“It said they don’t use GPS and don’t track your location. Then how would they know if I’ve been close to somebody else who they also don’t track?”
Bluetooth.
Bingo. Turn it off.
“Bingo. Turn it off.”
Easier. Do nothing.
Turning off bluetooth is not the same as turning off bluetooth and wifi scanning.
These are features that allow apps to use bluetooth and wifi information to more accurately determine your position, so you can get more relevant ads, no doubt.
Settings to disable scanning are in different places in Android depending on your phone model, and some do not allow the option.
Nefarious actors (China, Google, your favorite stupid game app) can use bluetooth scanning to locate and track your movements with far greater accuracy than GPS alone. Not only were you at the mall at x.x W, y.y N, but you were in front of the bluetooth beacon in the Eddie Bauer rack on the second level of Penney’s for 7 minutes and 33 seconds. Oddly enough, Private Johnson’s fitbit and General Discharge’s Samsung watch were both there at the same time for the same amount of time - three times this week.
Building a 3D map of all the paths in a building and a metadata file of all the people nearby, when, where, and with what frequency can yield a treasure trove of information that would cost the lives of untold numbers of Humint assets. Big problem with the Chinese drones and apps that go with them.
Earlier this spring/summer, Android rolled out the Covid tracking update which wasn’t particularly highlighted, but I have avoided on my devices for all the above reasons.
They *say* they aren’t tracking you and the data is anonymized. And that *may* be true, for now. But when has the camel ever been satisfied with just a sniff under the canvas?