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Australian Malls To Track Shoppers By Their Phones
Fluffeh writes "Australian shopping centers will monitor customers' mobile phones to track how often they visit, which stores they like and how long they stay. One unnamed Queensland shopping center is next month due to become the first in the nation to install receivers that detect unique mobile phone radio frequency codes to pinpoint location within two meters."
leave it at home.
...Australian shops are so overpriced that it's getting to the point where they're not going to have any customers to track.
worldmobilenet.com -- World Prepaid Wireless Internet plans
Great, thanks. Now I know next time I go shopping in Oz I will pop the battery out of my phone.
WTF is up with companies these days who think they can track everywhere you go and everything you do? If this is not privacy invasion, I don't know what is. Pretty soon every child born will get their global tracking implant right after birth so they can be tracked throughout their life.
Please repeat, 1984 is NOT an instruction manual.
bet you it's a Westfield - probably Chermside...
First the payment of parking, next tracking, finally IC brain implants.
This isn't strictly an Australian thing, so you'll need to just get rid of the phone. A prominent, international retailer that I work with is using a service similar to this now. It tracks the unique addresses of the phones of the people in the store as well as the ones just outside of the store. It helps to measure conversion percentages (e.g. how many people that walk in the store actually buy something) and could be used to give an indicator of store front appeal (e.g. phone ID xxx has been walking by the store everyday for a week, but came in the store after the price cuts were indicated in the store window). Finally, if the tracker is installed at multiple stores, it will note if the same person browses at one store and purchases at another (e.g. finds product at the full price store in Manhattan, but buys at the outlet shop in Paramus).
This isn't really that new, just a new approach to more targeted marketing. Retailers have been counting you as you walk through the door, collecting your name, address, and purchasing habits for years. Some customers even volunteer their information by signing up for club cards and rewards cards.
Sadly it isn't even for anything as noble as the government forcing a broken utopia on the masses like 1984 propsed. This is pure greed on the part of the companies running the shops and the mall management.
All this technology so they can position the ad stands and displays in a certain way to extract cash from the gullible who are too impatient to wait to buy XYZ product. Sure have a look in the mall, make a note and go home and buy it half the price online!
Advertising is the vomit that stains modern living!
"Ms Baddeley said mobile phone monitoring, already operating in the UK and US, would help the struggling retail sector develop marketing campaigns and identify the best mix of shops in centres."
I'd love to know where, so I can avoid the places like the fucking plague.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
Cameras have a hard time IDing people, but this technique will let the shop owners connect the data of multiple shoppings to one person.
So, taking a picture of a public servant working in a public place with the photographer and camera in plain sight is illegal wiretap but snooping personal details from a mobile phone surreptitiously and without notice is perfectly OK. Is it just me or is it OK for the government and corporations to do anything they want to ordinary people but its not OK for ordinary people to do anything but consume and pay interest on their debts?
Smartphones weren't intended for fart apps only
The developer of the software behind this lists a sample of the data they can collect.
While I can one of the first to be concerned about private data becoming available for marketing purposes, I don't mind as much if the data is not linked to me personally. That is what seems to be the case here: the mall can track my whereabouts as long as they do not know it's me (by linking my credit card purchases to my phone for instance). If this information is gathered in this (anonymous) way, I do not mind as much. If they can link the data to me personally, I shall be bothered...
And yes, Westfield is the name of the company testing this software right now.
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees. -- Willam Blake
Section 7 - Telecommunications not to be intercepted
A person shall not:
a communication passing over a telecommunications system.
This seems like a pretty clear violation to me. (note, that even though it is data traffic between the phone and the cell and not voice, it still violates the above.)
Federal Privacy Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim said the Privacy Act applied only if the information collected identified individuals.
Hmm, let's see if they qualify.
Path Intelligence national sales manager Kerry Baddeley stressed that no mobile phone user names or numbers could be accessed.
Sounds good so far
One unnamed Queensland shopping centre is next month due to become the first in the nation to fit receivers that detect unique mobile phone radio frequency codes to pinpoint location within two metres.
Hmm. That's close, but still doesn't identify you. Looks ok at this point.
It's much less intrusive or invasive than existing people-counting methods, for instance CCTV cameras and number plate monitoring.
Ahhhhhh, but when combining cell tracking (to 2 metres) and CCTV's, you are now tracking identified individuals!
It seems to track IMEI numbers being broadcast by mobile phones.
Not PII (personally identifying info) unless they merge the data with mobile carrier's data, which I find unlikely (yes, that's my naÃvite making a rare showing).
I'm not sure this is worse than the cameras that they already use to track shoppers' movements, which coupled with facial recognition software could be more invasive.
