Ukraine Tracks Protesters Through Cellphones

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/22/world/europe/ukraine-protests.html?smid=tw-share&_r=1

by eu22 • 13 years ago

73 31 13 years ago

I couldn't image getting this text: “Dear subscriber, you are registered as a participant in a mass disturbance.”

Puts a bit more focus on the reach available to anyone via my reliance on tech to "always be reachable". Good when my friends/family/customers need me but horrible when in the hands of bad actors.

ommunist3• 13 years ago

Well, this only proves how technologically backward the Ukraine is comparing to the US or the UK. Over here protesters can be tracked through cellphones before they even know they are going to become protesters.

errorrrr2• 13 years ago

nope,I think that's was just to add some pressure on protesters. Telecom companies even told that security forces was use fake cells to broadcast those messages

ommunist3• 13 years ago

Dude, thinking is not going to change what is going on there. EU wants the civil war in Ukraine, its organisation is paid. "Protesters" are just per-hour hired guys, professional street muscles. Germany wants half of Ukraine. And it always wanted. There is nothing you can do about it.

And poor security forces are the guys who are ordered to wipe "protesters" to keep Ukraine whole body and not becoming Sudan with Russian winter. I can only pray they succeed. Winters are harsh in Kiev.

strathmeyer• 13 years ago

The website says that I have already read my 10 free articles this month and need to pay money to read this one. This has been happening a lot with HackerNews links for me. Do I have a virus, or are you supposed to be rich to post here?

superuser23• 13 years ago

The New York Times is professional journalism. You don't need to be rich to afford $3.75/week. This is about $200/yr, on the order of the price of a print subscription. Working class families have been reading newspapers for decades.

Occasionally we find that professional, full-time newsrooms produce better content than the blogosphere. Producing that content took a staff of educated, full-time professionals with families and mortgages. I don't find it particularly offensive that people who regularly consume their output are expected to help fund their salaries so they can keep producing.

psykovsky• 13 years ago

Of course, because digital edition has distribution costs just like printed editions.

zzzcpan4• 13 years ago

But I don't like nytimes and almost never read their articles, just looking if it's of any interest to me, because it was posted here.

zzzcpan4• 13 years ago

Sometimes it works in private window. But I agree, this is ridiculous, I cannot access most of the links to nytimes either, especially blog ones, even in private window.

huckleberryfinn• 13 years ago

Just add this script as a bookmarklet (drag it to your bookmark bar) and click it whenever you get a paywall message:

javascript:%20window.location%20=%20window.location.protocol%20+%20'//'%20+%20window.location.hostname%20+%20window.location.pathname%20+%20'?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes';

PS: Support journalism if you have the money to do so!

MrZongle2• 13 years ago

Find the appropriate extension/add-on for your browser (assuming you're using a desktop version) and kill all your cookies from nytimes.com.

Repeat whenever you get the 10-article notice.

Edit: it should go without saying, but... if you find yourself doing this often, consider purchasing a subscription so this service can remain online.

smnrchrds• 13 years ago

During protests after 2009 Iran presidential election there was a lot of concern that the government will use this sort of technology to find protesters. Some people advised that one should remove the battery altogether near protest centers, because putting the cell phone in airplane or even turning it off wouldn't prevent the telecommunication companies from tracking it. The reason they provided was simple: if it doesn't transmit any data while it's turned off, how does it say a different message to the caller when the called number is turned off vs when battery is removed.

I mostly forgot about it until I saw this article. Anyone here care to explain if this is true?

conductor• 13 years ago

When you are turning off the cell phone it sends a signal to the operator (graceful shut down) so the operator knows that you turned off the phone. When you remove the battery the phone has no time to send a message to the operator about the phone going offline so the operator doesn't know for sure whether it's turned off or it is out of the towers range at this moment.

Of course this doesn't mean that they can't track turned off phones, it's still technically possible (while the battery is there).

Crito• 13 years ago

It would also presumably mean that the government could compile a list of cellphones that turned off during the protests, while not located at but rather near the protests.

