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A comment on Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smartphone Case. Parent comment

Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by raldi on Friday August 26, 2016 @12:36PM (#12367392)
They're trying to build something that can detect when GPS is on, to protect against phones secretly recording their owners' locations even while in airplane mode.

If it were me, though, I'd just drop the phone into a potato-chip bag.

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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by gjkood on Friday August 26, 2016 @12:52PM (#12367517)
Or one of these Faraday Cage bags. I wonder if anyone has independently tested these for emissions leakage.

https://www.amazon.com/Faraday-EMP-BLACKOUT®-Prepping-Smartp...

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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by dnh44 on Friday August 26, 2016 @01:09PM (#12367660)
Those look remarkably like some anti-static bags that we bought by the thousands in China for less than a dollar a piece. I'll check on Tuesday and post back here.
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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by dnh44 on Tuesday August 30, 2016 @12:02PM (#12391300)
Well I've tried the bags we have at the office and while they do indeed look the same my phone has no trouble staying connected while inside the bag.
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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by gjkood on Friday August 26, 2016 @01:40PM (#12367886)
I just spent a week in the Shenzhen Huaqiang Bei electronic malls and I couldn't agree with you more about the pricing. You can do so much better being there physically and negotiating the hell out of things.
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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by duskwuff on Friday August 26, 2016 @02:12PM (#12368129)
Read the reviews. Multiple users report cell phones working perfectly fine while inside the bag.

As noted by dnh44, these are almost certainly bog-standard antistatic bags, which are not intended to provide any kind of RF shielding.

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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by gjkood on Friday August 26, 2016 @03:03PM (#12368506)
As all things we buy on the internet, if it seems to be too good to be true... Hence my comment about independent testing/review of such products.

However the concept of Faraday Cages is not new. There are vendors catering to the Law Enforcement market that make these bags to prevent tampering of evidence on confiscated devices.

You just have to find the right ones. I was just showing examples of such products available online.

Caveat Emptor.

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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by Theodores on Friday August 26, 2016 @05:23PM (#12369416)
The potato chip bag option would have plausible deniability. I would go for a whole lunch bag with sandwich in genuine tin foil as mylar film doesn't seem that thick to me.

Plausible deniability is really important if one expects to be frisked. Traveling in something like cycling gear could be part of the disguise, you can go through special gates at train stations and not be ticket inspected by machine. Nobody expects the guy in fluorescent clothing travelling at 15 mph.

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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by krastanov on Friday August 26, 2016 @01:37PM (#12367864)
GPS locators are passive: only receiving signals, not emitting them.
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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by raldi on Friday August 26, 2016 @01:46PM (#12367930)
A entire section of the article is devoted to this topic. Ctrl-F "GPS Introspection".
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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by johansch on Friday August 26, 2016 @05:03PM (#12369284)
You can't really get massive global PR with a potato-chip bag though.
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Re:Bunnie Huang and Edward Snowden’s Malware-Detecting Smart... by e12e on Friday August 26, 2016 @07:00PM (#12369905)
Freedom crisps.
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