The Spy in Your Cell Phone

Raise your hand if you have a love/hate relationship with your cell phone.

*raises hand*

While having a cell is a great convenience (I have a cheapo Tracfone), they are expensive. And insecure. I’ve known for a long time that cell phone transmissions are insecure– they are truly radio transmissions, and can be intercepted and received by persons other than the ones making and receiving the phone call. And it’s illegal for anyone to tap into and record phone conversations– except for government entities, like the FBI. They do it all the time, without a warrant.

I did not know that spyware is readily available on the Internet, and is being used by crooks to stalk and spy on people. There’s a revealing video at YouTube called Tapping Your Cell Phone that’s quite an eye-opener. The embedding function is disabled for the video, but you can view it at the YouTube website. The video is some kind of cheesy 20/20 or Dateline show– it’s very sensational and overdone. But the basic point is true: your cell phone calls can (and probably are being) monitored, whether by accident by some radio aficionado, or by a stalker, or by the FBI. Cell phones are not safe and secure means of communication- don’t be fooled.

With all this technology, and a good deal of it becoming more personal for us and to us, we really need to remember that it is a weakness. Sure, it’s so convenient; but all this communication technology and other stuff like RFID and barcode scanner technology that lists and monitors our goods and food is a weakness– it’s digital information that is easily tampered with, easily malfunctioning, and easily monitored. It can be used against us. This YouTube video never comes out and say HOW spyware is installed on a cell phone, but it is implied that a hacker has to get access to your phone to install the software. I would also assume that some of those ringtones and other junk you can download into your phone may have spyware. And Bluetooth-enabled phones don’t need any installed software on the phone for spying on them.

So does this mean I am going to ditch my Tracfone? No. I’ll still have it; I use it for emergencies and the convenience outweighs the threats. Here are some ways to secure your cell phone:

• Never leave your cell phone laying around, where someone can tamper with it.
• Remove the battery.
• Remove the SIM card.
• Place the cell phone in a foil bag or wrapper. This is a little extreme, and it means you cannot receive phone calls as well as make them until you remove the phone fromthe foil; but it’s a great way to block all radio transmissions and a way to block your movement.
• Shutting off the cell phone does little. The FBI, for example, is able to activate the speaker to your phone even though your phone may be turned off.
• Place the cell phone in a ziploc bag. Sounds are distorted through the plastic. This is a great way to still have your phone on and you are able to hear it ring, but a hacker cannot hear your non-phone conversations.
• And one final bit of trivia for you: did you realize that cell phone capability on airplanes was non-existent before the 9/11 incident? How could all those passengers have made cell phone calls to their loved ones if airlines hadn’t permitted cell phone calls back then??

Thanks to WXPNews for the link to the video.