It is scary knowing that others, that you don’t know, are able to track you via Bluetooth.
It never crossed my mind”, an individual the Bose has identified through their headphones says.
Right now somewhere in the world, someone is wearing a pair of the popular headphones from Bose called QuietComfort 35 or similar.
Completely without the owner’s “knowledge, their headphones are beaming out its unique name and identity on a frequency humans can’t hear.
Today, at this precise spot nearby, someone is listening in and registering all the messages being sent from nearby Bluetooth devices.
This technology is enabling phones, headsets, and speakers to talk to each other wirelessly.
Not new but ubiquitous.
Hey, nowadays your car is also geared with these bluetooth capabilities.
Researchers have shown over 10 million intercepted Bluetooth messages within a 24-hour period in a capital city in Europe.
The number might seem high, but it only reflects the almost continuous exchange of messages sent via Bluetooth.
In short, the messages show that:
At least products with Bluetooth transmitters were uniquely recognised at least 24 hours apart.
At least1500 headphones could be tracked in the dataset for longer than 24 hours.
Popular headphones models from Bose, Bang & Olufsen, Jabra, Sennheiser and JBL can be tracked over longer periods of time.
The data were collected by researchers that traveled by bike with a Bluetooth receiver.
The first couple of trips were used to test the device and the procedures, and then they endeavored a 200-kilometer-long trip over 14 days.
The antenna picked up Bluetooth messages within a radius of 100 meters line of sight.
To Bose, the researcher said a car would have given better results in terms of radius.
The reason some digital devices can be tracked over time, is because they don’t change something called their MAC address on regular intervals.
These are firmware i.e. hardware and built-in to electronic chips on the motherboard.
This address is making each Bluetooth device unique, and is used so products can communicate with each other.
For people who are in a vulnerable situation, this is especially scary.
This shows that it doesn’t help to just change your phone number.
Somebody could just drive around and search for MAC addresses to fridges, laptops, smart TVs, and headsets.
The last couple of years, more devices have begun hiding and frequently changing their unique identifiers on a regular basis.
One of the reasons phones began changing MAC addresses, was because the NSA infamous whistleblower Snowden’s revelations were showing that the NSA were mapping individual persons’ movement by tracking the MAC addresses of their Smartphone.
There are several reasons why a device might be trackable over time.
To a certain extent, some of it is because there are different Bluetooth standards, and only newer versions allow for frequently changing the MAC address.
Also, there are no requirements forcing manufacturers to change this address at regular intervals.
Last year, some European manufacturers of headphones with bluetooth capabilities reported that the companies were tracking Bluetooth messages to measure travel time on several sections of public roads.
They ended these measurements after EU’s GPRS regulations, but similar systems are still in use by law enforcement to measure time through airport security.
Several of the headphones which could be tracked over time are for sale in electronics stores, but according to two of the manufacturers NRK have spoken to, these models are being phased out.
Older devices, such as phones and tablets, would not recognise the headphones if they changed MAC addresses, according to experts – hmmm.
This would heavily diminish the user experience” since the user had to reconnect the devices on every use.
JBL confirms through a spokesperson from the owner-company Harman that the specific product uses Bluetooth Classic.
Here is what 5G wireless technology is actually about – making it feasible for telecommunications providers to deliver profitable services over their wireless networks.
4G LTE made running their radio access networks (RAN) too expensive.
Compared with 5G, 4G consumes too many resources, requires too much human oversight, and to borrow a phrase best uttered by Ella Fitzgerald, runs too darn hot.
The promise of 5G is that it cuts costs.
Realising this promise means selling consumers and businesses on 5G as an ideal; well before 4G LTE (which ironically stood for “Long-Term Evolution”) was originally due to expire.
5G requires a tremendous capital investment, not only in retrofitting existing base stations but also in constructing a denser mesh of smaller, cooler towers, and laying the network of fiber optic cable that connects them.
For Telco’s to afford that investment, they have to sell consumers and businesses on the 5G ideal, well before it can effectively be demonstrated, let alone realized.
They’re all pitching a service that has yet to go live.
To consumers, 5G is being marketed as a higher quality-of-service option for media-rich, multiparty communications.
