Posted on 02/22/2010 12:29:24 PM PST by nickcarraway
Law enforcement is tracking Americans' cell phones in real time—without the benefit of a warrant.
Amid all the furor over the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program a few years ago, a mini-revolt was brewing over another type of federal snooping that was getting no public attention at all. Federal prosecutors were seeking what seemed to be unusually sensitive records: internal data from telecommunications companies that showed the locations of their customers' cell phones—sometimes in real time, sometimes after the fact. The prosecutors said they needed the records to trace the movements of suspected drug traffickers, human smugglers, even corrupt public officials. But many federal magistrates—whose job is to sign off on search warrants and handle other routine court duties—were spooked by the requests. Some in New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas balked. Prosecutors "were using the cell phone as a surreptitious tracking device," said Stephen W. Smith, a federal magistrate in Houston. "And I started asking the U.S. Attorney's Office, 'What is the legal authority for this? What is the legal standard for getting this information?' "
Those questions are now at the core of a constitutional clash between President Obama's Justice Department and civil libertarians alarmed by what they see as the government's relentless intrusion into the private lives of citizens. There are numerous other fronts in the privacy wars—about the content of e-mails, for instance, and access to bank records and credit-card transactions. The Feds now can quietly get all that information. But cell-phone tracking is among the more unsettling forms of government surveillance, conjuring up Orwellian images of Big Brother secretly following your movements through the small device in your pocket.
How many of the owners of the country's 277 million cell phones even know that companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint can track their devices in real time?
(Excerpt) Read more at newsweek.com ...
I honestly don’t know.
YOu are right about where you are but I was referring to the “who called.”
Whoever monitors my whereabouts is going to be bored to tears.
I say bring it on.
Buy a prepaid, simple phone (mine was $9.99 Tracfone).
Don’t turn it on until you want to make a call.
Problem solved.
You can turn the GPS “off”, however law enforcement can still override that.
“The only way to be secure when carrying a cell phone is to remove the battery.”
That is correct. One US Goernment facility where I worked required that cell phones either have the battery removed or left outside the perimeter.
So some kind of communication is going on passively.
Anyone else notice similar phenomenon?
The IPhone doesn’t have a removable battery.
If the phone is turned on, it will communicate with the nearby cell tower periodically. The resulting interference with some electronic devices is especially noticeable in GSM phones (i.e. AT&T, T-mobile).
In your case, the piano is not sufficiently shielded to avoid reject the interference. I also hear it through speakerphones all the time. It is reportedly a real problem for some hearing aids, which are so small that sufficient shielding is impossible.
If someone rarely does that, then one day they do, that is a tip off they are up to something. It can be much more incriminating than leaving the cell phone on, sitting in front of a TV.
Buy either an internet tablet or an old PocketPC/Palm Pilot with Wifi capabilities on Ebay.
I’ve noticed the problem if I put it too close to my computer speakers, or the stereo in my car. I’ve also noticed it on wireless mics if the speaker puts the mic transmitter near a cell phone.
I don’t think you can remove the battery from Ipods.
“All land line calls are tracked”
Might as well be tracking buggy whips too! (Who needs a land line anymore?)
I think that even if your option is turned off, as long as your cell has power and can receive, that can be overridden.
I think your right. I suppose one could remove the battery from their cell phone while doing their dastardly deeds and not be tracked.
Why not just buy a throw away? No phone, no records of who was called, or originated the call.
I think they call the tracking device for landlines a phone book.
This is why pay phones are so rare...
I still use my landline exclusively when I am home. My cell doesn’t work well at home, I can have phones in different rooms, and I can use a decent sized phone instead of some little thing.
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