However, I don't care for it and now have yet one more excuse to *not* go shopping at major retailers. Hopefully more people will adopt my non-consumer lifestyle, but I highly doubt that (whew, that naÃvite didn't last long).
I could just put my mobile phone in a Faraday cage-case, although I guess that would defeat the purpose of carrying the mobile in the first place. Damn these cunning shopping centres.
While I totally agree with you, the lawyers of the mall might not. They probably will come up with some lame excuse, quoting a dictionary that:
intercept
verb
[with object]
obstruct (someone or something) so as to prevent them from continuing to a destination:
intelligence agencies intercepted a series of telephone callsI intercepted Edward on his way to work
chiefly Physicscut off or deflect (light or other electromagnetic radiation):
a second prism can be swung in to intercept the light beam
Mathematics(of a line or surface) mark or cut off (part of a space , line , or surface).
source: http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/intercept
They will probably argue that they do not prevent the signal from reaching its destination
We' had this in the UK for at least two years (See http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/05/20/tracking_phones/). I know the system has been in place since early days in the Southampton WestQuay and Portsmouth Gunwharf Quays centres. The aerials are not exactly subtle once you start looking for them.
I know for a fact that this is used at least in my country (not Australia). Based on Bluetooth technology the data is anonymous. I think this is the company, not the UK based one, so there are multiple solutions on this and they are already implemented. http://www.rapidbluesolutions.com/solutions
Does not mean you must.
This goes for about anything you can think of, not just the invasion of privacy.
Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth, UK has been doing this since about 2008 (not that this makes it in any way ok).
Some blog
BBC News video
Which is why the Act (Sect 6) explicitly defines intercept to mean:
(1) For the purposes of this Act, but subject to this section, interception of a communication passing over a telecommunications system consists of listening to or recording, by any means, such a communication in its passage over that telecommunications system without the knowledge of the person making the communication.
So all they need to do is put up signs saying they are doing it, and it's fine.
Having worked for telcos many years, I know there is no way to get detailed information from a cell phone without hacking it or getting the user to install a tracking app. I'm actually surprised that they even found a way to identify a phone by passively monitoring it's signals, and am quite curious as to how they accomplish this.
This is no more intrusive than the sensor belts used to monitor traffic flow on a highway, and is not worth panicing over.
Go back to worrying about Crackbook cookies -- those really do track you as an identified individual.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
He says on an American website.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
If you had read even the summary you would have known that they do not violate that provision.
They're tracking phones, no more no less. Just tracking where a phone is, using the radio signals sent by the phone. They don't listen to what the communication is, just keep track of where the signal comes from, and as such where the phone is. It's not even necessary for people to talk on the phone, just having it on is all they need for this.
...maybe they'll be able to track me walking 100 yards out of my way to avoid the damn Dead Sea Salt salespeople, and will eject them from their malls.
From the article:
One unnamed Queensland shopping centre is next month due to become the first in the nation to fit receivers that detect unique mobile phone radio frequency codes to pinpoint location within two metres.
how do they know the radio frequency codes without actually reading the signal? Communication in this sense means the phone signal, not the actual talking on the phone. It doesnt matter whether you are actually talking on the phone.
None of this technical mumbo-jumbo is going on. The gov is hiring 'roos to track shoppers to lure them to secluded spots where the drop bears can mug them. And they haven't even gotten around to placing the eucalyptus tree bombs yet. Don't even mention the Commando Platypus Squads... shudder.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
In Germany it's illegal to use an open, unencrypted Wifi 'cause it's considered interception of a transmission by a 3rd party, and some Corporation want's to intercept encrypted GSM Communications? This would be illegal in allmost every civilized country on the planet, isn't in in Autralia?!
The technique is nothing new. Already 3 years ago there was an article about this.
I fear this is already widely used in some countries without people even knowing.
I can't help thinking about Minority Report, where the shopping centre's billboards scanned Tom Cruise's irises to adapt their advertisements to suite his recent shopping behaviour. I guess we're still lucky with only phone monitoring; we can see were it's going, though...
"telecommunications network" means a system, or series of systems, for carrying communications by means of guided or unguided electromagnetic energy or both, but does not include a system, or series of systems, for carrying communications solely by means of radiocommunication."
(my emphasis)
Source: http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/taaa1979410/s5.html#telecommunications_network
That's why /.'s rating system is for the ass. Why his score is 1 and not +5?
Anyway, even if you do not read the signals from the phone, it is intercepting anyway. You have to receive the signals from the phone somehow to get the position, so it is intercepting. There is also a definition of all terms used.
"communication" includes conversation and a message, and any part of a conversation or message, whether:
(a) in the form of: (i) speech, music or other sounds;(ii) data;(iii) text;(iv) visual images, whether or not animated; or (v) signals; or (b) in any other form or in any combination of forms.
