That's why you have all been brainwashed, I mean taught, that having the newest gadget like an Iphone proves the caliber of person you are. You have all been hoodwinked into not only putting up with this surveillance, but actually PAYING FOR IT. TPTB are making money off their efforts to monitor you at all times. Good thing you bought their stuff!

The only cell phone I have is one I found on the ground once. I have kept that chip through several phones. It is registered to I don't know who, and down here you can buy pay as you go cell phone minutes anonymously. I'm sure you cannot do this in the USSA. Don't you have to show ID to be able to buy a cellphone or a Blackberry? Keep financing their control of you! Good job!

reply to post by CaptChaos


Well, I'll agree and say get all your tech for free if possible. I won't even go into how I obtained my iPhone but it certainly wasn't through apple and I actually use an anonymous prepaid plan with tmobile. I would say this though, we definately SHOULD stay on top of the current technology, and learn to modify it to our needs and to protect ourselves ( bobsuruncle is awesome in this respect, I wish we all could be able to learn the things he can do.) Why pay apple money for their tech? I took a $200 netbook and modded it to dual boot leopard os and win xp for about $90, thereby bypassing the $1000+ price tag apple would have on their product of similar description(actually my netbook is more powerfull than their MacBook pro at this point). And I daresay that you too are being recorded and watched just posting on here unless you were at some sort of Internet cafe that had no surveillence cams ( unlikely). There are ways to anonymize yourself, I encourage everyone to do so. But who knows? Just like we find ways around tech limitations and lack of privacy there are highly paid people working day and night to thwart our every move. Technology is wonderful, but the growing neccessity of it in daily life troubles us all probably.

Well i don't own a mobile so i guess they can't track me Oh well they have hundreds of other ways i guess. Along with this and the celldar technology someone made a thread about i guess there is no point in worrying, it's inevitable in the end.