
Secret life of phones: how one contacted 315 servers a day - thinkling
http://www.channel4.com/news/phone-mobile-data-24-hours-apps-security-secret
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thinkling
I wish they'd give a transcript of what they actually did during the day, what
apps they actually started by hand, what happened without user action
initiating it, and so on.

It'd certainly be useful to know more about the activity while the end user is
idle. Not only for privacy reasons but also since you sometimes (e.g. when
roaming) want to strictly limit data traffic.

~~~
mathattack
Maybe someone could write an app for this. :-) And better yet, put the
transcript in plain English.

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DanielBMarkham
The really crazy part of this is that this article is restricted to simple
internet traffic that can be traced. There's as much -- or more -- information
available at the transport layer, which can include where you are, who you
call, how long you're on the phone, and so on. Then there's reading of MAC
addresses from the phone's WiFi passively and tracking folks down to the sub-
meter level than way.

The modern cell phone is one of the pinnacles of mankind: it is able to tag,
track, and monitor the individual's thoughts and actions on a level never
dreamed of by science fiction writers.

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Codhisattva
Title is deceptive. ONE test Android phone did this and much of the traffic
was related to one app.

~~~
thinkling
Fair criticism on the title; I weakened it and made it specific to Android.
[Edit: op edited subject after I did.]

Your comment about the one app (Talking Tom) isn't quite accurate. Most of the
times the phone sent its IMEI, this was due to Talking Tom. But the sheer
number of servers contacted is unrelated to that app--and there was no testing
of how many other apps that weren't installed would have sent the IMEI.

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sleepyK
This is why my Android phone is rooted and uses Xprivacy to control app
permissions.

Though I still have no control over all the information Google itself leeches
using it's own framework.... which is sad.

~~~
chestnut-tree
This article, if true, reveals even more invasive measures from Google

 _" Google takes its tracking into the real world"_
[http://digiday.com/platforms/google-
tracking/](http://digiday.com/platforms/google-tracking/)

Just as depressing as the story however is the lack of scrutiny of online
companies on privacy matters. Google arguably tracks and records online
behaviour with far greater capability than any other online company. Yet
Google gets an easy ride on privacy issues from the tech community.

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philip1209
Sticking a VPN on a smartphone then sniffing the traffic always yields a
surprising number of ad requests in the background.

~~~
ancarda
I once put a proxy in front of an HN client for iOS. Every time I tapped on
something or performed an action, it would send at-least 10+ requests to
various analytics firms. This included locking my phone. Additionally, almost
every private key was transmitted in the clear, over HTTP. Nothing was
encrypted, not even the connection to HN.

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neil_s
Am I the only one who found this incredibly uninformative and sensationalist?
Their 'special device', just a wireless proxy, measured 350,000 requests,
which to someone who doesn't know how many dozens of requests loading an
average webpage would make, might be frightening. Every level you win on Candy
Crush, and every profile picture loaded on Facebook would be a request. The
number of requests mean nothing. I'm going to stop myself from continuing to
rant because there's too much to be said about this video. Their aim seems to
be to frighten, not inform, people.

~~~
kaolinite
The number of requests is irrelevant from a privacy perspective, but it does
mean one thing - reduced battery life. Making 30,000 requests when the phone
is idle over just 45 minutes is a good way to kill the battery.

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rsync
My MOTO FONE (Motorola F3) contacts zero servers per day while idle.

~~~
makmanalp
I had one of these too! I finally caved and got a Nokia N9. Before that, I had
my F3 and an iPod touch together. All in all, sadly, the convenience of a
smartphone beats the ridiculous durability and talk time of the F3.

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nyar
I got Xprivacy on my android so it doesn't affect me. Before that I had
Pdroid. These things don't affect me because I take privacy in my own hands.

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bitwize
FYI man, you can sit at home and do absolutely NOTHING -- and your name goes
through like 17 computers a DAY, man.

