Publicly available Cellphone triangulation.

Now this was some funky news in the news paper a few days ago.
I was both shocked and in a hurry to get my cellphone disconnected after reading it

An article in the newspaper stated that the belgian cellphone providers are done testing and getting ready to make public a system where you can send an SMS with someone's Cellphone number and you'll get the persons location sent back to you after a minute or so, resolution of up to a few meters.

Up to now, cellphone triangulation has been a nice tool for police and other goverment agency's to track people or find people in dispair in case they have a cellphone with them.

Now the belgian cellphone company's are opening this up to the public so everyone can use it.

I wonder how long it'll last seeing this is without a doubt one of the biggest violations of privacy you can imagine.

Any thoughts on this? Shouldn't this be and stay priveleged tools for lawenforcement and other goverment agency's?

Any news on this being publicly implemented in other nations around the world?

hey ,if the government can track you why should they be the only ones allowed to do it.make the technology public and track them,then see how they like it.if anyone anywhere could track you by your cell phone maybe you would think twice about where you are and what you are doing.just turn the phone off if you dont want to be tracked.

U ppl live under a rock or something..In Finland that have been in use over a year and so. Emergency personnel use it to find lost people and common people can check for example, where their wives are when they are at work etc
And the whole technic is pretty simple.You just use 3 gsm antennas to triangular the position of a cell phone. Gps is used somewhat at same principle if i have understood it correctly..
-ap

For what are you holding me dude. I know this is old tech, I've been using it for quite some time.

This tech has no place in the public imho. Phonetaps and tracking of people can't be done without a warent, for the reason that its a violation of privacy.

Not this tech would be publicly available, whoever wants to know where you are can do so if you dare take you phone with you.

With GPS, you need to have a GPS tracker on you to be able to be tracked.

With this, you can't take your phone with you without whoever wants it knowing where you are.

So you'd have to trade in your freedom to go where you want when you want how you want for the freedom to have your own phone with you whenever you want, where you want and how you want?

They should at least have the system made so that when someone requests a tracking, the person that is being tracked gets an SMS to ask if its ok to send his location. So that he can decline it if he wants to.

And for law enforcement and rescue workers, this could still be done normaly without needing verification of the owner of the cellphone, with a warrent.

Noone has the right to check on where you are without you having the choice to alow it.

There is a system that if someone tries to track you, you will be sent a message where you either agree that people may track you or disagree..and you will be allways notified when this happens.

btw. did you know that if you input a certain code before the phone number and dial to it, you can listen what the microphone in the phone "hears"..like if it�s in someones pocket you can just listen what�s happening around him and target person won�t have a clue. It�s used by police primaly and i haven�t tested it myself so can�t be 100% sure.
-ap

To spare you from reading older posts of mine.

Yes I know of all and any of the digital and electronic gadgetry and methods there are in police and forenzic research. I'm part of a cybercrimes unit in belgium, specialized in digital and electronic surveilance and tracking.

What I'm saying is that the sales plan here is currently like I said in the first post. You send SMS and bang you get location, there is no word on the trackee getting to verify.

I for one need my solitude sometimes, but I always have my sence of duty and have my phone with me in case I'm needed. If someone wants to call me, no problem, if its someone on the whitelist on my phone at that time, I'll answer. But even if you answer, the other person still doesn't know where you are if you don't tell them.

But if you got a cellphone with you and people can just track you without even talking to you, that just doesn't go with me.

Kinda scary stuff ! Hmmm I dont know what to say, cos it could be used for good as in keeping location on your children, however who is to say that pedophileas cant use this......Hmmmm.

In addition, with this technology there is a problem...The location sent back is only as good if the person is carrying the phone. Some people just leave them in a safe place/....NOT SO GOOD ! still interesting

Originally posted by aape
btw. did you know that if you input a certain code before the phone number and dial to it, you can listen what the microphone in the phone "hears"..like if it�s in someones pocket you can just listen what�s happening around him and target person won�t have a clue. It�s used by police primaly and i haven�t tested it myself so can�t be 100% sure.
-ap

And that code would be what? Initial searches came up mostly empty except:

www.textually.org...