HOW DOES IT WORK?

 

Most of your toys require an Internet connection to update their software. This is an ideal vector for hackers to attack you. Malicious software, secretly installed on your home computer, could easily load itself into your mobile device the next time you plug it in for an update. Your phone or GPS could be secretly converted into a spy that tells some shadowy third party everything he could ever need to know to steal your identity.

The GPS packed into your smartphone, installed in your dashboard, or mounted on your windshield keeps track of your location by using you as the pinnacle of an upside-down pyramid with three or four satellites forming the corners at the “base.” The more satellites there are keeping track of you, the more accurate the GPS signal is, down to about ten feet. If you’ve got GPS, you probably don’t even remember how you got anywhere without it. You have vague memories of printing out maps from the Internet or—horror of horrors—getting bizarre directions over the phone from your stupidest friends. But this must be the product of a fever-driven nightmare.

When you’re in an unfamiliar city, GPS is worth its weight in gold, but that convenience is a two-way street. In order to supply you with maps and directions, the system must be aware of your position. Consumer GPS signal is almost never encrypted. If your GPS system is turned on, whether you’re using it or not, someone else could be using it to track you.

That’s only the easiest and most obvious way to track you. Cellular networks are a rough grid of interlocking hexagons or circles with a cell tower at the center of each. Because the cells interlock and overlap, you can move from the coverage of one tower to the coverage of another without interruption in your service. This also allows cell towers to triangulate your position. When your phone is turned on, it communicates constantly with any nearby cell towers. If a government agency has locked onto your phone, they will always be able to determine your position, within 150 feet or so—accurate enough for a sniper to find you. Any device that connects to a cell network or wirelessly to the Internet can be tracked like this. The only thing that varies is the distance at which the tracking can be performed and the accuracy of the location.