Re:Location-based ads are growing
by supbitcoin on Monday March 05, 2018 @12:22AM
(#16518943)
I don't get it, how would you identifity someone with their wifi turned on ?
Re:Location-based ads are growing
by dillondoyle on Wednesday March 07, 2018 @05:56PM
(#16540763)
And bluetooth beacons (which you can get geo position without having to pair) are uniquely identifiable and used by almost all big box stores..
If the WiFi is on, you broadcast your MAC, which is uniquely identifiable unless you root your phone and install software to change this fact.
IIRC current android and iOS devices will probe Wifi using a randomized MAC and only use the real mac once connecting for realsies.
researchers found that "the overwhelming majority of
Android devices are not implementing the available
randomization capabilities built into the Android OS,"
which makes such Android devices trivial to track.
[...]
Apple, meanwhile, introduced MAC address randomization in
iOS 8, only to break it in iOS 10. [...] its network probe
broadcasts to include a distinct Information Element (IE),
data added to Wi-Fi management frames to extend the Wi-Fi
protocol.
four scholars from the US Naval Academy say they've
managed to track 100% of all test smartphones, despite
the devices using randomized MAC addresses.
[...]
The novelty in our method is that we are sending RTS
frames to IEEE 802.11 client devices, not APs, to
extract a CTS response message which we derive the true
global MAC address of that device.
unpaired bluetooth and unconnected wifi are gold for anyone wanting to track you around a space.