So just a signal is a communication passing over a telecommunications system as defined by law. It is not necessary that the signal is decoded.
http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/taaa1979410/s7.html
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
I wonder if it's too late to switch back to the old pager.
I don't really get it why they invest millions in CCTV cameras, face recognitions, and now in tracking of mobile phones. I'm pretty sure it is not to get more customers to the most shopping centres.
Because if they wanted more customers, all they have to do is a) extend the opening time to up 10pm (I was in Sydney and it was a real surprise to me that most shopping centres close at 8pm or earlier. If you work up until 5pm, then you have 3 hours max. for the mall. Or like me who study until 4:30pm, then go home, it's 6pm, then go to mall it's 6:30pm, then you have 1,5 hour in the mall. So the big buildings for the shopping malls are mostly empty the whole day).
And b) drop the prices.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
Basic rule: If you don't need to broadcast your location, don't. Otherwise someone'll use it.
One way to fix this is to change mobile networks from having the handsets always signed in to the nearest tower to, say, listening on a much wider range pager-like frequency for a wake-up signal. That can also be abused, eventually, but is more work.
Of course, then the next step for the mall is to use facial recognition or tracking you by the unique signature of your jeans (the seams and stonewashing makes a natural barcode of sorts, among other things) or make the parking pass RFIDed (like they already track every traveler through an active RFID tag handed out for the duration of your stay at certain airports) or simply track you by RFID tags left in purchases or even that happen to still be in the clothes you wear. It can be done, so it will be done, unless legislation says they can't. That doesn't stop those who don't care about the law applying to them, though (criminals, spy agencies, most federal US law enforcement), so it's still better to only deploy those systems that're sufficiently secured against leaking info like that.
Designing such systems could be a hacktivist's calling, as corporates won't without being forced to somehow.
I knew retailers were desperate to try and retain shoppers (A lot of Australians have started purchasing items like clothing and electronics overseas for half the price) but this isn't going to help bring anyone back into their stores.
Maybe if the whole supply chain wasn't about gouging consumers with large mark-ups at every point in supply maybe Australians wouldn't be shopping online nearly as much.
Section 7 - Telecommunications not to be intercepted
A person shall not:
(a) intercept;
(b) authorize, suffer or permit another person to intercept; or
(c) do any act or thing that will enable him or her or another person to intercept;
a communication passing over a telecommunications system.
Its a corporation that's intercepting communications, not a person.
You think corporations dont get special treatment under the law... what are you simple or something.
It's very easy to get around... toggle flight mode or similar every now and then when you're in the afflicted shopping mall. Do this around unpopular shops, and suddenly this system makes them look much more popular (more unique visitors) than they really are.
You might miss a few calls while toggling, but lets face it, this is /. You weren't going to get any phone calls anyway ;)
In Australia, the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979 explicitly prohibits this activity. Section 7 - Telecommunications not to be intercepted
A person shall not:
a communication passing over a telecommunications system.
A lawyer will argue that air (in which the radio waves travel inside the shopping center) is hardly a telecommunication system.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
IANAL, and it's been a while since I read the relevant acts, but that particular section refers to telecommunications, specifically listening in to phone calls that get relayed over radio links. It dates back to a time when there were unencrypted phone links to remote areas, and to ships in Australian waters. (Yes, you could phone a ship if they had the equipment and you knew how.) I'm quite sure they'd argue that by not decrypting the voice content, they technically aren't intercepting telecommunications. I'm also quite sure they'd get a court to agree with them, given the intent of the original act.
Now a more productive line of attack on this might be to look at other sections regarding listening to transmissions not intended for you. Australia has some of the most permissive laws regarding radio communications in the world, I used to use a scanner to legally listen to all sorts of things which I could be prosecuted for in other countries. However, although the law said I could listen to anything that was transmitted that wasn't part of a telecommunications link, I was not permitted to profit from any information I received that was not intended for my use. (Where the term profit isn't restricted to monetary gain.) This was what they used to use to smack down tow truck operators and serial pests who listened to police transmissions to turn up to accidents back in the 80's. They'd have a pretty hard time arguing that they aren't achieving some kind of gain from listening in, the question would be whether the phones are broadcasting in a manner intended for anyone, or transmitting to a specific recipient. You could argue that they're only aiming for the phone towers belonging to the company they're contracted to use, or you could argue that they're broadcasting to everybody and waiting for a response. Depends on how clever your lawyers are.
After the last break-in into my home, I setup a cron job on my home server to scan for any phones with active bluetooth service every few minutes.
Surprisingly, enough people have their phones configured to be detectable.