To enterprises, 5G represents an alternative route to cloud data centers and global business services.
Both service classes are being pitched not so much as eventualities as inevitabilities.
Several years into the 5G transition already, there remain open questions and unresolved issues.
Most importantly, some services with the “5G” moniker are live now, or at least available in some early form, and consumers are searching for that much-promised value.
Also: 5G reinvented: The longer, rougher road toward ubiquity
The first stage of the 5G Wireless platform is here now, for users of 5G devices in many metropolitan areas.
5G was designed to co-exist with previous generations of wireless communications equipment, particularly 4G LTE.
5G’s principal purpose is to enable telecommunications service providers (“Telco’s”) the ability to offer a wider variety of higher-bandwidth services, on newly allocated spectrum.
Those services are not available everywhere yet, especially in North America, but the platform is being put in place now.
If you use a 4G cellular phone today, it may be operating on a hybrid 4G/5G network at 4G frequencies.
The biggest promise of 5G for consumers is this: Media transfer and data transaction speeds comparable to wired Ethernet networks across the country, and at boosted speeds in areas where the topology and service infrastructure support the necessary technology.
Once all of 5G’s components are fully deployed and operational, you will not need any kind of wire or cable to deliver communications or even entertainment service to your mobile device, to any of your fixed devices (HDTV, security system, smart appliances), or your automobile.
If everything works, 5G would be the optimum solution to the classic “last mile” problem: delivering complete digital
connectivity from the tip of the carrier network to the customer, without having to drill another hole through the wall.
With so many technologies under the 5G umbrella – home broadband, office broadband, home television, Internet of Things, in-vehicle communication, as well as mobile phone – there’s no guarantee that, when it comes time, any consumer will choose the same provider for each one unless that consumer is willing to sign a contract beforehand.
That’s why Telco’s are stepping up their 5G branding efforts now, including rolling out preliminary 4G upgrades with 5G monikers and reintroducing the whole idea of 5G to consumers as a fuzzy, cloudy, nebulous entity that encapsulates a sci-fi-like ideal of the future.
For Telco’s; the makers of transmitter, radio, and antenna equipment; and the producers and providers of data networking services, their reality has been this: Customer and enterprise demands on the current wireless network cannot be met with the 4G LTE generation – perhaps in the near future, and already in countries such as Japan, several years past.
In these densely populated regions of the world, according to operators there, maintaining the equipment that supports 4G and 3G Wireless generates more expenses than they earn in revenue.
Service providers desperately need an infrastructure that enables a sustainable business model, through the use of durable, reliable, manageable, affordable equipment.
They must meet these new customer demands for quality and availability of service, without succumbing to accelerated technological obsolescence or the unpredictable whims of the global economy.
The whole point of “Gs” in wireless standards, originally, was to emphasize the ease of transition between one wireless system of delivery and a newer one — or at least make that transition seem reasonably pain-free. (Not that any transition has ever been a trip to the fair.)
5G entails a set of simultaneous revolutions, all of which would have to go off without a hitch . . . or at least without any further hitches: Once complete, the 5G transition plan would constitute an overhaul of communications
infrastructure unlike any other in history.
Imagine if, at the close of the 19th century, the telegraph industry had come together in a joint decision to implement a staged transition to fax.
About 20 odd years ago I de-commissioned telex services in Telecom Fiji (taking up the entire 5th floor of the old GPO building – Ganilau Rd side) – only 3 regional customer for an outdated civil aviation 2400 baud link!
The power bill alone was enormous!
That’s essentially the scale of the shift from 4G to 5G.
The real reason for this shift is not so much to get faster as to make the wireless industry sustainable over the long
term, as the 4G transmission scheme is approaching unsustainability faster than they thought.
Too many Netflix customers methinks!
Here’s the thing about 5G… requires closer transmitters at high power so…I’m not keen on microwaves close to me on the street.
As always, God bless and stay safe and masked in both digital and physical worlds.
- ILAITIA B. TUISAWAU is a private cybersecurity consultant. The views expressed
in this article are his and are not necessarily shared by this newspaper. Mr Tuisawau can be contacted on ilaitia@cyberbati.com
