They appear to be devices that mimic mobile phone towers. The feds use them hoping to have the phones of people they’re tracking connect to the device (instead of a real mobile phone tower), and then using signal strength to figure out how far away they are. Do that a few times and you can triangulate someone’s location, even if they’re not making a call, and without having to ask the telcos for any location info (which, so far, they’ve been more than happy to turn over anyway).
Details Emerging On Stingray Technology, Allowing Feds To Locate People By Pretending To Be Cell Towers from Techdirt.
Although you own a cell phone, apparently the feds believe you have no expectation that your cell phone will only connect to the cell towers used by your mobile service provider. Forget surreptitiously planting a GPS tracker on your car, the government can track you via your cell phone, without a warrant, without probable cause and without having to ask a mobile service provider for any data. This is all performed in real-time.
This stingray technology sounds somewhat similar to a man-in-the-middle attack but instead of malicious attackers accessing your mobile device its the government. As our liberties and privacy continue to erode thanks to the police state our government seems to be migrating towards, is it any surprise the feds are using these types of tactics?
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