It just might help the next time.
And I guess it is not illegal to do this, since all this simple setup does is scan and log any actively replying devices. I see no harm in that.
The same would also work to 'sample' and analyse visitors' movements in a shopping-mall. Or who visits some board of directors when using a directional antenna pointed at a building from some distance.... http://www.tomsguide.com/us/how-to-bluesniper-pt1,review-408.html
And one of the tricks of the trade in some companies' internal restaurant is to scan for phones and see which (other) consultancy firms are also hired. Don't you just love naming conventions?
Gatwick airport here in the UK is in the process of implementing this. Ostensibly to enable them to provide services such as expedited check-in and to notify you when to go the gates, but it's really to target marketing as you wander around the shops.
Incidentally, probably like many airports, Gatwick is essentially a mall with a runway. The operators make money from parking, retail and the fees airlines pay to use the runway - in that order.
Pair it with face recognition from cameras and with enough samples, you should be able to pair the face of the owner with the signal of the phone.
Is it intercept? I bet the service is provided by the telecom, not intercept.
And is it communication?
IANAL but the mobile system is connected to the landline system (series of systems) which together make up the telecommunications network. I would conclude therefore that the mobile telephone network is not excluded by this provision. An example of an excluded system might be a taxi radio control system or air traffic control.
IANAL but one might argue that "copper wire" isn't a telecommunication system either.
But, like free space (or air as you put it) it might form part of one.
The act doesn't specify how the network is established - only that intercepting communications on it would be in contravention of Section 7 of that Act.
Same story in the UK, in 2008
How long before we get the slashdot story on a US mall trying this out?
"Given the pace of technology, I propose we leave math to the machines and go play outside." -- Calvin
If that was the case then you would be able to run any wardriver software in Oz. This is little more than wardriving, but for endpoint clients rather than base stations.
This isn't interception, it's merely noticing that a radio transmitter is active, and where it is transmitting from.
Learn to read, dumbass.
That being said, I wouldn't shop in such a mall.
So how come they're public places now???
Just make an app that will spew all kinds of fake numbers as you browse the mall. Get enough people using it and the signal to noise ratio will be far below useful.
Take phone ID's of shoplifters, use the info to aim cameras ( Location within 2 meters!) Pair face with phone, Instant 1984!
Two flaws.. First, there doesn't have to be an active 'communication' in the sense of a phone call. Switched-on is enough to detect the phone. Second, more important, is:
without the knowledge of the person making the communication
So they just put up a sign at the entrance of the mall saying 'your GSM is tracked for your convenience' and presto.
A person shall not:
---
The Act only apply to people, not corporation.
Your quote may be right, but your interpretation is incorrect.
"intercepting radio signals is specifically excluded" only applies to "a system, or series of systems, for carrying communications solely by means of radiocommunication".
A cell phone uses a "telecommunications network" that does not consist of "communications solely by means of radiocommunication", since a cell phone network includes the regular phone system, including exchanges, etc.
The exclusion given above would apply to things like ham radios, walkie-talkies, etc.
I'm glad I have a box full of cell phones that I can spoof the IMEI on by running a single command on them.
Since they are only noting frequency ranges and not necessarily inspecting the data, it's likely they have a loop hole. The lawyers might say this is the equivalent of jotting down the size and color of a bag without looking inside it.
Australian Law make this form of interception illegal.
http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/taaa1979410/
There are two types of conversations which occur which are specifically mentioned in the act.
The first is between your phone and the carriers infrastructure to enable the phone to maintain contact with the carriers infrastructure.The contract that you have with the carrier provides for this to occur.
The second occurs when you call someone.
It would appear that the purveyors of this product either can't afford a lawyer or have a really good one.
Both types of conversations are protected by the telecommunications Interceptions Act (from memory this is the specific act). Even a layman can understand the extract from the act below.
CHAPTER 2--Interception of telecommunications
PART 2-1--PROHIBITION ON INTERCEPTION OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS
7. Telecommunications not to be intercepted
PART 2-2--WARRANTS AUTHORISING THE ORGANISATION TO INTERCEPT TELECOMMUNICATIONS
In short intercept and not have a warren t then go to gaol for two years :)
...at least not yet. In the USA, we have a succinct description of this - wiretapping. It will probably happen eventually but is of a dubious legal status at the moment. Surely US retailers will be over this, but I doubt anyone wants to implement these systems until they are well-established as a legal practice, which could be expensive. Precisely how they use the signals, and how much they are decoded, will be key factors in how quickly this gets a legal stamp of approval.
This is a hacked account, for which the owner can not be held responsible.
I won't get tracked? Check out www.bvinetworks.com, I think they are the best in the industry for tracking customers.