I'd argue that if someone wants to get a flip phone for privacy reasons they should be able to not download shady apps and give them permissions without thinking.
Flip phones have some of the best protections available: the sensors aren't there. You can't leak your location if there is no GPS module in your phone, you can't have your camera hacked if there is no camera and so on.
I'd prefer all this stuff came with physical switches so it can be enabled/disabled in a hack-proof manner.
You can't leak your location if there is no GPS module in your phone
While not as precise, you can definitively leak your location by scanning for the surrounding cell towers, especially in a city, which usually have hundreds or thousands of them (Manhattan alone has eleven, for example). I used to run a Python script on my Nokia phone that logged the tower ID, and I could reliable tell when I got to work, home, etc.
And that's just for people who control your phone. Your operator has U-TDOA¹, which is typically accurate to 50m.
jacquesm|9 years ago
I'd prefer all this stuff came with physical switches so it can be enabled/disabled in a hack-proof manner.
icebraining|9 years ago
While not as precise, you can definitively leak your location by scanning for the surrounding cell towers, especially in a city, which usually have hundreds or thousands of them (Manhattan alone has eleven, for example). I used to run a Python script on my Nokia phone that logged the tower ID, and I could reliable tell when I got to work, home, etc.
And that's just for people who control your phone. Your operator has U-TDOA¹, which is typically accurate to 50m.
The camera part is true, but tape is cheap :)
¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-TDOA
uph|9 years ago
What's your threat model? https://ssd.eff.org/en/module/introduction-threat-modeling
For most people mass surveillance is a more realistic threat than the NSA hacking their camera.