I would like to start this article with a funny story. I was a manager with a now defunct wireless company. A woman walked in and said that she was going through a divorce. She had stated to me that she thought her soon ex husband was using her very techno son to spy on her by devices that she thought was placed in her phone. This was in the year 1999 so we know that cell phones were nowhere near advanced as they are today. I asked her why she thought this? She said because she heard voices that was not hers when she used the phone. I asked her if it was tower echo and she said no. She insisted that the son had placed a tracking device in her phone and she wanted me to take the phone apart. I had no luck talking her out of it. So I proceeded to take the phone apart. It was a Nokia so it was easy enough. When the phone was apart she saw the earpiece and said, “What’s that?” I said it was the earpiece and she said “ I don’t want that in there.” I said “ yeah, but, you need that!” She was insistent that I remove it, so I did. The next piece was the microphone, which was also removed by her demands. I put the phone back together and, of course, no one could hear anything. She was happy and left. So what is the point of the story. Paranoia is a big destroya! The voices she heard was in fact tower echo, not her son or ex honing in on her conversation. But in her state of mind she was willing to have a non-working cell phone to ease her mind.
Now I have a cousin that also is just as out there as this woman. He is wary of things that may monitor his actions. Just like people who want a prepaid phone because they think no one will trace their usage, he will not get a post paid cell phone. Wake up people!! Uncle Sam does not need you on a phone to see what you are doing. Just because you do not provide an address or a social security number does not mean you cannot be tracked. GSM phones and other phones are easily tracked by “pinging” pinging the tower for their location. The phone does not have GPS, so what. Cell phones use an old system of tracking them by an old mathematical equation called the triangular equation. Instead of satellites it uses three towers to help pinpoint your location. That’s how a cell phone 911 call is tracked for your safety.
In closing, the government has super computers that track millions of conversations every minute for key words even if you are talking to someone in your house, alley or at a sporting event. Being on a cell phone means nothing. As a matter of fact, a post-paid account has more protection for your privacy than a prepaid as it is protected by the FCC CPNI rules. And finally, what are you doing that makes you so scared anyway!!??*
Written by
-Wire Wizard-
* This article is dedicated to my cousin Dan- the real life Dale Gribble
Midway Arpt., IL