To a sane government, this information wouldn't be of much use. To a crazed paranoid government going on purges and witchhunts, this could be all the information they 'need' to find somebody suspect.

Of course if you pull the battery, they would also notice the phone dropping off the network (though it would be unclear what the cause was). To a crazed government, the difference might not be too important.

If you are ever in the sort of situation where any of this might become a concern, I recommend leaving the phone at home, sitting comfortably on your couch, turned on with the TV on. Of course this precludes using the phone in an emergency, so 'burner' phones with removable batteries may become valued.

pjc50• 13 years ago

The baseband can lie about the phone being off. So the phone has a blank screen but is still phoning home.

dobbsbob2• 13 years ago

There's also state spyware like FinSpy that makes it seem like your phone is being turned off, or that airplane mode is activated but it's not so they can track you and listen in. Your baseband can also be sent silent sms for precise tracking, or sent commands to auto answer and turn on the mic without you ever knowing. Phones can also be bricked this way if the goal is just shutting down communication. Your carrier can also be coerced into OTA updating the SIM to broadcast your location, intercept voice, or programmed to use rogue BTS set up by police instead of regular towers. Welcome to the dystopian future here's your portable state spying device

coldtea• 13 years ago

As if only Ukraine does that. How about OWS protesters?

Mikeb85• 13 years ago

When the US does it = good.

When a country we don't agree politically with does it = bad.

Likewise protesters attacking police with Molotov cocktails, charging their lines with farm equipment and torching police vehicles would elicit a fairly strong reaction from any Western government, yet the Ukrainian government is demonized...

dobbsbob2• 13 years ago

Rogue BTS/stingray. Ukraine needs to set up something similar to the decentralized Athens community network so protesters can turn on airplane mode and remove sim cards which will work for a while until they jam it. Note how every government during sustained protests resorts to hiring criminal hooligans to randomly assault people wonder if they will be given a list of subscribers to go visit like Bahrain did when doctors were dragged out of their houses and beaten for having their cell radios tracked to underground hospitals to treat injured protesters.

excellence24• 13 years ago

Of course their top 3 cellphone providers had no knowledge of this... (our American companies said the same thing). They probably got the cellphone data from the NSA. (For a small fee of course, added to our black budget.)

This is interesting though and something I think we should consider if we Americans ever get the courage to stand up to our government for it's abuses of power. It semi-happened with Occupy but they were barking up the wrong tree. You can only force a private bank/companies hand with the power of government. They can stand out their all day and do whatever, but it would be easier if a law or resolution were passed.

How do you know if someone at a protest is a 'plant' whose job is too incite violence so as to show the protest as negative regardless of their stated goals.

I was thinking of a system maybe, that would definitely be reputation based, but one where you could verify someones identity while still maintaining a certain level of privacy. Maybe something similar to how bitcoin works. Everybody could have a public key that anyone at the protest could scan if needed and say 'ya this person's legit, they have XXX amount of reputation, we are connected by XX people, etc' or 'woah, who are you? you have -XXX reputation and no one here knows you'... but this idea needs to be developed further...

When i put my 'evil' cap on and think how I would use the data if I had all the data in the world and I wanted to stop people protesting me, I would use those kinds of cellphone SMS messages to intimidate people in the area and I would want them to be divided by those who want to achieve revolution nonviolently and those who would easily engage in violence if given the opportunity. Taking it a step further, I would use that system the NSA made that tracks internet browsing history especially for porn, to threaten people that their data might be 'leaked' if they continue to protest. Or perhaps sent messages and calls can be 'rerouted' to different people to cause confusion in their communications. Or perhaps I'd use a few 'if-then' simulations to put the right police officer in front of the right protestor so that violence would be most likely to occur. evil cap off.

The rest of the world seems to be taking the lead in standing up to corruption, but when America catches up, I want us to lead by example of how it should efficiently and safely be done.

Ukraine Tracks Protesters Through Cellphones

Related Stories