This software protects your data using bank-grade encryption to keep your online activity private. To use public Wi-Fi while protecting your privacy, it’s a good idea to connect with a VPN like McAfee’s Safe Connect VPN. That Wi-Fi provider will then record your location whenever you’re in range of one of its hot spots. When using public Wi-Fi, the provider commonly asks you to agree to location tracking. Your device automatically scans Wi-Fi access points nearby and notes the signal strength. Public Wi-FiĪ smartphone that has Wi-Fi enabled communicates with nearby Wi-Fi networks even if it’s not connected to one. It pinpoints the phone’s location within a 300-meter area. This technology was developed to help 911 operators locate callers. Cell carriers can calculate the general area of your phone by measuring the time it takes for a signal to travel back and forth.Ĭarriers use cell tower triangulation for a more accurate reading, which combines location data from three cell towers. When you use your phone, signals travel back and forth to the nearest cell tower. The United States has more than 307,000 cell towers. Here are four ways that your phone could be tracked: Cell towers If you have an Android phone and the Find My Device app, you can log in to your Google account and use Google Maps to check your phone’s location history. For example, the Find My iPhone app uses Bluetooth to help you find an iPhone even if it’s offline. You may have used some of these yourself to find a lost or stolen phone. Whether you have an iOS or Android phone, there are ways it can be tracked even if location services are turned off. This article explains how your phone can be tracked and what you can do to enhance your mobile security. However, a smartphone can still be tracked through other techniques that reveal its general location. ![]() This is important if you don’t want third parties knowing where you are or being able to track your movement. Turning off the location service on your phone can help conceal your location. ![]() But what if you don’t want your phone to be tracked? Can the phone be located if you turn off location services ? The answer is yes, it’s possible to track mobile phones even if location services are turned off. But the revelation that the agency has developed a technique that apparently enables it to monitor thousands of cellphones-even when turned off-is likely to only inflame civil liberties groups’ concerns, prompting further questions about the full extent of the agency’s spying efforts.Your smartphone comes with built-in location services, which are useful if you lose it or if you use an app that needs to know your location. The NSA says that a vast database that it maintains on phone calls made by millions of Americans does not include location data. In recent weeks, the NSA’s surveillance programs-both domestic and international-have been the subject of intense scrutiny following a series of leaked secret documents. firm SS8, which sells “lawful interception” tools to help governments conduct surveillance of communications. The update drained users’ batteries and was eventually exposed by researchers, who identified that it had apparently been designed by U.S. In 2009, for instance, thousands of BlackBerry users in the United Arab Emirates were targeted with spyware that was disguised as a legitimate update. Though difficult, the mass targeting of populations with Trojan spyware is possible-and not unheard of. The NSA may have resorted to a similar method in Iraq, albeit on a much larger scale by infecting thousands of users at one time. In 2006, it was reported that the FBI had deployed spyware to infect suspects’ mobile phones and record data even when they were turned off. In most cases, when you turn your phone off-even if you do not remove the battery-it will stop communicating with nearby cell towers and can be traced only to the location it was in when it was powered down. But to spy on phones when they are turned off, agencies would usually have to infect the handset with a Trojan that would force it to continue emitting a signal if the phone is in standby mode, unless the battery is removed. ![]() It is not explained in the report exactly how this technique worked.
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