IMEI explanation from Wikipedia:
News Article: "The Saudi government is hunting down women who flee the country by tracking the IMEI number on their cellphones":
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If you're important enough to the government and they wanna track you/ poison you the decoding factor of if they are able to or not isn't gonna be of you have telegram installed in your phone or not lol
We all carry around devices made in Communist China, devices with hardware that could literally be anything, hardware we don't understand whatsoever, that's updated yearly, but of we have a certain app downloaded or not that's how they're gonna catch us?
It's just silly...
This POV ignores a ton of nuance.
Primarily, the fact that the CCP cannot surveil us using the hardware alone. Installing CCP-backed apps like Telegram or TikTok is required before they can track & monitor a phone in real-time.
Or Google, or any of its services which you cant turn off.
Do a dig on Google's "SensorVault Database".
They can pull data on all the cellphones in a given location for the past decade.
Republicans were questioning it, then Democrats started once Roe v Wade was overturned.
And if you use Apple, well you're really screwed.
You can get pretty close to degoogling your phone on Android. GrapheneOS for one example does not allow any Google processes to run and when you use something from the Play store, it runs it sandboxed with no special permissions given to them.
But, a lot of people don't want to go through that hassle, or if they play mobile games don't want to deal with the performance hit or potential compatibility issues that may inconvenience them.
What this method does: Remove Google telemetries from your phone
What this method does not: Remove telecommunications telemetries. So, the government can still track you through that aspect.
If you want to have a phone, you're going to be tracked in some fashion. But I guess if you're so inclined, it's probably better to fight the government on a Constitutional basis rather than fighting the "muh private company terms of service" BS.
Quick edit: There are also ways permanently prevent apps from tracking you, but I'm not big on sandboxing apps on Android. I don't care so I never went down that road directly. There are more problems than being tracked and it's as inescapable as it is inexcusable.
I really like your post, but if people wont even bother reading an article for their own good, I doubt they are going look at GrapheneOS. 😟
That's ok though. One thing I've learned about this community is there are a lot of tech pedes floating around here, and we'll enjoy it.
This is not true. Lots of hardware tracking options in phones as well. In fact, so many people own phones that you can be tracked by those close to you. You can be heard without a battery. The only safety is ABSTINENCE. Any other advice of avoiding tracking is foolishness. 1984 has been here awhile pedes.
Agreed! Smart TV, Smart Oven, Smart Washer, Cars, credit/debit cards, buying online, google maps, etc. They have satellite technology that can look at the land and see what was there thousands of years ago. I’ve seen several videos on this. They have found Viking sites, the site of a lighthouse in Ancient Greece. Unless you are living in a cave or underground they know where you are. Look at the cameras in stores, streets and probably at many businesses.