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A comment on What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You. Parent comment

Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by Fnoord on Monday February 16, 2026 @12:41PM (#47037859)
Don't worry about Tesla's being tracked. Via Bluetooth this has existed for at least 7 years [1] (was mentioned on HN as well). Tesla know (also for 7 years), Musk doesn't care 'since license plates can also be tracked'.

I used it in train stations, and get hits when passing highways via train or bus. Esp. fun if you stand still due to traffic lights or traffic jam, since you can try to get a visual.

The only lesson to be learned here is that it allowed one to learn in 2019 Musk is overrated. But you can also learn that lesson from the book The PayPal Wars which predates this by 15 years.

> I believe shopping malls often use such signals (wifi, bluetooth) to track what your travel pattern through the mall is. They know what section of the store you spend most of your time in and what storefronts you stall at.

Not allowed in EU.

[1] https://www.teslaradar.com/

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by xaldir on Monday February 16, 2026 @03:45PM (#47040095)
> Not allowed in EU.

I'm surprised, I know for a fact that some stores definitely have the ability to do that on their hardware.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by m-s-y on Monday February 16, 2026 @07:28PM (#47042153)
and i can commit crimes with my kitchen knives, yet they’re still legal
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by thenthenthen on Monday February 16, 2026 @08:17PM (#47042503)
Utrecht Central Station does this, there are stickers at the entrance notifying the ‘public’ of this. Or its just a sticker;p
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by Fnoord on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @09:26AM (#47047826)
Only under strict rules, i.e. anonymized one way hash not relatable to a legal person. It isn't allowed to track a person that way.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by sneak on Monday February 16, 2026 @08:59PM (#47042789)
It’s done in Europe’s second busiest airport, Amsterdam Schiphol. I saw the advisory signs (so they can pretend that you gave informed consent by walking out of the jetbrige) up just last week.

https://media.licdn.com/dms/image/v2/D4D12AQHCyctOFz_EJg/art...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by Fnoord on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @09:22AM (#47047778)
The URL which explains the technicalities [1].

[1] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-wi-fi-bluetooth-tracking...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by nandomrumber on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @01:34AM (#47044364)
> Not allowed

This phrasing needs to die.

Not allowed is something your parents imposed on you when you were a child.

You’re not allowed to have an ice cream, or you’re not allowed to hang out with that boy.

Laws don’t not allow anything, they only sometimes impose penalties if you’re caught breaking them.

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Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by palata on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @04:27AM (#47045383)
> This phrasing needs to die.

If we're being annoying about language for no valid reason, I would say that a "phrasing" cannot "die", because a "phrasing" is not a living creature.

> Laws don’t not allow anything, they only sometimes impose penalties if you’re caught breaking them.

How does it work with your parents? Do they cast a spell that prevents you from hanging out with that boy? Nobody was "allowed" to smoke, and yet...

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Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by nandomrumber on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @07:53AM (#47046976)
Fortunately for me, words are allowed to have more than one meaning.

die /dī/

intransitive verb

2. To cease existing, especially by degrees; fade.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by palata on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @08:26AM (#47047266)
I explicitly said I was being annoying for no valid reason. If you want to justify something here, you should probably justify that you weren't annoying for no valid reason.

Does your dictionary say that "not allowed" is specific to parents and children?

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by nandomrumber on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @12:40PM (#47050373)
From the HN guidelines:

Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by palata on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @05:21PM (#47054263)
Thank you! That's exactly what you did not do. The strongest plausible interpretation of "not allowed in Europe" was perfectly fine.

I'm glad we agree.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by nandomrumber on Wednesday February 18, 2026 @04:16PM (#47066522)
> That's exactly what you did not do.

Heh, yeah, you do have a point there.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:What Your Bluetooth Devices Reveal About You by Fnoord on Tuesday February 17, 2026 @06:03PM (#47054700)
I consider businesses who do this to track customers naughty, and I find their behaviour childish (scriptkiddie level). Therefore, 'not allowed' is exactly the phrasing I like to use in this context, and readers are expected to understand this refers to legal status.

You should also consider not everyone on HN is a native speaker, and consider to focus on the content of posts instead of minor tangents.

[ Parent | on HN ]