
Government planes mimic cellphone towers to collect user data - erkose
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/14/government-planes-mimic-cellphone-towers-to-collect-user-data-report
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dang
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8604626](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8604626)

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dsl
This same platform (SHENANIGANS) developed by the NSA that is deployed by the
CIA aboard drones to locate individuals for targeted strikes.

I generally support the mission of the US intelligence community, but it seems
my greatest fear is coming true: domestic law enforcement wants to play with
the cool toys too. As a result the line between foreign intelligence and
domestic law enforcement becomes even more blurred.

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javert
> I generally support the mission of the US intelligence community

We no longer have the freedoms the US intelligence community is supposed to be
defending. They have already failed us.

edit: Sure, we have _some_ freedoms, but they are vestigial. In principle, we
do not. This is obvious with respect to not being subject to warrantless
search and seizure: we officially live in an Orwellian surveillance society.
But our freedoms are (less obviously) withering in all other areas as well.

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bthornbury
If government planes are able to mimic industry cell phone towers, I can only
assume hackers can do it too.

I'll be paranoid every time my 4G slows down for no reason now.

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bjornsing
UMTS/LTE (GSMA 3G/4G) has strong mutual authentication, so is generally harder
to attack without collaboration from the mobile operator. What should really
worry you is when your phone switches over to Edge (GSMA 2G) for no good
reason. There's no mutual authentication there(!) so it's trivial for an
attacker to impersonate your mobile operator...

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acd
Pretty sure they tap into Apple location, Google location and cell phones that
registers to fake cells.

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seymores
Have we all given up?

